Solar Quotes for the North West

Spies

I'm trying to get some quotes together, the only installer that has got back to me so far has quoted £5847 for 12x355w panels which is £1.37/w, I tried Red Electrical as someone else mentioned them in the other quotes thread but they got back to me to say they're only carrying out local work at the moment

Are there any others installers that serve the North West that I should ask for a quote from?

Reed_Richards

Scottish companies tend to be reconciled to travelling long distances so it is worth looking north of the border. 

Spies

I've emailed a few more towards the North border so hopefully something will come of that.

I guess a lot of installers have contract based work as I've not had much luck with getting quotes back from more local companies. 

Spies

Another quote for 3.3kw (10*330 with optimisers) for £4500 which works out to £1.36/kwp.

Are optimisers necessary on an unshaded roof?

QrizB

Spies said:

Are optimisers necessary on an unshaded roof?

I would say no, they are not. I don't have them and my system (marginally) beats PVGIS on average.

I'm shocked that anyone is quoting for 330w panels, 370w - 420w panels are mainstream and if you have space there are 495w panels out there.

Let's make the (not unreasonable) assumption that installation cost for a panel is the same regardless of power. In your £4500 quote there's maybe £900 for panels plus £3600 for everything else. Using prices from here:

• 10x 370w panels will cost £1110, 3700w system cost £4710, £1.27/watt
  
• 10x 410w panels will cost £1280, 4100w system cost £4680, £1.14/watt
  
• 10x 495w panels will cost £1410, 4950w system cost £5010, £1.01/watt
  

(Personally I wouldn't go any bigger than that on a 3.68kWp inverter.)

If you are confident having a discussion with your potential installers, ask why they chose those particular panels and whether they think you have room for higher-output ones. (Or more panels; the installer I recently used gave an indicative price for a 12-panel system but I could add or delete 370w panels to the system for £200 each all-in.)

Spies

He is concerned about being able to fit anything (physically) larger than a 330w (1650x1000) panel on the trickier roof which looks like this, I think the proposed configuration is 3 on the left in vertical and one horizonal under the velux.



The other roof has no obstructions and will fit 4 vertically, with 2 horizonal underneath them.

Spies

I got another quote this morning for 3.65kwp (10*365) from the same person

£4500 inc vat £1.23/kwp

Good?

Reed_Richards

Two roofs?  East/west?

Spies

Reed_Richards said:

Two roofs?  East/west?

sse and wsw

JKenH

There is quite a bit of inflation in the building trade so perhaps increases in labour and scaffolding costs are greater than the reductions in panel costs and the magic £1/kw will just become a distant memory, at least on sub 6kw systems. Your situation is perhaps aggravated by scaffolding being required on 2 elevations.

Spies

But all in all, decent price for two elevations?