Opinions please

Paulrn

I am having this fitted to a flat roof very soon. The panels are to lie at a shallow angle and whilst I know that this could reduce efficiency it will be more than made up for by the extra 4 hours of sun the roof receives over the house roof, which incidentally isn’t big enough owing to dormer windows on the southern aspect. I have also gone for emergency back up as we have more than our fair share of outages owing to overhead cables. I am in the south of England so I am hoping with the battery to be fairly self sufficient during the Summer and use Octopus night charging for the deep winter. Average consumption 2881 Kwh. Not particularly worried about payback and one day may go EV but not for quite a while or forced to.

To supply and install a 5.22kw Solar PV and battery system that can produce 5135 Kwh/a.

 

The system is made from the following parts:

 

12 x 435W JA Solar panels all black (25 year warranty)

1 x 5kw Solax Hybrid inverter (10 year warranty)

1 x 5.8Kw Solax battery (10 year warranty 

Mounting kit and Bird Mesh.

All electrical components including emergency EPS Socket

MCS Certification (5 year insurance backed warranty)

DNO Application

A.C Electrical certificate

Digital handover pack.

 

The Total cost is £9,000 zero vat.

 

To supply and install emergency EPS cable from the inverter back to the mains and auto Contactor board so solar and battery can be used for whole house back up total cost £850 zero vat.

BossBob

I’d question if the battery is big enough for prolonged power outages if you are having the whole house powered during blackouts. You’ve not given any details of your use of electricity and with 2 of us in a relatively small house with gas hot water and heating 5.8kW battery wouldn’t cover daily use.

Screwdriva

I don't get how installers can charge such audacious premiums for what are extremely low end, cheap brands! JA Solar panels are available wholesale for <£50 a panel. The Solax Inverter for <£450 all in.

I would not recommend proceeding with that quote when you have the option of superior inverter/ warranty durations/ panel level performance monitoring/ reputed brands and a slightly larger battery capacity at a lower price point. 

An example I've seen just this month:

12 X Sharp 425W panels (30 year warranty)
12 X SolarEdge optimizers (25 year warranty)
 1  X SolarEdge 5kW inverter (20 year warranty)
 Van Der Valk flat roof mounting + Bird Netting + G99 all included.

£6200 installed. You can add a 6.5 kW Growatt battery + AC/DC controller + blackout protection capability for an additional £2800 all inclusive.

Paulrn

Not expecting to cover prolonged outage as will reduce to emergency use. Given our estimated yearly useage installer reckons battery will be big enough but I have the option of fitting a second if required.

Reed_Richards

Don't you need planning permission if the panels are not flush with the roof?

Paulrn

Reed_Richards said:

Don't you need planning permission if the panels are not flush with the roof?

Apparently the planning laws were relaxed in December, but mine will be relatively flat anyway so not above the old limit

Martyn1981

Paulrn said:

Reed_Richards said:

Don't you need planning permission if the panels are not flush with the roof?

Apparently the planning laws were relaxed in December, but mine will be relatively flat anyway so not above the old limit

Yep, big improvements in PP. Used to be that panels on a flat roof needed PP if they were at an angle. Now they are allowed to protrude by up to 1m above the plane, which will be fine for almost all I suspect (if mounted landscape).

Also, wall mounted panels needed PP, but now they too are permitted development, so long as they don't protrude more than 200mm. That could aid many properties that don't have south facing roofs, flats etc etc, and black panels can look quite nice as a feature on walls - bit like decorative cladding.


Edit - Subject to some local restrictions, like conservation area etc..

Oscarmax

Screwdriva said:

I don't get how installers can charge such audacious premiums for what are extremely low end, cheap brands! JA Solar panels are available wholesale for <£50 a panel. The Solax Inverter for <£450 all in.

I would not recommend proceeding with that quote when you have the option of superior inverter/ warranty durations/ panel level performance monitoring/ reputed brands and a slightly larger battery capacity at a lower price point. 

An example I've seen just this month:

12 X Sharp 425W panels (30 year warranty)
12 X SolarEdge optimizers (25 year warranty)
 1  X SolarEdge 5kW inverter (20 year warranty)
 Van Der Valk flat roof mounting + Bird Netting + G99 all included.

£6200 installed. You can add a 6.5 kW Growatt battery + AC/DC controller + blackout protection capability for an additional £2800 all inclusive.

The correct about the Solax X1 AC invertor I has been useless since day one, after 18 months yesterday it gave up the ghost, hopefully they will fix it on Friday.

When first installed we were getting used to the system, we allowed the battery to deplete, we struggled to get the system to recharge the batteries, in the end we switched it on and off it was banging away internally like some sort of solenoid eventually it started to charge, the installer stated this was normal which I don't believe.

The other day I miss time charging up our PHEV car, it depleted the battery it was nightmare switch the system on and off eventually it started to recharge again along with load on internal banging.

Several days later the system totally failed. The installation comes with a 10 year warranty installation parts and labour and a HIES warranty, however, initially we had to take legal action against the company after the installation to get any paperwork or warranty, they informed us our warranty was with Solax, lets see what happens on Friday, the main director is coming out with their electrician.

Screwdriva

Oscarmax said:

The correct about the Solax X1 AC invertor I has been useless since day one, after 18 months yesterday it gave up the ghost, hopefully they will fix it on Friday....

..Several days later the system totally failed. The installation comes with a 10 year warranty installation parts and labour and a HIES warranty, however, initially we had to take legal action against the company after the installation to get any paperwork or warranty, they informed us our warranty was with Solax, lets see what happens on Friday, the main director is coming out with their electrician.

Very sorry about the agony you're clearly experiencing. All brands experience failure, some more than others. That said, I see weekly examples of brands like Solax, Solis, Huawei, Growatt etc. putting end consumers through similar experiences. 

The inverter brands I have observed treating their customers much better are: SolarEdge, Enphase, Fronius, Victron and to a lesser extent SMA. That's it sadly. 

Oscarmax

Screwdriva said:

Oscarmax said:

The correct about the Solax X1 AC invertor I has been useless since day one, after 18 months yesterday it gave up the ghost, hopefully they will fix it on Friday....

..Several days later the system totally failed. The installation comes with a 10 year warranty installation parts and labour and a HIES warranty, however, initially we had to take legal action against the company after the installation to get any paperwork or warranty, they informed us our warranty was with Solax, lets see what happens on Friday, the main director is coming out with their electrician.

Very sorry about the agony you're clearly experiencing. All brands experience failure, some more than others. That said, I see weekly examples of brands like Solax, Solis, Huawei, Growatt etc. putting end consumers through similar experiences. 

The inverter brands I have observed treating their customers much better are: SolarEdge, Enphase, Fronius, Victron and to a lesser extent SMA. That's it sadly. 

Our touring caravan has  a Victron 15/75 invertor and 2 x 80w solar panels in series, the Victron is bullet proof. Its the installer problems they are a local company and been going for years, if they try it on I will get the HIES involved again, when the installer previously tried it on HIES contacted them I received all the document online through HIEs the same day