SilverNodashi

You can put a ball valve at the top of the JoJo tank, to automatically top it it up from Municipality, and then run your house directly from the tank. If the water pressure is a bit low, install a 3bar pressure pump

How are you connecting the Pi to the Mac?

Yes, you cut the plastic on those tabs away to get a cable in.

I know some companies charge between R2.5 and R4 per Watt.

I can help you, what exactly are you looking for?

In a DC system, it's perfectly fine to "break" just one input. + is normally broken, though - can be broken as well. Solar regulations require that we "break" both though. You need to put fuses in for protection, and then an isolator to safely switch disconnect the PV array from the MPPT in case of emergency.

I meant, us / we, those of us with solar systems

But we're already busy fixing it

I think a supercap will last longer?

I prefer to cater for worse case scenario's as well. We can't control, not predict erratic weather and I would rather be safe than sorry in this case.

Grid tie inverters, without batteries. do this as well. It will, for example, feed the full 2Kw PV available into the grid. If the house needs 2.5Kw, the remaining 500w will come from the grid.

And then you need to install a nother R150K solar system to charge it

Now, imagine that expense!

This is quite valuable information. For both the Victron and Voltronic inverters, the manuals state that float voltage should be 53.0V or 53.2V respectively and not 52, or thereabouts as you say.

In all honesty, thin film panels, like the Solar Frontier panels are designed completely different than Monocrystalline or Polycrystalline panels and generally perform much better. Since they're more expensive fewer people use them.

A microwave's input is often 2x it's rated output. That 500W microwave night use 1000W or perhaps 900W to run.

Those DB boards are rather sturdy and I prefer them over the cheaper ones at Voltex or ARB. They're a bit more expensive but very good quality.

Just keep in mind that that a 36 cell (10W) panel's efficiency is generally much lower than a 72 cell panels

He probably has to jump start it on cold mornings.

This is a good comparison. I have to add though that Victron's are rock solid and have a good track record. Though I also know of some Infinisolar's which have been running for 3 years.

Count me in.

Hands up! Who's Yingli solar panels are still working?

I didn't say it's not allowed to be installed in City Of Cape Town. I am saying that we can't rule what happened in another municipality as the golden rule for all. i.e. the rules of CoCT don't apply to City of Johannesburg, as example.

I think it's safe to say that the COCT rules don't (yet?) apply to SM so there's no need to worry about it. At least not at this stage?

Same here. My mom's alarm packed up so I took it out and see the MOV is blown. Ok, no worries, get a new one and replace it. Get a new one for R10. The trip to the supplier was far more expensive in terms of time and petrol. Replaced the MOV, nothing else looked blown, took it back to my mother's house and reinstalled it which probably took another 40 minutes to rewire everything in the tight space I had to work with. Test it. Same problem exist. I feel the heatsink and it still gets hot and the remove zone still don't work. So now a R10 job suddenly turns into a few hour's and up and drive to figure out what is wrong since we don't even have an alarm in the house. My conclusion, go buy a new alarm, even if cost R1500.