WildM

Hello To those who are looking at batteries and are as overwhelmed as I was, here is a spreadsheet that I created that contains as much information as I could gather on majority of the batteries on the market. Please note that I focused on mainly 1C batteries and batteries that were recommended. I left prices out of the equation because they fluctuate too often. The info was pulled from the battery data sheets and warranty documents. I have not made a decision as to which battery to go for, it will most probably come down to stock availability and price too but the front runners for me are Greenrich, BSL and Sunsynk. Does anyone know if the Sunsynk is a true 1C battery? I am not sure about this as there is conflicting information out there. Feel free to fill in the gaps if you have the information that I was not able to obtain. This took me a really long time so I hope this helps someone. 5kWh Battery comparison.xlsx

@Sc00bs gold, thank you!

Thanks @Sc00bs and you couldn’t apply for the switchover online right? You had to physically complete forms and go hand them in? That’s the only way I can see from looking online.

Exactly this. I work full time and have a baby to take care of so this process is taking me extremely long as I can only do my research some evenings and over the weekend. Last week I woke up in a daze and asked my baby if she wanted her ‘battery’ instead of saying ‘bottle’. Crazy. I started researching towards the end of last year already and I am still trying to figure out what we really need. I was very tempted to simply close my eyes and pull the trigger on a system this past week after having a 36 hour power outage in our area BUT the money we spend on this system comes out of savings for education and a home renovation, so I would rather make triple sure and not waste money. Having said that I have no problem spending the money on the right system.

So I will essentially be paying almost double the amount of money for Pylontechs to get the equivalent rate of discharge of other 1C batteries? To throw another spanner in the works though, a lot of these 1C battery data sheets still suggest that you should stick to a 0.5C rate of discharge? So that pretty much means you might as well go for Pylontechs? Or am I misunderstanding what these data sheets are suggesting?

Thank you so much, this is very valuable, much appreciated.

Hi guys Once you have switched to prepaid, do you no longer have to pay the service charge and network charge to COJ?

100% agree with you @Peter V. I worry about this because I would not know how to confirm/check this. I could ask and the installer might just tell me ‘yes the inverter supports the battery’, he performs a workaround and I would never know! Is there a simple way to check this using the data sheets of the inverter/batteries?

Hi @Nexuss please elaborate on the counting of cycles? And what are they if not lifepo4?

How does one go about checking this? I would like to do this for our household to double check the system that we are considering.

Hi everyone. I am completely new on the forum and doing my research to ensure that we don’t waste money (specifically on the batteries) whilst we embark on this solar journey. So far, we have had 5 solar companies come to our house in JHB to quote on a solar system and I am yet to find people who will perform a proper needs analysis and not simply tell you to go with Sunsynk batteries and inverter because that is ‘what everyone else has’. I am mostly worried about the reliability of the batteries we purchase and the after sales service. After reading this article https://www.solarquotes.com.au/blog/battery-testing-final-report/ , I am worried that most of the batteries being recommended to us by these guys are going to go down the same path of doom as the majority of the batteries mentioned in this report. We have settled on an 8KW Deye inverter and JA solar panels to match and have decided to prioritize having more solar panels installed for now than go crazy on the batteries since we both work from home and use electricity mostly during daylight hours. We also have no problem changing our behavior if it means saving money. We have been recommended the following batteries so far: Volta, Evo, Revov, Hubble, Sunsynk, Dyness, Greenrich, BYD. Strangely, none of these guys have recommended/quoted on Pylontechs. One of the guys who came to see us recommended Voltas/Evos (despite there being no reviews or much on the internet about these batteries) over Pylontechs. This now blows my mind after looking at these battery test results. Have any of you had experience with any of these brands/had these batteries installed for a while and can vouch for any of them? Or experienced the after sales service from any of them? Help/opinions/advice would be greatly appreciated! I don’t want to make a R30k+ mistake.

I am having a look at batteries too and would really appreciate if you could share which two brands and which one you would rather choose and why?