Location of panels

[eastpoint turbine]

Is there any merit/advantage in having string facing "each direction   eg, one north one south etc ? My feeling is one would catch the morning sun another the evening ,but as the sun rises All will face the sun , or am i way off
     Jason

[zoneblue]

What you are talking about is known in the industry as a virtual tracker. Its best uses are for targeting time of use NEM grid tie programs, or in the off grid world for supplying particular daytime loads like water pumping. You can create a much flatter prodution curve by facing arrays SE/SW.

[eastpoint turbine]

So what you are saying Zoneblue,  is that All should face the same direction

[Westbranch]

It depends... on where you are the period of the day in which you get full sun, the size of your battery bank and the amount of panels you have vs the number of hours you need to be at Absorb,etc, etc, etc,....you get the picture, it depends...

[zoneblue]

If you just want the best total production facing them all south at your latitude elevation is best. However if you run aircon or something heavy all day, then facing half the array SE and half SW will give you slightly less overal but for a longer time over the day...if that makes sense.  Google virtual tracker for more details.

[dgd]

I have seen a version of this where a main 2k8 array points exactly north with a 600 watt array northeast and another 600w northwest. After some experimenting with array angles this resulted in a more 'evened out' power production throughout the day.  Seemed like a lot of bother to me 

dgd

[TomW]

When you South of the Equator folks start talking solar orientation alarms go off when I here "pointing N, NE, NW" etc until my feeble brain connects the dots on geographic location.

Just sayin..

Tom

[zoneblue]

Yeah well we were just in the states, so i translated those angles to usa-ese there...even if that is in a reverse-revers way confusing. LIke those solar calculators that wont let you put in 0 north as a azimuth. How about 45 degress off azimuth?

[dgd]

This north or south orientation is not always obvious. A recent visit to install a Classic 150  I noticed that the pv array was on a ground frame. The rear posts had all been extended by near a metre. When I asked why they did not put longer 4by4s in the ground in the first place it was explained that the frame was built for a south facing array (this was near Tauranga in New Zealand latitude 38deg S).
Apparently the system designer thought the builder would obviously know the array was to be north facing but the frame instructions were from a magazine article which emphasized it was important to get the array accurately orientated south.
The posts were all in concrete hence north ones were reduced in height and the south ones were extended.
This made me smile, proves you can never assume people know what they are doing 

dgd

[zoneblue]

That is just hilarious dgd. Sometimes i think its a wonder we humans achieve anything at all...

[TomW]

That is just hilarious dgd. Sometimes i think its a wonder we humans achieve anything at all...

Reminds me of a sign over the tech area when I worked for Collins Radio:

"No problem is too big to be overlooked"

Or as NASA discovered with that lander that plowed into Mars. Do not calibrate in one unit and program in another!

Been there done that, got no T shirt, however.

Humans are curious critters.

And we all know what happens when we assume.

Tom

[eastpoint turbine]

At midday it does not matter which direction they face, but for me  west captures the remaining sun ( this time of the year 5:30 am to 6:30 pm)