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Regie

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Everything posted by Regie

  1. It is just the winter temp. Don,t worry
  2. OK. Power went off 8h30 in Vasco. They wont call it loadshedding
  3. Check Bloomberg report on Tesla batteries
  4. TTT You nailed it! Wind turbines are problematic. Most of the problems actually comes from bad charge controllers. Wind charge controllers are way behind in technology. I wish that somebody can sometime soon make a good charge controller with multiple inputs, i.e rpm sensing, external wind speed meter to start with. The controllers currently, is like a "one size fits all". MPPT charge controllers does not work well with wind turbines, cause it takes time for the MPPT to sync and wind speed varies all the time. In my case I found that PWM controller works better then the MPPT, cause it grabs every bit of energy from the gust to the more stable winds. This past winter there were only a few days that the wind turbine played it's role in keeping the batteries above 70%. Currently i have a 600W turbine that's running with a 360W solar panel set-up, connected to a auxiliary battery bank (12X110amp *48V bank).I use the turbine to keep the auxiliary bank topped up, this is my emergency stash. If you were on an open plane and had a 15 meter or plus pole to mount a turbine, in a good wind area, then go for it. From the turbines I've used, i would only vouch for the 600W Windmax/Pegasus turbine. If you know of a decent charge controller , pleas let me know.
  5. Hi Sarel Congratulations on your installation. You have a nice set-up here and i have a system similar to yours. Just be very careful with the way you earth the system, even the so-called pro's get it wrong sometimes when it comes to this type of system.It's not grid tie system nor a off-grid system, its what the yanks call an island system, as there is still utility power connected to your property. Enjoy the energy of the sun.
  6. Does all the charging take place at the same time. Night and day temp differs so does battery density with every 2degrees.
  7. What about temperature differences when charging
  8. Are you going to integrate the buses charging system (alternator) with the solar charging system, if so you must determine the voltage the bus is running on (12V/24V) If you are going to integrate the charging systems there is 2 ways. The one is to have a blocking diode so that your charge current from the bus does not flow towards your charge controller and solar panel. The other way is to wire a relay into the buses accessories system on the ignition side, this will make the solar system go open circuit once the bus starts and in this way the buses alternator will charge the batteries while the bus is running. Solar panels and vehicles can be tricky the biggest panels i would suggest you use is 90W panels (2 or 4 of them). You will also have to redo all the silicone between the frame and the glass, meaning put a second layer of silicone on to attached the frames better to the glass. You really need to do this as they do come loose. As you will not always park in direct sunlight (when on a camp site) you can make the panels removable with a a long cable so that you can park in the shade and put the panels in the sun, so take care when you built the frame to attached your panels too. If you go bigger then 90W panels you will have to have custom made panels as the frames would have to be different. Please take note that most charge controllers cannot be combined with your vehicle charging system, You can also google for local mobile solar power companies i am sure they would be able to assist you.
  9. Hi Ballar The points made is valid , however i think one of your strings on your solar panels must have a dry joint(loose) even a PWM controller's output wont be this low. There is an easy way to find out if one of your strings have loose joint if you can get to the panels easily. You will have to put load on your inverter during the day in good sunlight so the output from your panels is maxed. You must then shade each string of panels (just one panel in a string will do) with a piece of cardboard for example. The string that is not making a difference on the output is the one that got the loose joint. But lets not jump the gun, check all your connections in your combiner box firstly. Just two weeks ago i had a problem with one of my mobile solar units and one of the strings had a faulty connection in the combiner box. Hope this helps.
  10. Hi Wet Sorry you battling with your installation and this is a tricky one. Do you have a ripple relay in your DB board? Cause this can cause a problem. Then there is also DC to DC output ripple (noise), From 10:00 to 11:00 this is when your panels start to produce serious power and the meter might be picking up high frequency noise, Mike you've never had problems with the installation of the infini, What is the DC voltage that you normally bring into the infini from the panels? Maybe this also plays a role. Good Luck and keep us posted A perfect DC supply produces one EMF continuously with no variation. a supply is created from an AC source this is not possible. There is always some decrease in EMF during the times that the AC volts drop to zero. As far as possible the variation represents a sine wave of the same frequency as the original AC supply. If the DC part is filtered out by perhaps a capacitor we are left with an AC signal whose mean value is zero. Now find the RMS of this resultant signal. This is the ripple voltage. And expressing this as a fraction of the DC component gives the ripple factor. The theoretical meaning is a measure of the quality of the supply. i.e how well it approximates the theoretical perfect DC supply. A ripple factor of zero is the perfect rectifier system.
  11. Hi The inverter must be connected to the batteries and not the charge controller. The charge controller's load out cannot handle the inverter load. Hope this is going to help solve your problem. Regards
  12. Congratulations , this is really a nice system you have installed. I am not an expert but can only provide help from my own experience, so i have a few questions for you. Was this house on the grid? What do you use for water heating and cooking? Like Mike said these batteries needs to be checked, hope they did not have too much shelf life, also your MPPT charge controller needs to be set-up properly. If it goes from one mode to the next too quickly, the batteries wont charge properly. You will have to get a KW meter to check what your power consumption is on the AC side. From there you'll get a better understanding on what your big power consumers are?
  13. The only precaution you have to take, is not to take your PV array's grounding to the same as your house grounding, Had this problem a few years ago. PV array must have it's own grounding, DC negative (batteries) must have it's own grounding and the AC side must also have it's own grounding the rods must be a minimum of 3 meters apart. If you don't to this a short-circuit can become very expensive. Electricity always takes the easy path and before it goes to ground it blows up a few things if it is on one earth rod.
  14. Hi I agree, most people look at their total monthly electricity bill and then they want to determine how much solar they gonna need. If you do that you gonna need a lot of solar panels. Mike hope you got some batteries by now, even if it is just a few not to be left in the dark. Regards
  15. Hi Mike Do you know off hand what the dimensions is of the 235W Jinko panels as the project i'm busy with have limited space. Thanks
  16. Hi Mike Do you have a solar geyser? and if you do use it as a pre-heater for the gas system. How much battery storage capacity do you have currently? P.S pitty the grid tie fails when the grid fails
  17. Off-grid means to me, gas stove for cooking, solar or gas water heaters, solar panels and or wind turbine with a charge controller and battery bank, plus inverter for AC appliances. A lot of people overlook the important part, gas plays in an off-grid installation. Before I went into the solar panels, i installed a gas stove and that brought down the electricity bill. The next thing was getting a solar geyser installed. The gas stove and solar geyser plays a big role in an off-grid installation. How many of you guys have a gas stove and solar/gas water heating?
  18. Wetkit - The batteries you currently have is Fiamm- mono lite 100 Amp, if I look at the picture displayed. They are really good batteries as their cycle life is good. I've had 4 x 180 Amp of the same brand and 6 x 100 amp also of the same brand for the last 4 years. They just don't like cold weather. The cost is not bad and you will get good cycle life out of it, you will just need more than what you have, as you know. I have 12 x 110 amps AGM's of a different brand , but the price is not worth the hype and they are not that forgiving.
  19. Hi Korn Would like to know if you have nay information on the following batteries: Nortstar NSB 110FT? I cannot find any info on the performance in off-grid application. It's a year later know but your discussion on batteries is very informative. A lot of people tend to forget that in winter you get less out off your batteries then in summer. Batteries like temperatures between 22 and 27 degrees. Also if you put 60amps in it does not equate to 60amps out, you should be putting in 30% more than what you take out. (people don't forget rate of charge and rate of discharge=battery bank size) It's winter and it's always tough this time of year in off-grid applications. Thanks
  20. Hi guys Leaves it sound like a plan. Thanks for your replies. Regards Regie
  21. I tried a GTI with a high voltage wind turbine (2 KW).The problem is the time it takes to sync with the grid voltage. It takes a few minutes to sync and the wind speed always varies. To me it seems it is not viable to try and connect small wind turbine with GTI, maybe with the bigger turbines 10 KW and up it will work better. I could be doing something wrong cause i am not an expert in this, it seemed like a fairly straight forward set-up to me. Has anybody tried connecting a small wind turbine to a GTI and did you experience any problems in doing this? Regards Regie
  22. Hi Jakes Living off grid have a lot of challenges. From my experience you will have to also build a small 12Volt system as a back-up to the big system. That said, hot water in winter can be a problem. If suggest you try a low pressure solar geyser and a some type of a metal fireplace i.e jet master. You can place a radiator (from a car made of aluminium) a half inch in an enclosure behind the fireplace, this will allow you to use the radiator reverse to what is is being used for in a car. You will be able to heat water while heating up your home with the fire place. The piping is fairly easy, you will be needing a few one way valves. Wind turbines are far less efficient then solar. The problem with wind turbines are the charge controllers. If you do get a turbine put is 12 meters high and get a PWM controller and you will harvest the power from all gust winds more effective. Hope this information will assist you in your off-grid system. Off Grid the way to go
  23. Regie

    Regie - Solar Wind Hybrid Home

    Home on the Cape Flats. Solar & Wind System
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