Bl4d3

Very nice!

My saving this year will be 36000 rand. Will be paying off my system next year in June. A bit over 2 years payback.

COCT only cares about changes that affect the grid-facing characteristics of the system (AC side). Pure DC-side changes do not affect the grid and therefore usually don’t trigger re-registration or a new COC.
Scenario 1: Add more panels to the existing inverter (within inverter limits)
No re-registration required
No amended COC required
Why:
Panels are on the DC side. Inverter model, rating, and export capability remain unchanged
Anti-islanding and grid protection are unchanged
Important conditions:
Must remain within inverter:
Max PV power
Max Voc (cold conditions!)
MPPT current limits
No AC wiring or protection changes
This is why COCT does not require an amended COC for DC-side-only upgrades the COC covers the electrical installation, not panel count.
Scenario 2: Add a second inverter with additional strings:
Re-registration required
New or supplementary COC required
Why:
Inverter capacity changes
AC wiring and protection change
Grid connection characteristics change
You’ll need: Updated SSEG application
Updated Single Line Diagram (SLD)
Export limit confirmation
Cable upgrade if existing wiring (e.g. 6 mm²) is no longer adequate
This is a material system change and must be declared.
Bottom line:
If the AC side and inverter configuration stay the same, COCT doesn’t care.
Once you change inverter count, AC wiring, or export capability, paperwork is required.
This is why DC-side upgrades do not need an amended COC, even though many people assume they do.

Happened to my parents this past weekend. They bought as much as they could before the increase. Since then, they havent bought any units because they have about 2000 units in the meter.
They still used the utility to run the oven + charge up batteries, but didnt need to buy.
Come Sunday, power is off. They phoned CoCT who sent someone out within an hour. They were told that they were disconnected because they are clearly tampering with the meter. A new meter was fitted and they lost all 1500 remaining units. They were told they're now being investigated but not to expect to get any of their units back and they wont get any answers for at least 2 months.
 

My calculation was based off of my current system costing R55000 with a saving of roughly R1100 per month, gives me an ROI of 4.1.
Funny enough, I just did the calculation, if I buy another battery for R14000 (Cyclone F5 from Solarway Suppliers), that takes my overall system cost to R69000. Bearing in mind, this system costs includes all costs associated with the system such as raspberry pi, solar assistant, mistakes I made with wrong conduit, wrong breakers, etc.
R69000 / R1400 = 49.2 / 12 = 4.1 ROI.
This calculation doesnt take winter into account or yearly increases in electricity. I will be able to provide more accurate data after 12 months of continuous use.

My system was considerably cheaper than most because I did the bulk of the work myself, call it 95% the install I did myself. Granted, I made some mistakes, it was still considerably cheaper than using an installer.
System was still inspected and connected to DB by an electrician and electrical engineer has signed off.

My systems performance so far:

Assuming I sale R1100 this month and R1100 next month, my average monthly saving would be at R930.
I've since installed a 2nd battery in July which brought down my grid usage considerably. At this rate, ROI is 6.93 years.
I have done some changes since my last posting here which has taken my final install cost to R77285.40incl for the inverter, 8 panels and 2 batteries, with hook up which I've already used

My systems performance so far:

Assuming I sale R1100 this month and R1100 next month, my average monthly saving would be at R930.
I've since installed a 2nd battery in July which brought down my grid usage considerably. At this rate, ROI is 6.93 years.
I have done some changes since my last posting here which has taken my final install cost to R77285.40incl for the inverter, 8 panels and 2 batteries, with hook up which I've already used

Will see the generation at my house in summer but starting to break 3MW per month after adding some panels on east/west roof.

I've never tried to be honest. I've only ever reached 5kw as I try to manage the loads as best as possible.

I think @Bl4d3 meant direction not orientation.

Thank you for all the replies. I just bought a combinder box ready to he installed.

My budget solution to solve this, is to shift the entire string up. My geyser is whats casting the shadow, so shifting the string up should solve my problem. My intention is then to add 2 more panels below, landscape, and shift them all the way over to the left.

Paying R3.37kw/h in Cape Town with a monthly R340 connection charge

Figured it out, was being an idiot. Can be updated in the app when connected to the dongle directly.
Looks like I now have 17A MMPT input as well

System Update:
Generator input added. This was done with 6mm cable, a dual pole 25A isolator, and a 32A CEE plug on the outside wall.
Added an additional battery and neatened up the battery cable from the fuse holder to the inverter.
Next item on the to-do list is the route the battery cables between the batteries a bit neater and to cover the earth and comms cables on the left battery with conduit.:

Also enjoying the sun

Loosing power on PV 2 because I positioned that string like an idiot and now a shadow is casting on the bottom of 2 panels

Also enjoying the sun

Loosing power on PV 2 because I positioned that string like an idiot and now a shadow is casting on the bottom of 2 panels

Yeah, me too... been painful having to part with some cash going to eskom.

I'm running the same inverter with panels that have a 14.08A short Circuit Amps without issue.
The inverter starts clipping when it hits 13A to protect itself.

I've only seen clipping happen on cloudy days as my batteries weren't charged and when the sun shun, it maxed out.
With that, it has never been a problem as the inverter clips the input.

Solarway has a similar unit called the Cyclone F15 with 280Ah of capacity.
If its anything like their F5, then its good quality with phenomenal aftersales support.

Had a similar problem at my parents house

Front row was casting a shadow on the 2nd road, the solution was to lower the angle massively and slide the panels forward.
As you can see in the above, it over hangs the IBR roof slightly which isnt ideal, and at the lower angle, there is some lost efficiency, however, this is made up by the considerable increase in performance from not having shading on the rear 5 panels.

Just the bank.
I've wired mine like the below diagram.
Positive coming from Pack 1 and Negative from Pack 2, this ensures equal balancing when charging.
Blue line is the battery comms between the 2 batteries connected using the RS485 ports.
Green line is the comms to the inverter connected via the CAN port.

One of the down sides of printing with ABS is that if you don't use an enclosure to maintain a high temperature, the print begins to warp due to rapid cooling.
This is with a 100°C print bed and 235°C nozzle temperature, cooling fans off.
As I recently moved in, I've yet to setup my enclosure.
The enclosure traps heat in which allows the print to gradually cool, preventing the print from warping. To try and minimize this further, I printed the Pi case with a 10mm brim to give the case more surface area to stick to the print bed.

Just the bank.
I've wired mine like the below diagram.
Positive coming from Pack 1 and Negative from Pack 2, this ensures equal balancing when charging.
Blue line is the battery comms between the 2 batteries connected using the RS485 ports.
Green line is the comms to the inverter connected via the CAN port.

Yes. Running comms with the battery.
Battery is set to Lithium and setting is option 2, same for Pylon.
I have also added another battery last week

Thanks for all the replies. We ended up going with 28 x 550w Canadian Solar panels, 3 x Luxpower SNA-6000 inverters and 6 x 5KW Revov batteries that the installer supplied at the same price as Ecohub. I bought a second hand 36U cabinet that we put on it's back for the batteries.

We did have some issues with the installation, some code on the inverters was wrong so it couldn't communicate with the batteries. Turns out Luxpower changed the code from their manual to the actual inverters for some reason. Then the system kept on tripping the earth breaker, turns out the previous owner of the house had a 20A earth breaker installed so when the inverters were pulling power from Eskom it tripped the whole system. Installed a 63A earth breaker and now it is humming along very nicely. Today will be the first time we have it running 100% so will see how it goes.