Should solar inverters be serviced?
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[Deleted User]
Posts: 0 Newbie
Mine will be 3 in October. It's fine as far as I know but should it be periodically serviced?
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Mine never has been, and the people who installed it have never suggested I have it serviced.
It's just a box with electronics inside. I can't see why it needs servicing any more than a TV would.If it sticks, force it.
If it breaks, well it wasn't working right anyway.0 -
Nah, nothing that could really benefit from a routine service as far as I know. I Suppose one could clean out the fans if operated in a dusty environment if the manual says so?
Perhaps better to monitor output periodically (maybe compare to PVGIS) to detect if there is any significant drop in performance.My PV system: South West England, 10x 250Wp Trina Solar panels, Fronius Inverter, South facing roof, 35° pitch with no shading.0 -
The fans (and indeed the rest of the circuit boards) could indeed do with cleaning off occasionally - else one day the whole thing might burst into flames ! And of course if there's a filter in the fan system to stop dust accumulating that might need to be cleaned out occasionally.
However, if the inverter is in a reasonably clean environment that's unlikely to justify an 'annual' service - perhaps once every 20 years would do and of course long before the unit actually catches fire you'd get a warning whiff of charred fluff to alert you to need for a service.NE Derbyshire.4kWp S Facing 17.5deg slope (dormer roof).24kWh of Pylontech batteries with Lux controller BEV : Hyundai Ioniq50 -
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Fruit_and_Nut_Case wrote: »Made me jump there. Then I checked and confirmed that the trusty SolarEdge uses convected cooling. No cleaning for me, then.
Convection will still suck in dust! Perhaps running a vacuum over the vents if they look grubby.My PV system: South West England, 10x 250Wp Trina Solar panels, Fronius Inverter, South facing roof, 35° pitch with no shading.0 -
No, a waste of time and effort.0
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Convection will still suck in dust! Perhaps running a vacuum over the vents if they look grubby.
Hiya Mac. Just being (too) pedantic here, but the SolarEdge heat sink is, in my opinion, a thing of beauty. It's mounted on the back of the inverter. It's the entire size of the inverter (top to bottom, & side to side), with fins that stick out towards the wall of approx 1.5 inch, but the inverter is mounted approx 3 inches from the wall. So all convected dust etc travels up a tunnel (chimney?) between the wall, and a massive single piece of aluminium heat sink.
My fanless SMA's ...... not so lucky, dusty little b*****s!
Mart.Mart. Cardiff. 5.58 kWp PV systems (3.58 ESE & 2.0 WNW). Two A2A units for cleaner heating.
For general PV advice please see the PV FAQ thread on the Green & Ethical Board.0 -
Martyn1981 wrote: »Hiya Mac. Just being (too) pedantic here, but the SolarEdge heat sink is, in my opinion, a thing of beauty. It's mounted on the back of the inverter. It's the entire size of the inverter (top to bottom, & side to side), with fins that stick out towards the wall of approx 1.5 inch, but the inverter is mounted approx 3 inches from the wall. So all convected dust etc travels up a tunnel (chimney?) between the wall, and a massive single piece of aluminium heat sink.
My fanless SMA's ...... not so lucky, dusty little b*****s!
Mart.
Ah, so you mean the SolarEdge electronics are cooled by conduction and the heat sink is then cooled by convection? That's ok thenMy PV system: South West England, 10x 250Wp Trina Solar panels, Fronius Inverter, South facing roof, 35° pitch with no shading.0
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