Jacques Ester

Hi everyone, so I had the need to get daily, weekly and monthly solar statistics emailed to me but after requesting this directly from the Solar-Assistant team for months, I decided to create it myself. I have made it available to all if you can find the use for it and can be found here - https://github.com/Stef1986/email_scheduler_solar_assistant
Once you have cloned the repo locally, you simply edit the .env file with your Solar Assistant's MQTT details as well as your reporting preferences and run the docker-compose up.
Just have a look at the README.md, it should be detailed enough to get you going.
As a quick overview, basically what will happen is on the host of your choosing, you will run the docker container that will subscribe to the MQTT topic created in Solar-Assistant and will ingest all the data. It will then (based on your choosing) schedule daily, weekly and/or monthly statistic reports to be emailed to your inbox.

The body of the email will contain a nice table with statistics (configurable in the .env file) with min/max/avg values as well as a csv attachment (also configurable) containing the totals for daily, weekly and monthly for stats like PV generated, Battery in, Battery out, etc etc

Hope you guys enjoy and if this helped you, consider supporting my efforts with a beer or two 😁🍻

Also try to put n load on the Generator before connecting. The generator needs to ramp up it revs to keep the voltage and frequency stable.

Also try to put n load on the Generator before connecting. The generator needs to ramp up it revs to keep the voltage and frequency stable.

Until someone gets electrocuted. Then he will have to answer for not grounding the gate motor. Not bashing You , just saying

Pylontech you can mix the different size batteries. I have 3 Us3000 and 2 UP 5000 connected together. Newest always the master battery. For software just search on the forum. It is available

A great clear Highveld morning with good PV before the clouds come rolling in this afternoon.

This is what the result looks like.



I would like to supplement the instructions of @BritishRacingGreen with a list of steps for diagnosing and repairing the inverter parts that I had to repair and that he did not touch.

Also check your Frequency setting on the inverter.
Make sure it is on 50Hz

We have a winner! Lucky Number 7!
Lets see who this corresponds to on the excel :>
Sincerely
jason

@madness_za Congratulations!!! Well done!
Thank you so much to Sonoff Africa For this Fantastic giveaway. @Sonoff Africa
Well done all! @madness_za you welcome to send @Sonoff Africa your delivery details!
Lucky number 7!
Sincerely
Jason

Okay, so I think I am winning.

Everything is installed and working flawlessly. I have noticed that the installer of my tank system was very very conservative with the float and when the float stops the tank from filling, we are only indicating about 1980lt. So, I'll address that at some stage. The enclosure might need a little tweaking and reprinting too, but for the interim it'll do. Otherwise, I'm happy with how everything turned out. I'll monitor it for a couple of weeks and then start building one for the other tank too.
Thanks for all the help - the inner nerd in me would not have been able to figure this out.

Okay cool, going to give this a stab! 

Achieved a good milestone with my system, of completing my panel installation with the wiring. All finally connected and generating.
Being later in the afternoon and overcast, the graph on the Solar assistant was all over the place with me testing the system putting on the kettle etc
Happy so far with this progress.

This will depend in the type of install you want to do.
If your loads are high in the day you can opt for a on grid system without batteries. The upfront is lower.
If your loads are high at night you will nee a lot off batteries making the upfront cost higher.
With both type of installs you will save money in the long run.
With the increase in the electricity price the payback will also increase year by year.
 

Hello Everyone
So I have moved the Grid tied wind turbine inverter to the Genport on the Parallel Solis S6 6KW Hybrid system and have activated the AC Couple functions. 
I am pleased to say that it now shows the Power Source as external inverter on the portal. See the Picture. 
However we have not had much wind for the past couple of days so now I am praying for some nice wind. 😅 
This will allow is to create some very nice data to illustrate the performance of the wind turbine on the Smart port of the Solis Hybrid inverters. 
I will enquire with Solis if I can have the External INV renamed to Wind Power. 
The moment I enabled the AC Couple feature GRID and GRID Load also appeared on the portal even though I have no grid and my inverters are in OFF GRID MODE. 
I will post pictures of my Power Station once I have tidied up the cables with some trunking everything is still very much in shambles because of all the changes I need to make to do all the different tests.

Installing solar setup for me was not just about the savings on the electricity purchase every month, the benefit to always have power is a huge positive. If your system is roughly specced according to usage and you get the family to work with you on when to use what - you will save alot - every month!!
A solar system is a huge investment, if done correctly - money well spend and worth every cent!

Think carefully about selling back. In SA it will cost you money to do that (cost of new 2-way meter at least, possible change of tariff) and the resell price is not very attractive. Again this will be detailed in the tariffs. Here in Johannesburg I can't see how I would as much as break even - so I don't export.

Also bear in mind that tariffs will change.  Look at the State of California as an example. A few years ago they were offerring very good reseller tariffs and there was a lot of uptake. But resell can also create problems for the utilities, and now California doesn't pay for any electricity fed back into the grid. In COCT they are currently paying above the NERSA tariff for electricity you feed back into the grid, but they got a 2-year exemption from the NERSA tariff. They also got a 2-year waiver on the net consumer requirement (IE you cannot sell more kWh than you buy). They have yet to indicate if they intend to renew those waivers. If they don't, then the position for resellers changes quite a lot.

So download the tariff booklet that applies to you and do the sums.

Absolutely will save you money, especially if correctly installed and appropriately spec'd for your requirements.
@Tariq mentions his power purchases, I have about the same result my side summer about 1Unit per day(feedback prevention) and winter about 3Units per day(battery top-up).
Also as @Jacques Ester mentions as the price of power goes up your payback time decreases 🤩

This. You have to take a long term view. It's a classic case of spending money now to save over the long term.

I noticed a drop. From, admittedly, a low base as we were using < 450 kWh per month. I'm in Gauteng, which is very overcast at the moment and is going to stay that way for days, so right now system performance is not startling, but most days I manage to generate about 50% of what we use. In sunny weather this gets more like 95%.

It depends on what you buy, how well matched it is to your situation, and how much you can change your routines to make maximum use of the sun. EG we don't run the dishwasher at night, nor the washing machine, nor the pool pump. We  heat water during the day.

What I would change is getting more panels, or more powerful panels. Then I'd be doing better on overcast days.

But sure, they do save on your power spend. I am averaging about 2.3 kWh per day over a year. 

Analyse your tariffs. EG in Johannesburg, on the default tariff, you are going to be paying a grand a month in fixed charges. Those will not fall away if you go solar, though you will reduce the charge for actual electricity.

If you are in South Africa then there is what I call a "soft value" to having an alternate energy source. Even during stage 6 the power was always on in my house. So we were in no danger of losing the contents of the deep freeze; lights and wifi were always on etc. In general we could keep on with our usual routine. That's worth something too. Despite significant improvements, Eskom are warning that we are not out of the load shedding woods yet.

It depends
Solar panels (and assuming a battery pack as well) can definitely reduce your reliance on municipal power but as a household there would need to be some changes in how you go about your days and nights. 
Generation assumptions
Lets assume your system is an 8kw inverter, 12x600w panels and 15kWh battery pack - this will go for about 170k at today's prices. On a normal sunny day those panels will generate between 35 and 45 KWh (units) of power when its not so cloudy. When cloudy that amount goes down so we will get between 17.5 and 22.5KWh. So monthly you generate between 510 and 1350 units of electricity
Battery assumptions
Lets also assume that you set your battery to discharge to 50% so approx 7.5kwh of that daily generation will go to recharge the batteries. This leaves you with between 28 and 38 units on a perfect day to use for the house and between 10 and 15 units on a cloudy day
Consumption assumptions
A standard home uses between 15 and 30 units per day. YMMV. Things of course that influence this include heating and cooling, older appliances and lights etc. So per month you are using between 450 and 900 units of electricity. A portion of this usage will be covered by the panels during the day and batteries at night but on cloudy days you may have to draw from the grid.

This will depend in the type of install you want to do.
If your loads are high in the day you can opt for a on grid system without batteries. The upfront is lower.
If your loads are high at night you will nee a lot off batteries making the upfront cost higher.
With both type of installs you will save money in the long run.
With the increase in the electricity price the payback will also increase year by year.
 

This will depend in the type of install you want to do.
If your loads are high in the day you can opt for a on grid system without batteries. The upfront is lower.
If your loads are high at night you will nee a lot off batteries making the upfront cost higher.
With both type of installs you will save money in the long run.
With the increase in the electricity price the payback will also increase year by year.
 

My monthly consumption is approximately 500 kWh's, in summer I buy about 25-30 KWh's per month and winter about 100 kWh's 

No.
Inverter must be connected via RS232 cable to SA. Batteries have to be connected via CAN, RS485 or Console cable to SA. In your case, if you have Shoto batteries, there's a dedicated RS485 cable for it: