A Forum run by Enthusiasts of MidNite Solar

Hi Guys

I have looking for an inverter charger that is suitable for OZ that is able to deal with 48 volt bank of Ni-Fe cells at the moment I am favoring outback VFXR 3048E as it goes up to 68 VDC input max 66.6 VDC  being the equalizing charge for the this type of battery, initially I had been looking at the Radain series but found that the Radian as it no longer complies with the AS/NZS standards and IEC.

Your thoughts would be appreciated

Check out Selectronics SP Pro 48v 5kw runs up to 68v DC .. Nice units i run the 24v 4.5kw at home

Thanks Mate on to it

I use a Xantrex (Schneider Electric)  XW-6048.   It produces up to 64.5V, and survives to 68V (warning at 67V)

Thanks Mike on to it hopefully they are available here in OZ

Hi Guys

Had a look at the Selectronic SP-PRO SPMC481â€"AU Interactive Inverter/Charger seem to be the one as it is a local supplier and the reviews I have read has no complaints as well, it also suits my needs as it can cope with DC input up to 68 Volt.

Which is defiantly required for Ni-Fe cell as their equalization charge is 66.6 VDC  was going to attach a spec sheet but because i live in the Nimdin, NSW area the net here is well not the best at time especially over school breaks

 :) woo hoo Just got the ok

SP pro Spec sheet the one i am after is  SPMC481

GRR

Having Rainbow power installing the SP Pro and have one person who wants everyone to meet and see if my system is up to standard which I can understand as they are doing the job and have to look after there rep and there biggest concern is my Ni-Fe cells as they do not really understand them and think I can only use 2 KW Hrs yet when I explained to them for a 48 volt system you equalize at 66.6 V DC your absorb charge is 63.6 V DC and float 60 V DC with no harm to the cells they could not comprehend it or the fact if you flatten them you do no harm to the cells ( I think he has his head wrapped around lead acid).

So I gave them so reading to do from Thomas Edison Chang Hong and Iron Edison then he said how do you dispose of them so when i mentioned They last up to 40 years if not longer and the process of emptying the cells and flushing them out if any crap comes out then refilling them with a mixture of Distilled Water 1 kg of KOH and 100 Grams of LOH and use them again he went into raptures say it was impossible dam sales men think the know it all making something relatively simple difficult, unfortunately they are the only dealer around here that sells and install the the selectronic SP Pro sigh so I have to deal with them and they don't like MidNite MPPT  they are to interested in Sunny Boys and SMA inverter Chargers I think and they are supposed to be the innovators of solar here HA let the come here and see i have a dry compost toilet no grid feed heaps of fruit trees and a substantial veg Patch (compliment of the wife) heaps of water and a solar system that works but needs a bit of tweaking to make it more efficient and no Lantana as I Mulched it all  and pulled out most of it by hand that should hopefully shut them up

Sorry My Rant

I just want to do my bit for the local environment!

Cheers Herman still A newbie and learning sorry about any typos and still learning so back to the energy books.

you mean my NiFe bank can't possibly be working ?

Bank shown below:
https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.209715335768594.51674.120212794718849&type=1&l=9747e4dde6

Mike et al.

What is the drawing factor in choosing NiFe batteries? Simply long life? Doesn't it also have a low efficiency in regards to charging? Care to explain a bit about Edisons? I opted (happy with) for LFP.

Cloud

Hi Mate

Without looking it up i'll answer as best as I can (if I have made a mistake no doubt ill be corrected)

Long life was the biggest draw and the fact you can use 80% of the power with no ill effect to the cells where as Lead Acid if you start doing that you shorten their life for memory lead acid to keep them up to speed a 200 AH bank you can use 30% and if needed on occasion 50% and they last up to 10 years if you ill treat them substantially less and replace them (cost) where as Ni-Fe work them hard and it does not hurt then if you flatten them with no ill effect to the cell, as it states in Thomas Edison's hand book and you can leave then with no charge for years with no effect to the cell yes there is a lot of speculation about their performance, but why did Exide buy the Edison Battery Company and immediately drop the making of that type of battery simple Answer is why make a battery that can last up to 15 - 85 Years you make no money as the world is governed by greed

That my short Answer :-)       

Thanks, Herman.

Near my reasoning with LFP cells. 100%DOD = 2000 cycles. 80%DOD = 3000. 70%DOD = 5000. (Although as LFP cells have only been on the market since 2008 we will see what the real world-non lab conditions come out to be. )

Also, the other factor was the lack of watering/maintainance regimen.

This 5 kWh pack cost me $2500 USD 3 years ago but I am seeing that you can start to purchase entire packs from destroyed EVs for quite cheap. A quick search shows 5 kWh worth of Tesla Model S cells for $1400USD.

Should be interesting purchasing either old or brand new from auto-makers in the near future of lithium packs for bottom prices. Luckily we have intelligent (set point programmable) equipment in our gear backs to run them.

Cloud

Why the desire for NiFe ?
  Hard to kill.  Run them flat.  Overcharge till they start to warm up.  No problem, add more distilled water to top off.
I don't worry about 10 cloudy days and not being able to reach absorb for 90 minutes.

Drawbacks are internal resistance, water consumption, lower recharge efficiency.  Being un-killable and 20+ lifetime is
a major plus.

All great things, Mike.  Are they cheaper than LFP? Lithiums do not require an elaborate ABSORB process. Just an ENDAMP of 0.05C or 5 amps in my case. Once they hit that they are good-to-go. Lithiums are also nice about not caring whether you fully charge them so often or daily.

I suspect with the nature of people crashing cars that the EV market will spill a bunch of lithium packs into the RE market. In 2008 when Lithium came onto the scene it was $1000USD/kWh. I purchased my pack in 2013 at $500/kWh. Now on Ebay you can find it around $150/kWh.

When the Tesla Gigafactory starts pouring out millions of 18650 cells next year and beyond... where will we be? All good stuff for us RE folk.

Cloud

ps. Mike, your FB page and commentary to your setup is hilarious. Especially the ones with your banter to the manufacture. :-D Your battery. Your Choices. Exactly.

Hi Cniemand

Just food for thought I spent a long time in the military and have use Lithium batteries with a lot of equipment and have had to drop a pack and run due to a cell that has decided to vent and run due to is toxic nature then having t dispose of everything after the event as it is contaminated, I know the Fire Brigade co ordain off a Toyota Prius when the have a bad smash due to the environmental impact,
yeah I am being negative about it but i have been in some incidents that made me realise what are we doing to the planet, nature and ourselves, no I do not like DR David Suzuki he is a doomsday preacher.

What I like about Ni-Fe cells as well is the electrolyte is an alkaline base easy to mix by yourself ad you just have to wash it off if you spill it on your self with immediately flush with 3% boric acid solution or drinking water, and the solution has no negative environmental impact as it just changes the PH level of your soil, so to dispose of it is relatively easy just dilute it and dispose but i may be wrong as i got most of that information from a 1902 manual, so I create no environmental impact as I and other Ni-Fe users have next to nothing to dispose of we don't have to wear crazy PPE your have to set up a safety process but I am certain a spill of a Ni-Fe solution is not as bad as a rupture and gas leakage of a Ni-Fe Cell there is good reading at The OtherPower forum http://www.fieldlines.com/index.php?topic=146754.0 by Bill Blake.

The only thing I would like o be able to do is make distilled water because that is all I need

Remember
If we contaminate the soil we cannot eat
If we contaminate the air we cannot breath
and If we contaminate the water we cannot drink


Sorry I am Waffling

Quite so, Herman.

There is a variety of chemistries under the "lithium" umbrella. Those early Li-ion types that made laptops burst in flames... When I speak of lithium I talk about LiFePo4. Stable. You really have to abuse them to get them to be dangerous. As far as Toxicity with batteries and Earth-stewardship, I would say that through renewables we do more good for the air, water, land than by not. Pb is toxic. All things of value end up being recycled. Lead Acid batteries incredibly so. Lithiums will end up in the same.

:) I'm not against NiFe. Just curious on its attributes and why others choose a certain chemistry over another. I was having the same conversation with another person over Aquions Flow Battery.

Hey

I got hooked by the Ni-Fe when I was on a permaculture course here in AUS unfortunately I met a idiot who blew smoke and used mirrors about solar and the wonders of the stuff he was using this also clouded the vision of all newbies like me that have never been on solar the only thing that was decent out of it where the Ni-Fe cells so due to my lack of understanding of it I had this supposed expert mainly install it BIG Mistake he totally undersized the alarm bells rang when he was unsure of what MPPT to use so i contacted Iron Edison and asked what they use for their cells and that how i found MidNite which I purchased it, anyway to cut a long story short he left a sour taste in may mouth about solar (btw I am totally off the grid) so the more knowledge I acquired I realised he was a leach to society and a poor advocate for solar he was sent packing (er well ran away) he not only did me over, so I could say Conman who used smoke and mirrors.

when this was happening the only thing that worked well where the Ni-Fe cells even though i had to help charge them, so I got the utmost respects for them.

So first is to put larger wattage to replace the 12 DCH BX 65, 65 W  with new solar panels on the roof using TS CIGS SERIES 160 W as I have 12 of them that has no cost and getting another eight for minimal cost, to get the sizing right to get enough power  to run the house during daylight and charge the cells (no Gen) this also means getting a new charger invertor selctronics SP Pro series which can handle 68 Volt DC and not have a hissy fit this allows me to equalize with no power loss BTW he installed 240 AH Ni-Fe and try and get them to work for 24 H with no assistance. The saving grace they work with a 24 volt bank with a transfer switch so I can swap from one bank to another automatically.

I doubt the Ni-Fe have enough depth to do the 24 Hour thing so I will be probably be changing them for 800 AH jobs so by doing this I am trying to keep the cost down.

why i did not pick up this idiot earlier was due to a condition I have, PS not crazy like Halfcrazy   

Then piss off all his crap and hopefully get some of the cost back and I have a Person that is very interested in the 240 AH cells which I think he plans to use the 48 volt bank which I have into two 24 volt banks in parallel to run a pumping station on his property out west and he is in no real hurry (by doing the parallel thing he gets 480 AH) as he only fills up 3 tanks with water and he is sick of doing it manually (starting a water pump and waiting for the tanks to fill) he cab=n use a electric pump with a auto start and shut off switch.

I just sort of hope I have this right as I don't want to upset my better half any more.

I hope that makes sense and thanks to all the forum users it is helping me to understand the beauty of solar 

Sadly, there is a number of crooks inside the RE and EV movements. Plenty of money lost with good intentions. :/

O well Rainbow Power Company Balked at earning money and do not want to touch it as they do not understand the Battery chemistry and feel they will be held responsible if anything goes wrong which I don not blame them in that aspect as they have a reputation to look after.

However I did mention to them on numerous occasions if any thing goes wrong I wont bet blaming  any one apart from the initial installer as he put us into this predicament and they are unwilling to read up on the Ni-Fe Cells yet they sit there and bag the information I give them as Rubbish so much for a supposed forward thinking industry that states it looks after the environment and the population yet unwilling to even look at the most environmentally friendly battery that has ever been made

So no selectroincs SP Pro from them Ill Just go the OutBack  VFXR Series 3000VA 48 volt Inverter Charger - Outback Power VFXR3048E which also goes up to 68 V DC and is $3000 cheaper their loss my gain

Herman, I'm a bit south of you (Albury, on the NSW/Vic border), and have been living and working 100% offgrid for over a decade. My original inverter was a RAPS5 - manufactured by Power Solutions Australia (now defunct) and supplied by (as it turns out) rainbow power company. They were pretty much the only ones prepared to sell me the inverter at the time, without demanding their people install it.

At the time, I was using 48 x 300AH 2V hawker cells (VRLA) from a datacentre, as a 48V bank. They were on their last legs, but they were cheap ($500 the lot) and got me through construction and the first couple of years.

About 2 years ago, I was in the fortunate position to get rid of all my lead-acid cells (by now, replaced with newer but still previously used 2V/500AH AGM), with a bank of 16 x 300AH LFP (LiFePO4) "Lithium" cells. If I knew then, what I know now, I'd have just got the full capacity I wanted but was to scared to buy.

12 months ago my old inverter gave up. No smoke, no bang, just plain stopped working. I was able to buy an SP-PRO 481 directly from selectronics themselves at short notice. Make no mistake, it's a very nice inverter/charger. So many improvements over the "state of the art" stuff around 10 years ago!

If you are competent, or can hire competent help, you shouldn't have too much difficulty installing the SP-PRO yourself. It didn't take me long to get it unpacked, mounted, cabled, configured and running. I needed help getting the old thing off the wall because of its location and weight. I could have put the SP-PRO up by myself with a struggle, but two of us made light work of it.

As others have said, LiFePO4 (Lithium IRON, or often just LFP) is nothing like most of the other Lithium ION cells you're used to. I very nearly purchased NiFe quite some years ago, but to me, the huge difference from charge to discharge voltage just made it too difficult (especially since I had an inverter that wouldn't do it), and the very low cycle efficiency was a deal-breaker. Not so bad when you have enough sun, but down here I often get extended periods without enough, while simultaneously having a situation where I cannot "choose not to use power" - all the business machines need to run, regardless - so the cells inefficiency means far more operating cost when burning propane to run the genset.

I'm seeing about 97% cycle efficiency on my LFPs after 2 years of solid use...

Thanks Ross, I have had to reassess everything I have my first problem I identified the installer short changed us on our panels by installing 12 BX 65 W about 52 Volt open circuit if lucky which barley put out 1 KW a day even in full sun, so first thing first I am in the process of remedying that with 10 TS_ Cigs 160 W thin film panels 87 Volt Open circuit these I have sourced and an exceptionally low price which I will be installing in the next few days, unfortunately they will be facing NNE as due to the geographical location So They will be sitting on frames at a 15 DEG angle to capturing all the morning sun and hopefully most of the afternoon sun, then logging how much power I am getting which should be substantially more than what we have been, this will also be hooked my Ni-FE bank which is 48 Volt bank.

The next step is to set up all the BX 65 to feed into my 24 Volt lead acid bank one of the things I will be doing is removing all the installers soldered joins and dodgy wiring and using MC 4 clips ans he cut all the factory installed one off and hope that these preform better than the old poly crystal panels that are charging them at the moment as the BX panels are far more shade tolerant than the ploy's,the next step is to fix up all the wiring and put in some decent breakers and fuses where they are supposed to go.

Then I will look at the the invertor charger   I an leaning toward the Selctronics PRO but by the time i have finished the above work I have to hope I wil have enough funds for it or I will be going for the Outback Power VFXR3048E which has the same operating DC voltage as the selectronics but only a 3 kw invertor do I need a 5 KW one (not really) plus the mate 3, I will keep you guys posted on the progress.

So summing it up I basically got stung and spent good money after bad, now I have to fix a system (spending More money where I should not but have to) to make it safe and have it easy to operate for when I am not home so my more sensible half came just turn the key on the Honda generator and it charges the batteries if required on both of the banks of batteries.

The one plus out of this whole experience I scoured the MidNite Classic 150 from DC Solutions in Melbourne not him and when the system failed he was placing the whole blame on the MidNite not his terrible work which caused the short which melted his soldered joins on 6 panels so much for making things waterproof he forgot what I said to him if it is waterproof it also does not let water out especially when you have a large open pipe at one end.

I would like to thank forum for providing information and pointing me in the right direction and the information that you all share especially .mike90045 and Halfcrazy Cheers will try to post some stuuf later as in before and after shots. 

I wish i'd heard about the TS_ Cigs 160 W thin film panels BEFORE you bought them.   I hope you get 5 years out of them, that will buy you time to reassess your whole setup

I wish I had heard of the TS_ Cigs 160 W earlier as well, performance wise by the spec sheet nearly 3 times better than what I had, cost wise cheaper than what i had so I cant complain about that and the cost was far cheaper than the local supplier was offering.

@ Ross: 97% is about what I am seeing as well with my bank being on since June 2013.

For those of you with systems that have been operational for a decade or so, what are you seeing for longevity of Components? I've only been off-grid for three years now. I am wondering what the true life is of a Charge controller and inverters? I use a Midnite CC 200v and a VFX 3648. Is there any sort of typical expectancy or has that changed over the last few years as components are beyond the qualities that were just ten years ago as Ross makes note?

Cloud

Quote from: mike90045 on January 06, 2016, 04:02:51 PM
I wish i'd heard about the TS_ Cigs 160 W thin film panels BEFORE you bought them.   I hope you get 5 years out of them, that will buy you time to reassess your whole setup

Sorry, this was supposed to be in Comic Sans (sarcasm) font.
The thin film panels are noted for being both high voltage and short lifetime.

Ha!

Cniemand,

A couple of years ago, the CEO of SMA Germany actually came out in Public and said,  "SMA expect a life of only 10 years with all their products".

Now whether he was saying that for the shareholders and his sales teams, so his company would always be selling stuff and it looks good on the books, I do not know.

Personally I would have thought 20 years as a minimum, but hay ho, the World seems to only exist by making profits and taxing at every stage.

Seems to defeat the whole philosophy of Sustainable Renewable Energy. 

That 10 years seems to be an industry standard for electronics goods these days.
I guess we need to consider ourselves lucky if we get more than that?... :o

I want to be lucky, WB! :)

Here Mike

Just adding fuel to the fire Warranty • Product warranty*: 10 years for material and workmanship • Power output warranty*: 90% at 10 years and 80% at    25 years of minimum rated power output I will find out if it is true or not I will tell you in 5 years time  :-\

With the industry standard comment yes stuff is manufactured to last x amount of years and why would they produce some thing last for a life time or more, for example the Ni-Fe cells last for ages possibly a life time or more so why make them for a one off sale and never see the customer again, well how about and industry that sells and services Ni-Fe for example I sell you the battery and I service them for a cost and when required I recharge them with new solution again for a cost so not only are you a provider but a service center much like we already do with vehicles (Planes, Trains and automobiles) but then I may be of the mark and waffling. I am not a greenie  I just do not see the sense in waste.

Quote from: Herman on January 08, 2016, 06:05:59 PM
stuff is manufactured to last x amount of years and why would they produce some thing last for a life time or more

I think very similarly to you, logic and reliability of product for a fair price... I wish Exell (sp?) made a 24 volt unit, I like their warranty /repair concept, ''we can repair in the future for a reasonable price.''

(This may spark a rebuttal:)
Only one better IMHO is MidNite where the service for the CC's is unmatched, return and we will fix/repair/replace, as necessary,  if it is flawed at the beginning... ie not user damaged...

I believe a lot of products are made now looking solely at the MTBF and 'get it out the door as cheaply as possible' and if it is in the x% that fail at startup, we can absorb that cost and replace the unit ...  after an extended time period within which the consumer may give up seeking a replacement and live with the defective product... and most of the face to face flack taken by the retailer

gosh Westbranch!

Have you been following my debarcle with SMA?

As regards 'Midnite' products, may they keep producing quality and well thought out New products, something all other RE product manufacturres should aim for....?

I commented on The Aus Whirlpool forum, when somebody there mentioned about Midnite,s factory tour Video.      http://forums.whirlpool.net.au/forum-replies.cfm?t=2484009 (http://forums.whirlpool.net.au/forum-replies.cfm?t=2484009)

"Nice Video.

A real company, doing real work, with real knowledgeable folk and a real Customer care department, and a continues flow of New products.

They have their own Forum split into areas of their products. http://www.midniteforum.com/ And importantly you can actually talk on that forum to Midnite guys that know the products and openly discuss everything with no hidden agendas.

We here in Rural Normandy France have a range of cost effective RE products from new and used German SMA stuff, Morningstar Tristar, Outback and Midnite products.

I purchased a Midnite Classic 200 MPPT controller for handling 3kw PV on a tracker at 170vdc to charge my battery bank, (the best battery charging regime out of my 7off Dc controllers). I noticed that the internal fan cable was pinched on the case it still worked but I was unsure. Within a few hours I had a email and they openly discussed it on the forum and were ready to correct the fault at No expense to me. However they were also willing to talk me through doing a cable repair with gluelined heat shrink, without effecting the warranty, no hassle and the person that cased the Classic got a rollicking.

Over the years I have found that Midnite come top of my list for quality well made product, service back up, and ease of talking to the companies knowledgeable folk about pushing tech parameters etc.

Morningstar are next, good quality and hard working products, and a gentle trickle of New Products, they do respond with customer care but are very slow.

Worst are SMA, so called specialist advisors know nothing about sustainable RE, Customer care is non existent up until very recently. Their product range is expensive and diminishing, and they lock you into their products only with some unpleasant software tweaks. SMA on solar roof GTI's is their specialist area.

For me Midnite is what a professional RE manufacturer should be, and may they continue to do so.
Yes they are quirky, but at least the accountants Directors and slimy sales reps haven't taken them over.

Happy New Year Midnite. "

I just recently ( pre Christmas) received a placement power/control board that we hope is the solution for my lack of connection to the MyMidnite monitoring system/database,It was working till I did a FW upgrade and then nothing...  The staff has been very helpful in wading through stuff that is way above my paygrade (retired :D), my issue has the DB manager baffled right now...  but there was no question about trying a few other options and the board showed up in the mail and included the return mailer.. 
PS sending stuff across the US/Canada border is not an easy process by courier, USMail is far better!!

MidNite is at the top in my books!

I have found it very surprising how many companies down (well not surprising) do not use MidNite products or Ni-Fe Cells and do not rate them, these same companies are just happy to sell SMA Sunny Boy stuff and not much else, I think it has to do with the guaranteed in x years I will stop working.

Where as MidNite, Ni-Fe and probably some other companies  do not get a look in due to how well their product preforms and how long it service life is, not including Support from the manufacture, so there are good ones out there you just got to do your homework to find them, this I initially did find difficult being a newbie to the world of solar as I did not no what the hell I was looking at and reading stuff from the developers is mumble jumble and like trying to read a computer manual were as MidNite state this is what it does and shock I does it well yeah I am rambling once a again     

Quote from: Herman on January 10, 2016, 02:58:02 PM
there are good ones out there you just got to do your homework to find them, this I initially did find difficult being a newbie to the world of solar as I did not no what the hell I was looking at and reading stuff from the developers is mumble jumble and like trying to read a computer manual

Herman, I believe this goes under 'paying your dues'...?  NO?   ;)

I'm sure we have all suffered that fate at sometime...

Just a note on life expectancy of gear. We have an old solarex panel here which is approx 20 years old from a water pump system.
The panel is a little discoloured but still puts out 5 amps @ 17 voc (approx 60 watt panel).
No electronic circuits in it of course, but still a goer. And very old tech.

Russ : I fully believe Panels will last for ages. I am questioning if inverters and charge controllers have finally matured enough in the solar market to also have such long lives or are they still relegated to being replaced in 10 year intervals. :)

expect 10 years,  rejoice if you get more.   High power electronics don't last as long as a portable radio does.

Quote from: Cniemand on January 21, 2016, 08:11:22 PM
Russ : I fully believe Panels will last for ages. I am questioning if inverters and charge controllers have finally matured enough in the solar market to also have such long lives or are they still relegated to being replaced in 10 year intervals. :)

I have been using PVs since early 90s starting with OZ made Solarex 40 and 60 watt poly types
Well made, brown anodised frames, completely sealed and although I onsold them I still drive by them and see them still in use.

Mid 90s bought over 100 Siemens M55 monos. More than half had problems, h2o got through a junction box, seeped along ribbon trace and corroded it away. Just about impossible to repair, lost 6 like that. Over 30 had solder on traces over cells develop bubbles and solder runs on top of cells. Another 10 or so had glue/silicone sealant holding one or both junction boxes dry up, fall apart then box fell off breaking traces. By 2000 had disposed of the lot. Siemens junk.

2000 bought 30 Japanese Mitsubishi 190 200w pvs. Good QC, frames
clear anodised alu, never had a problem. on sold in 2006

Went MX60 mppt so now had first chinese 120w 12v pvs so they could be in 3s 51mpv.
QC awful but they worked well for 4 years until some started h2o ingress between front glass and ali frame resulting in cell edge corrosion on cells near ali frame.
So annoying that they were replaced more 12v 140w pvs, old 120s all went into garbage crusher,
25 year warranty was useless as supplier had disappeared.

I know many PV sites where PVs bought in last 5 years are already exhibiting potential problems.
The major issue seems to be QC of cheap PVs.

dgd

DGD : You have had a bank of PB cells since 1999? 16-17 years and they are still good?

Yes, since 1999, Century Yuasa Enersun SSR1025-4, six to make 24volt bank
17 years old. The best batteries I ever invested in.  Very rarely equalise but Absorb high at 29v and try never to let them get down to 70% SOC.
http://www.cyb.co.nz/content/documents/enersun/enersun-ssr1025-4.pdf (http://www.cyb.co.nz/content/documents/enersun/enersun-ssr1025-4.pdf)

dgd

Designed for 7 year life @ 20% DOD. Yet you got 17. That's impressive! :)

DGD, what does that 30  DoD amount up to in watthrs?
Types of loads? etc

Quote from: Cniemand on January 23, 2016, 01:06:42 PM
Designed for 7 year life @ 20% DOD. Yet you got 17. That's impressive! :)

Yes and still counting  :)
I doubt they are still full capacity but as my daily use is around 10% DOD the life cycle count is probably a lot higher. I do notice that the occasional 25 to 30 DOD seems to waken them up with the no load resting voltage rising from 25.4 to 25.9 so a decent discharge refreshed them. I never see them below 24.2v

In winter 2006 they got abused running down to 22.5 quite often, several weeks of no sun, too few PVs and I thought they would give up, but they recovered  :o

dgd

Quote from: Westbranch on January 23, 2016, 01:19:59 PM
DGD, what does that 30  DoD amount up to in watthrs?
Types of loads? etc

The daily report below shows usage.
As you can see real usage is fairly low. The worst case being a few days over new year where a storm front moved in.
Although the minimum battery voltage reports 23 and below this is due to the 1 second updates catching the 2Kw electric kettle or 3Kw coffee machine being switched on. I never see the voltage below 24.2 and it usually is about 24.5 just before dawn.

Loads, the 500WHr/year fridge/freezer is biggest but short term bigger loads are electric oven, microwave, hoover, microwave... Probably like all off-grid homes cooking and washing and hoovering all occur when sun bright and lots of spare energy.
Also lots extra energy diverted from PVs to hot water heating  :)

Looks a lot like my usage patterns. Although my LFP bank is 5 kWh. My first two years I would only use 3-4 kWh /day even though the solar array is fairly large.  The last year or so I have doubled that (or more) by using a space heater as a diversion load (not actually set up as one in the CLassic) to heat the house during the sunny winter days here.

Does the the angle at which panels are mounted have much of an effect on water invasion or do you consider it is
mainly caused by use of poor quality silicone sealants?
Would it help if the frames and cover were re-siliconed with a high quality product to help reduce leakage?
We get no snow here and rain is patchy most of the time.
Dust is the biggest problem and I have to "window" wash the panels on a regular basis. :o
Also the colour of the surrounding roof may have an influence on panel performance.
The reason I say this is that we have all our rooves painted white and they are a lot cooler, but have a lot of reflected "radiance".
I would imagine panels used on boats in the ocean and large bodies of fresh water would have some reflection/refraction effect on them.
Intensified by sporatic cloud cover and further reflection.

Could be. Much akin to a ground mounted Solar array surrounded by snow.

Quote from: russ_drinkwater on January 25, 2016, 04:36:40 PM
Does the the angle at which panels are mounted have much of an effect on water invasion or do you consider it is mainly caused by use of poor quality silicone sealants?
Would it help if the frames and cover were re-siliconed with a high quality product to help reduce leakage?
We get no snow here and rain is patchy most of the time.
Dust is the biggest problem and I have to "window" wash the panels on a regular basis. :o

Usually failed silicone sealant. Worst cases around junction boxes sealant dries up, gets hard and powdery like chalk then crumbles away. Sealant no longer glues box to PV or prevents water ingress. I have resealed several dozen PVs and lost many after traces to box corrode away.

On glass side PVs always get layered in dust and grime and it can collect in the tiny gap between glass and frame on lowest part of frame. Then lichen and assorted green stuff grows out of there.
I have seen lichen spread out over the glass until its partway over the cells.

This is one reason, inability to clean, that I tend not to mount PVs on building roof or anywhere I cant get a
cleaning mop sponge at it. A decent pressure water hose may work but won't always remove bird poop or live lichen.

dgd