jasweb

I remember an old lady, who's son visited her on the weekend and asked if he could charge his EV (car)...
 

The process will vary from municipality to municipality, but there will be things that are common as well. This is because part of the application is to ensure compliance with the relevant national standards.

So you are going to need to provide a line drawing of your PV system showing how it connects to the AC supply and to your DB, and this will need to signed by a suitably qualified engineer. You are going to have to prove that your inverter is on the list of certified inverters.
I don't know about the procedure in Tshwane, but when I registered in Jo'burg the City came out and inspected, and the inspection included things like labeling on the DB and on the box which holds the main breaker (IE the point at which my property connects to the grid). They did conduct some tests. They did point to a couple of things on the line drawing and say "please show us this" - those questions directed at the installer and the engineer (or their represtantives), not at me.

So I don't think that the regular person can navigate the certification process by themselves unless they on good terms with somebody who does have the neccessary qualifications to sign off on the system.

There are companies that do SSEG registrations, and I would recommend that you deal with one of them. The guys I dealt with took care of the entire process. I spent zero time filling in forms and standing in queues. They prepared the required drawings, took care of getting the test certificate for the inverter, the whole tooty.

So I recommend taking that route. Get the right guys and they will charge you, yes, but they will also save you a whole load of hassle.

Well, at least with the Victron charger, you could switch to Lithium batteries at a later stage.  The small-form-factor Victron chargers are IP65.  That is a good and a bad thing.  They are waterproof which might be handy for something living close to a gate motor?   But IP65 means Victron embedded the electronics is some potting or rubber compound making this charger unserviceable if ever something would go wrong.

Hi everyone, so we have found the problem.  So the dip switches seems to have only sorted out the problem for a short while and the problem came back.
The problem was BMS communication cable was plugged into the "Battery connector"  after plugging it in the RS485 port all issues went away and we can now pull over 5kw without any errors or tripping.
Thanks for everyone's help, I really appreciate it.

Green fields is correct with his statement about "On Grid always on". If that box is checked, the aux will always be on as long as the grid is connected. It will only default to the solar settings during load shedding. I found this excellent explanation by Craig Boswell (can't find where I downloaded it from) But
Sunsynk 8.8kW Hybrid Aux setup.pdf

Thanks to @Bloubul7and all the other contributors. This is my HA dashboard. It has all I need to view at a glance. (PS: really impressed with the Sunsynk)
 

A Sunsynk has local support. If this thing breaks you will be dealing with Sunsynk directly in Randburg. If a Deye inverter breaks down you left to supply chain between here, China & a 3rd party supplier in between. 
That can be very frustrating. Choose wisely folks. 
The machine is identical on the inside. On software/ Firmware level there are differences. Actually in terms of making the interface more simplistic on my opinion Sunsynk can do even more to make the user experience more western. But give them time, eventually they will get there. Otherwise both of them are very solid work horses. I'd opt for local support & repair centre tho. Just my preference. 

I have been in this rabbit hole for a long time and the more I look at better priced system the more I want to by the expensive ones but also could not justify the cost. I also import Sonoff so we designed boards that could migrate the load to Eskom around 3 pm and back to Solar at 9 am. They are quiet effective and using Sonoff, IFTTT and Broadlink the Automation shuts the aircons down with the broadlink remote moves the load and then turns them back on. Also did that with the Sonoff's in Scene's. It works really well thats how we built and designed the Loadshedder because the boards cost's are higher. We got on a average day using a Growwatt 5000, with 9x310 panels around 4kW a day more.  When load shedding would kick in we still moved the non-critical devices to Eskom which of course would be off the inverter.  Then around a year in of testing we simplified it and built the Loadshedder which just shuts devices down and keeps the cost much lower and has so many benefits like delayed startup and small delay's between device's resulting in smaller dips. The house goes into a low power consumption mode when there is no sun and load shedding starts.
 
 

Congrats Guys more giveaways loading 😉

Congratulations again!

I was talking about the panels' model # / specs. 😀 Or maybe you have the spec sheet that you can share?
Azimuth is the direction that your roof (and thus your panel) is facing relative to True North. You can get it to a reasonable degree of accuracy using Google maps.
Azimuth and pitch (or tilt angle) are important to know, because the panel's specs are derived at optimal conditions, and your own installation probably deviates from this. If you know what this  deviation is, then you can more accurately assess the degree at which the panel's performance would be degraded, and those voltages might not be so scarily high after all.
Kempton Park is roughly 26° 6' 0" S / 28° 13' 59" E. As a rule of thumb, optimal pitch is equal to the Latitude, so for your install this will be slightly over 26 degrees (relative to level ground).
Here's a vid explaining it: 
 
Location is also important for historic weather conditions, to size panel arrays you will need the lowest temperature recorded in the past say 10 or 20 years, this is because the panels' specs are derived at STC and / or NOCT, and lower temperatures than these cause the panel to produce more power than the spec sheet. You can get this information from a site like this.   
Once you have all of this info, here is a good guide on how to use it to do string sizing, and to take into account temperature coefficient.

If one can use the power in day time then I suppose one might as well blend when panels are fitted to the Kodak instead of the need for a grid tied. The grid tied is just great as you can save on any load on the install as it just adds the power to your AC from the grid.
Just looking back at my Solis grid tied and Axpert 3kVA for back up I can just say in nearly 4 years I have never had the need to press a button on the Solis apart from when I want to see how much power it is currently generating or to get other stats like monthly total or the previous month total. It took 3 years to pay back in savings.

Don't forget to enter. We will be giving away the 3.6 after the 5 has come to a conclusion. Excited for some one to make use of this battery!
Sincerely
Jason

You have it spot on. Can be risky if one needs software or repairs and cannot get it. Then a R2th saving was not worth it.

I been crawling the interwebs for good deals. It is amazing how many suppliers are out there, and some of them are clearly scams 
Best deal I found is:
Growatt SPF5000ES with Wifi dongle R12500 / ellyhillpower
Dyness 4.8kwh li battery R24000 / jcsolarpanels
R36500 Total
Its probably not the best time to be looking for deals in the middle of stage 4 when everyone in SA is shopping.. 🙄

Hi Gents. 
Please stay on topic. We very excited to give this unit away. Unit is currently in testing.
Soon soon. 
Sincerely
Jason

Oh I see now, it's a "Super Capacitor", not a "Supercapacitor" lol

Yeah, once I win this I only need the panels, inverter, 2 new DBs, cables, brackets and 100 other things (and a clever Sparkie to wire it all up)

Stay off the acid, get some Lithium Love! 😁

Here's my 2 cents' worth about batteries with a high C rating. My experience with the system at my previous house was that such a battery could have saved me some trouble. I had a 5kW Sunsynk with 2 Dyness B3 batteries of 3.6kWh each, which are 0.5C batteries. Due to the layout of the house I had to have all plugs on the essential load. For example there was one plug in the garage, that the garage door motor used, but also the washing machine and MOERSE 3.5kW whirlpool tumble dryer..  In the kitchen the Microwave and Dishwasher were on the same circuit. Long story short is that I had to keep close tabs on load shedding schedules in conjunction with dishwashing and laundry activity, because if that tumble dryer's heater kicked in without sunshine or Eskom to back it up, I had to go manually reset the batteries.

Hi Guys so here is another GIVE AWAY!
 
We are busy with a test and review of the GREENRICH U-P5000 1.5C 4.96 kWh Lithium Battery 
 
Yes we will be giving one away to one lucky Power Forum Member in a Lucky Draw 
 
I will post details on how to qualify for this GIVE AWAY soon watch this space!
 
Sponsored by Elleyhill Power (PTY) LTD
 
So some educational information about these batteries 
 
As you all know Greenrich batteries have been in the market for some time now and so far we have had mostly positive feedback from installer and end users alike.
 
What makes the battery desirable is the 1.5C Rating this means the battery can discharge at 1.5 times its capacity rating.
 
Why would that be so great?
 
Here is why if you have a 8KW inverter discharge the battery at 8kWh then this 4.96 kWh battery will be able to absorb a charge rate between 0.5C & 0.75C and a discharge rate at 1.5C without tripping the benefits of that is that when you start of on your solar journey you don't have to break the bank with just one 4.96 kWh Greenrich Battery because your 8KW inverter will struggle to reach the discharge rates of the battery. 
 
The 4.96 kWh is also inter compatible with the 3.686 kWh Greenrich Lithium if you require to expand to additional capacity.
 
This Lithium battery is the only Lithium battery in the market that offers true 1.5C discharge ratings. With 1.5C discharge rates, the Greenrich lithium battery has a much higher power output compared to other 0.5C or 1C lithium batteries. 
 
The cell technology in the battery is LFP cylindrical high density cells which can do up to 2C however for longevity the BMS limits the discharge  to 1.5C and charger rates to 0.5C continuous and boost charge rate for 5 minutes to 0.75C
Features:
High density energy
Long Life span
(10 years life performance warranty, >6000cycles)
More Capacity possibility (15 in parallel)
Quick Charging and discharging
Overvoltage protection；
Undervoltage protection;
Short-circuit protection;
Low temperature charge protection；
High temperature charge protection；
Low temperature discharge protection；
High temperature discharge protection;
Charge over-current protection;
Discharge over-current protection;
Dormancy function;
RS485 communication;
CAN communication.
RS232 communication
Compatibility tested with many inverters
Sunsynk
Deye
Growatt
Voltronic
Kodak
EV Tech being used for Energy storage
Relationship between CAPACITY and POWER
USABLE capacity
Safety
Compatibility
Application environment
UP5000 16S21P= 336 Cells (46000mAh per cell)
Battery specifications:
Weight: 51 kg
Dimensions:        55 × 47 × 30 cm
Battery Type: Lithium Ion
Nominal Energy: 4960 Wh
Depth of discharge: 95.00 %
Voltage: 51.2v
Normal Discharging Temperature Greenrich.-10°C to 60°C.   
Others Batteries 45°C max
Normal Charging Temperature 0°C to 50°C
Continuous Discharge Rate (Normal Use): 7 680 W
Surge Discharge Rate (100 Milli Seconds): 17 920 W
Maximum Charge Rate (5 Minutes): 4 096 W
Compatible with many of South Africa’s popular Hybrid inverters’ brands.
Built-in BMS that protects the cell from abnormal temperature, current, voltage, SoC, and SoH.
DATA SHEET

Technology evolves. Remember Moore's Law? Turned out to be a narrative repeated by the uninformed as fact. True science challenges that which someone tries to enforce as the holy grail. 

Hi Guys so here is another GIVE AWAY!
We are busy with a test and review of the Greenrich 1.5C 3.686 kWh Lithium Battery 
Yes we will be giving one away to one lucky Power Forum Member in a Lucky Draw 
I will post details on how to qualify for this GIVE AWAY soon watch this space!
Sponsored by Elleyhill Power (PTY) LTD
So some information to wet your appetite about these batteries 
Greenrich batteries have been in the market for some time now and so far we have had mostly positive feedback from installer and end users alike.
What makes the battery desirable is the 1.5C Rating this means the battery can discharge at 1.5 times its capacity rating.
Why would that be so great?
Here is why if you have a 5KW inverter discharge the battery at 5kWh then this 3.686 kWh battery will be able to absorb a charge rate between 0.5C & 0.75C and a discharge rate at 1.5C without tripping the benefits of that is that when you start of on your solar journey you don't have to break the bank with just one 3.686kWh Greenrich Battery because your 5KW inverter can never reach the discharge rates of the battery. 
The 3.686 kWh is also inter compatible with the 4.95 kWh Greenrich Lithium if you require to expand to larger capacity.
This Lithium battery is the only Lithium battery in the market that offers true 1.5C discharge ratings. With 1.5C discharge rates, the Greenrich lithium battery has a much higher power output compared to other 0.5C or 1C lithium batteries. 
The cell technology in the battery is LFP cylindrical high density cells which can do up to 2C however for longevity the BMS limits the discharge  to 1.5C and charger rates to 0.5C continuous and boost charge rate for 5 minutes to 0.75C
Battery specifications:
Weight: 41.5kg
Battery Type: Lithium Ion
Nominal Energy: 3686 Wh
Depth of discharge: 95.00 %
Voltage: 51.2v
Continuous Discharge Rate (Normal Use): 5000 W
Maximum Discharge Rate (5 Minutes): 5500 W
Surge Discharge Rate (15 Seconds): 6144 W
Maximum Charge Rate (5 Minutes): 2560 W
Compatible with many of South Africa’s popular Hybrid inverters’ brands.
Built-in BMS that protects the cell from abnormal temperature, current, voltage, SoC, and SoH.
DATA SHEET
 
 

we have some giveaway's for Power Forum Members coming up too 😉