Check out the latest update video here: kzread.info/dash/bejne/rKWCqsyMlpWefZc.html

A very informative video and well produced. You have given us a lot of valuable information and plenty of food for thought. I look forward to the next instalment . Thank you.

@th3bmc

Жыл бұрын

Thank you for your feedback, really nice of you to say.

I'm considering a similar project so I will be folliwing your videos with interest. I've subscribed to keep up to date with your project. hopefully I will learn enough to attempt a similar project myself. I'm just beginning to learn about this solar thing so a lot of the stats that you provide are over my head at the moment until I catch up! Thanks for taking the time to post and share your experience.

@th3bmc

Жыл бұрын

Feel free to ask a question or two here in the comments, I'm by no means an 'expert' I've been learning and researching as I go on. two primary things to keep in mind. 1. Use opensolar.com as mentioned In the video, those guys have a really good handle on panel outputs based on angle and azimuth. 2. Might be obvious but if you're ever unsure of something call an electrician, it's not worth frying over.

This is fantastic I just had my solis 5kw inverter with 3x4.8 plyontech batteries. I'm adding the solar to my garage next year as I have a tree which needs to go but what your doing here is what I was planning to do. So seeing this I'll definitely will be doing the same as what you have done to add to my battery only storage setup

@th3bmc

Жыл бұрын

Excellent, glad my video could help.

I don't know how you did the component scroll effect, but that worked beautifully! I'd love to have captions when you're experiencing noise in your voice track if you decide not to rerecord the audio because your video was so dense with information that I didn't want to miss any of it. Also, clever use of the phone as a remote mic!

@th3bmc

Жыл бұрын

This video has closed captioning for the exact purpose of being unable to edit out background noise.

Got 10kW and have not seen an electric bill this year yet 😂

@stephenrichards5386

Жыл бұрын

How many electric bills would you have to not see to pay for the whole installation

@april7_

Жыл бұрын

@@stephenrichards5386 Now it seems about 5 years. Calculated interest rate is now 14.5%

@stephenrichards5386

Жыл бұрын

@@april7_ that would be on a 10kw installation. At 300w/panel= 33 panels I've no idea how much per panel fitted by guess £150. About £5000 plus all the control mechanism plus the new hot water system. Call it £8000 at current rates of 35p / unit that's 22900 units of electricity. Now add compound interest on £8000 at 14.5%. £16,500. Redo the pay back time. That's about 10 years. Subtract your previous consumption. Voilà A lot of guess work in there but not far out I suspect. 10% loss of power after ten years, 20% after 20 years

@jsouto77

Жыл бұрын

@@stephenrichards5386 Im not sure if I can understand your logic but can you tell me where I can safely put some money and get that 14.5% interest rate in return? ... The other way I see it is that regardless of payback time, in the end you have "something" to show for it instead of having "wasted" the 8k giving it to the electricity company. Im not going on the offensive here. This is just my logic.

@stephenrichards5386

Жыл бұрын

@@jsouto77 No it's brilliant. The taxpayer pays another taxpayer to put intermittent energy source on their roof so that the taxpayer's can pay for the power station they need to provide energy 24/7.

Nice job! I'd recommend scooting the 3 bifacial over a bit and add 2 more at 90 degrees from the three. It would complete the roof on the pergola too

@th3bmc

Жыл бұрын

I designed it the way I did to allow for rain and snow to fall between the pergola panels and the garage. I also don't need additional panels, this amount already pushes to grid after filling the batteries and it's winter.

This is close to what I want to do. I’d like to add pergola along the length of the rear of my house, and install solar panels on top of that, rather than on the roof itself. First it’ll create a nice patio space that I don’t currently have, and second it would save a lot of money for roof repair costs when it hails (I’m in Texas), and the panels need to be removed to replace the roof. 1 hail storm would cost more in panel removal and replacement, than the cost to add a pergola for housing the solar panels.

I'd love to get a carport kinda thing, and add even more solar panels The issue is planning permission however

Oh, I had not considered the advantage of bifacial panels for overcast days. If you ever get snow, be careful that the panels on the pergola do not accumulate too much weight.

Great video. Can you supply more details of how you mounted the bi facial panels on the pergola roof?

@th3bmc

Жыл бұрын

Thank you, If you search for 'Aluminum Solar Panel Z Brackets' on amazon or ebay you will find the solution.

Absolutely outstanding setup and almost exactly what I'm wanting to do so thank you for sharing. I'm curious though, and it's probably a dumb set of questions coming up, but I'll ask anyway... The inverter is grid tied, how did you wire it in? Have you only got some circuits hooked up to it, or is it able to supply the whole house intelligently? (My use case would be primarily low wattage, but could peak at say 7kw if I used the induction hob and kettle at the same time for example, or when charging the hybrid). You mentioned if you wanted to get paid for export you'd need an electrician, I'm sort of surprised you don't anyway if the inverter is hooked into your consumer unit? If you are exporting, what protection is there to cut the inverter off if the power from the grid fails? Does the inverter take care of this? Wouldn't want to be frying linesman after a storm! Love the power output from your bifacials, and how you've put them on a pergola as this would be my plan now since I'd rather not have to hire scaffolding for a roof mount! Shall be following your channel very closely, look forward to seeing the video about the BOM for batteries :) Thanks for putting this out there!

@th3bmc

Жыл бұрын

Hi Steve, thanks for your comment, it's appreciated. That's a fair chunk there and I'm answering at 2am so sorry if this makes little sense. So the inverter connects just like a normal appliance back to the consumer unit, obviously with RCD protection, I did have a new run into the garage recently which was put in by an electrician and I mentioned my plans so he put an DC leakage AC RCD in (can't for the life of me remember the proper name but that's it's function to stop DC current making it back to the house). My inverter does have a 'backup' mode also called EPS (Emergency power supply) currently I don't have this hooked up to anything but the plan is I will in the future, obviously this would be on a completely separate circuit to the mains otherwise we enter the realm you mentioned of frying some poor electrician outside the house if the grid was off. Being a grid tied inverter if there is no voltage or a drop or the frequency goes out of sync, the inverter disconnects from the mains, that's why the inverter always needs at least 2 power supplies to function. Now because I have batteries in the day if the power went out I would still have 2 power supplies, the PV and batteries, this is partially why there is a separate AC meter provided with the inverter that feeds info to the inverter over RS485, however the inverter will still switch off AC with no incoming voltage regardless of what the meter says.. With regards to the 7kW, it's a difficult one as how often do you use both the kettle and hobs at the same time? if it's every day then cost up if it's worth paying more for the bigger wattage inverter, I would think if it was even half an hour a day at current rates it would cost you 40p a day, but in all likelihood the kettle and hob being on at the same time is probably 5-10 mins at most? With regards to the inverter having to be fitted by an electrician, it's an appliance just like an oven going back to the consumer unit. if you don't feel you can make it safe then get an electrician involved but it's not a requirement. some of the manufacturers like growatt are disabling features if it's not installed and signed off by an electrician but this is more around warranty and green credits installer's can get from government incentives. Hope that S.A was useful.

@snibbo71

Жыл бұрын

Thanks for the detailed reply! I have an electrician in the family but he doesn't specifically do solar, so I might point him at your videos :) The 7kw question wasn't really one of wanting to ensure the batteries could run it, more one of making sure that the inverter would deliver what it could and top up with grid to meet the demand. I'd be looking at 3.6kw inverter like you have I suspect, as you say the times when using above that would be minimal. I'm also going to be putting a 7kw car charger on but will likely set that to run on Octopus Go. Might be cool if I could have excess solar charge the car when the house batteries are full though... Not sure how I'd do that yet :) Once again, thanks for the great series, you've inspired me to investigate this more thoroughly since you're doing exactly what I want to :) All the best and I look forward to the next one!

@th3bmc

Жыл бұрын

@@snibbo71 Thank you for your kind words. I would imagine that the electrician may vomit at some of my cabling how it is in the garage on some of the other videos. I'm learning as I go along so I imagine you will do the same. Also with regards to car charging and taking from the battery, this can 100% be done but it depends on the openness of the api's of the inverter which is decided by manufacturer. Zappi is great at that kind of thing but you can't use a CT which zappi relies on most of the time. im sure there is a IFTTT or hook in for some systems. maybe look at zappi and work your way backwards to find a compatible inverter. I know solis doesn't do it natively, but im sure some people have raspberry Pi'd the crap out of it and made it work.

Hi, might be interesting to see what you generate on ghe greydays for the pergola panels vrs the inclined roof panels. I've noted that on grey days the flatter pannel outperform the inclined ones. May be important given how many grey days you get in winter. Take care M

@th3bmc

Жыл бұрын

Yep, will be doing that once I have a good amount of days to do an average readout with plenty of data points. It is roughly showing better in evenings and mornings but inclined roof does always appear to edge out the bifacials at midday. keep in mind there are 4 on the garage roof and only 3 on the pergola.

Could I trouble you for a link to the supplier of the panels, tried Googling their name and failed!! Thanks

Hi, Can you advise where you got the mounting clamps from for the pergola? How do you find the generation laid flat compared to the garage roof? Thanks.

@th3bmc

Жыл бұрын

Mounting brackets are from ebay, 'aluminium z holder brackets'. the generation from them being flat was usable but not great, a fair deficit during mid morning and mid evening, but they did start producing sooner than the garage panels. I have since changed them to have a 15 degree angle and it helps with water runoff and generation overall.

I've moved my whole home to electricity - EV, heat pump and induction hob. My electricity usage tripled in the process, but a 6.5 kW array covers 1/3rd of my current usage. It largely covers summer usage - much of which goes into the EV. Interestingly my overall energy usage has dropped by about 75% - electric solutions are just way more efficient. I'm considering a pergola to boost my winter production. I currently use 95% of the power I generate (the house battery helps there - there are weeks in the summer I barely use grid power). But winter production is incredibly low. Daily generation of 2 - 4 kWh isn't uncommon.

@th3bmc

Жыл бұрын

Thank you for that, I would like to think I get to the same point as your setup in the coming years like induction hob and heat pump. I purposely didn't factor in the car to keep costs low and based it's capacity purely on covering the house.

@snibbo71

Жыл бұрын

I think I'll be doing the same. I won't size the system to deal with the car, but it would be nice if I can use the excess in the summer to charge the car if I'm home.

@th3bmc

Жыл бұрын

@@snibbo71 Funilly enough today we had a fair bit of sunshine for 3 hours and it filled my home batteries to 100% from 85% (imported on cheap rate from 20%), put the oil heater on and charged the car at 5amp and put 1.5kWh in the car... at this time of year that's ace, summer I will be ABC - always be charging

Are the panels on the pergola mounted completely flat or at an angle? I ask this cause I think they are mounted flat which means less power per panel, but also, and you can see that already in the beginning of the video, rain water stays on the panels. Same will be the case with snow which will result in ever smaller power outputs.

@th3bmc

Жыл бұрын

Hi, this video answers your questions kzread.info/dash/bejne/iGRo2cOfj8qalc4.html

@demus8757

Жыл бұрын

@@th3bmc Thanks.

Can you provide some link for the Bifacials ?

@th3bmc

Жыл бұрын

www.itstechnologies.shop/products/460w-bifacial-ja-solar-72-cell-mono-perc-double-glass-half-cell-silver-frame

I was just wondering if you had to let your grid know about exporting ?? I am looking to start my own project

@th3bmc

Жыл бұрын

not sure which country you're in, but in the UK no you don't as long as it's under 6kWp for the array. If you want export payments then you need an MCS certificate of which a part of that process informs various bodies you are a micro generator. * The above is subject to change.

@quittrn

Жыл бұрын

@The BMC I'm in UK and currently with British gas and was wondering if I need to let them know that I might export or does grid need to know about it. Was thinking about even simpler setup with micro inverter for now

@th3bmc

Жыл бұрын

@@quittrn ahh fair enough, nope you don't need to let them know. recommend if you dont already have a smart meter or one that shows export to have one just so you can see what your sending to grid

@quittrn

Жыл бұрын

@@th3bmc thanks very informative 👍 great video keep up good content

@th3bmc

Жыл бұрын

Thank you for the nice feedback 😊. good luck with your project

Great content 👌 If my solar panel array is 5kw, with 5kw Hybrid inverter and 15kw pylontec batteries, would I need to get approval from the DNO?

@th3bmc

Жыл бұрын

Ooo that's a good question! I did some digging online and this is on nakedsolar's website 'If you want to install more than 4kWp then a pre-application is necessary. The pre-application process involves a lot more work for the installer so many installers have been in the habit of putting customers off the idea of having a larger system' Link to page: tinyurl.com/yph8sx9r

@th3bmc

Жыл бұрын

If you already have 5kw PV then I don't believe that the rest would be an issue.

@WindyJAMiller

Жыл бұрын

If you want help doing it, let me know, I do charge but nothing crazy.

@abukhal986

Жыл бұрын

@@WindyJAMiller sure, I could do with help.

@WindyJAMiller

Жыл бұрын

@@abukhal986 drop me a DM

Why did you not got for the 6kw solis? My understanding is that you can set it as g98 as to get started and move on from there without having to get another inverter if you decide to size up specially on batteries since the extra charging power will be handy to charge the batteries in the winter time on a cheap electricity rate 4 hour slot such as octopus go. Am I off the mark here?

@th3bmc

Жыл бұрын

Thanks for commenting, I'm already on intelligent octopus 🐙 and charging the batteries at cheap rate. The higher the inverter capacity the higher the voltage you need for generation from solar usually, if you check out this generation of inverters datasheet the 3.6kw has the same 'startup' specs as the 3kw, if you go above 3.6kw the requirements tend to go up. my system was designed to be small footprint, if I had more panels I would have gone for higher kw inverter. this way it's more efficient in winter. *I commented again below* One final point is my max average power draw tends to be when cooking food which goes roughly to 3kw so this one covers my needs, there are two exceptions to this, when I charge the car in which I dont want to be pulling from thr battery anyway and the second my hot water tank pulls 3.4kw, so when that's on it pulls the rest of the house load from the grid, but both these two things I do at cheap rate. Sorry it's an S.A but it's a good question and im glad you asked it.

@th3bmc

Жыл бұрын

So I had a look at the datasheet, link is at the bottom of this comment. I must have gotten this model mixed up with another, the pv start up requirements are the same across all this model type. So you can ignore what I said about pv start up voltage. This actually makes the 4.6kw model make more sense for my system as it would cover any of the random high load occurrences for not much extra cost. thanks @jsouto77 that's food for thought 🤔 and I may look at upgrading during the current RMA process I'm going through if they are open to it. www.ginlong.com/Uploads/file/Solis_datasheet_RHI-(3-6)K-48ES-5G_AUS.pdf

@jsouto77

Жыл бұрын

@@th3bmc Thanks, I was just wondering thats all and not meaning to criticise. I personally just starting with batteries (3x us5000) and inverter. I know you have your discharge rate covered but was just thinking of the charge rate in case you decide to go up on batteries. Your setup interests me as you are going nearly the same route as me including my future solar deployment. Thanks :)

@th3bmc

Жыл бұрын

@@jsouto77 No It's a good comment and made me question a decision I made that in hindsight makes the 4.6kw look like a better option. In terms of battery charging, I'm actually having to slow the rate down, currently set to 22amp because I don't want 100% battery when the sun is shining around midday which barzagli has been the case the last two days. drops to about 80% from full by 10am then fully charged about 12:20pm then the solar generation is wasted. With your 3 batteries and depending on your pv array size I would have thought you will need to do the same and reduce the charging time window or charging amp's. 14.25kWh total capacity, 90% is 12.825kWh ÷ 4 hours = 3.20kW for full battery in your octo window. 66.6amps. If you can get onto intelligent octopus 🐙 or 'octo go faster' and have that extra hour so 2.56kW is needed for the 5 hour window. 53.3 amps for your 3 US5000's to go from 10-100%

@jsouto77

Жыл бұрын

@@th3bmc Thaks for that. Ive just renewed go @7.5p off peak. Intelligent is no good for me at the moment as it can b e a bit of a faf and unreliable at times with tesla but I hope they will support my wallboxes again as they once did. I'll definitely be getting at least another battery as to be more comfortable and not stress them out so much hence the 5kw charge rate mainly gives a bit more flexibility in the winter months. Thanks again :)

What was the company that provided all the equipment? I couldn’t find them what I heard? Delamac property maintenance Ltd?

@th3bmc

10 күн бұрын

Segan were the wholesalers.

Ahh I see now. The pylontech battery is limited to 1.2kw output before you stress them. If you have two then you're good for max power of 2.4kw. I was wonder how you did the power difference, but you do have a current difference. Which is remedied, as as you had it would have been a fire risk. I thought you did this back in early summer. But with the waste power... A diverter is a key project to use some of that power excess... But there is only so much hot water you can use :) Panels were a good price, the pergola itself was a bit excessive... Bi facial bounce, would negate having a light colour, I think grass and sand ranked high, but yellow slabs maybe? That should boost productivity. But you don't actually need it. Be interesting to see how well the bi facials perform in the uk. Can't you get data for these alone?

@th3bmc

Жыл бұрын

Don't know where your getting your information from but it's incorrect, Pylontech US5000's are good for 50 amp at 48v normal usage up to 100a burst for a single unit. with two it increases linearly. Diverter won't work unless you can tell the inverter it's being called for, as self use mode keeps import, export at near zero, but as mentioned hot water would be a waste with the excess I may happen to get. RS458 could be used but once again pointless for the unlikely event excess occurs when battery is full. Bifacials are working well and doing what I intended them to do, much higher output on foggy and overcast days vs the 4 monofacials on the garage. Yes I can track the strings separately. Pergola was a good price, good luck finding a retailer in july/august cheaper for treated wood that's thick, pre cut with fixtured and a warranty.

Were you able to do the electrical work yourself?

@th3bmc

10 ай бұрын

The putting together of components (battery, PV and inverter), the cable from the garage to the household consumer unit was done by a local electrician and then certified the rest.

What is an angle of pergola? Or is it flat?

@th3bmc

Жыл бұрын

currently 10 degrees, video coming on this later. It will be changing.

@csf1757

Жыл бұрын

@@th3bmc And your latitude ...53 deg N? Did you consider putting the panels at the same pitch as your latitude?

@th3bmc

Жыл бұрын

@@csf1757 Hi, no, it's rather windy in the garden and although it would bring better yields it means I would have had to fork out more for bracket's which likely would have increased the stresses (due to wind) on the pergola. the logic also was the garage solar is about 45/50 degrees so string 2 would be optimal (garage roof) and string 1 would power on earlier due to it being bifacial. I also mention angle in this video. kzread.info/dash/bejne/iGRo2cOfj8qalc4.html

Since you have 3.6m x 3.6m pergola, why didn't you cover it with more panels?

@th3bmc

Жыл бұрын

Many reasons, weight from snow being a factor, snow coming off the garage roof panels, cost for little gain.

hi where did you order the panels from?