Hi all,

I am looking for BiFacial Panels. I want to buy 4 or so (400Watt/11Amp) but can’t find any at the usual online suspects. 
Plan is to put them vertically an orient them West / East. 

Any contacts?
 

Thanks

Like this?

https://onlineshop.gcsolar.co.za/product/lr4-72hbd-425-455m/

 

I cannot quite picture what you intend to do with them? If you mount them perpendicular to the ground, you will not get a lot out of them...

Edited September 13, 20214 yr by P1000

8 hours ago, P1000 said:

Like this?

https://onlineshop.gcsolar.co.za/product/lr4-72hbd-425-455m/

 

I cannot quite picture what you intend to do with them? If you mount them perpendicular to the ground, you will not get a lot out of them...

Thanks. I forgot about this site. I normally ignore sites that advertise ex-Vat. If they ignore things like the VAT act that prohibits this, I often wonder what else they ignore - like shipping your online orders 😜

As to why. I am researching and considering the vertical installation of these panels in a West (good side) / East (back side) orientation. 
 

https://www.ee.co.za/article/bifacial-solar-pv-modules-give-increased-power-output-potential.html#.XncAKyWxUlR

I have attached 2 articles as to why I am exploring this.

I have limited space and my 6 north facing panels over produce during peak midday times, but I get nothing after 17:00.
 

So I am moddeling my 3 options. 
- exporting

- another battery

- late afternoon and early morning production to better match load. 

So I needed to know the price ofthese things to do the math. 

I see. It would be interesting to see the calculations. It seems that you could expect up to 70% of the panel rating from the rear.

 

About the VAT - that is annoying, but is standard for business to business sites, which is their primary market. I only linked that one, because for some reason it was in my history, so it popped up before I searched google.

Won’t there be a wind issue with the panels mounted vertically 

15 minutes ago, P1000 said:

About the VAT - that is annoying, but is standard for business to business sites, which is their primary market. I only linked that one, because for some reason it was in my history, so it popped up before I searched google.

Standard practice but illegal! Even if B2B

5 minutes ago, Tariq said:

Won’t there be a wind issue with the panels mounted vertically 

Part of the issue. The guys at Lumax Energy from where I bought my KlipLok roof   Brackets and Clamps from will work with me and consider the wind. Might need to do a thin wire cable from the top at an angle. 

I have been considering something similar for a while now, so please report back on your progress.

Longi is apparently the world leader in bifacial panels, and are (or becoming) partners with ZA's Artsolar. 

I predict if I ever do this, it will not be in the very near future. The reason I say this is I had a paid calculation done which relied on a high bifaciality factor.

The bifaciality factor I chose was higher than mainstream values, with a view that when I got around to doing this, it would approximate a realistic value not a historical one.

That said, let me try and explain what and why I did what I did.

I am a believer that an MPPT should within its threshold be optimized. Because of the bifaciality factor of theses panels one side is more productive than the other.

This means if your N-S vertical panels have their best side facing E then the morning peak will determine the MPPT size necessary. The afternoon peak will essentially underutilize that same MPPT capability.

So I thought, what if I didn't line up the panels exactly N-S, but offset them so that the sun's arc favoured the afternoon peak (at the expense of the morning peak), so that both peak's were the same size. That way I could use a smaller (read cheaper) MPPT that was fully utilized at both the am and pm peaks. My thinking was that at noon production would be low, so I could possibly also add a north-facing string and achieve full utilization throughout the day.

OK, so far so good. Except that knowing that this offset must exist, is quite different from trying to estimate what it is.

So I contracted Charles Landau at solarpaneltilt.com and posed him with this question ( for a fee).

This is an extract from his reply and I hope it helps in your own quest:

Based on your information:
Latitude 28.746 degrees South
Panels mounted vertically (fence)
Bifaciality factor 83.5%
Calculation for the summer solstice

The two sides of the fence will produce the same amount of power if the good side is oriented 315° from North, which happens to be exactly Northwest.

Your situation is unlike any I've encountered previously, so unfortunately I don't have any intuition of what the result would be at a different latitude or different day of the year. To determine that would require a new calculation, and a new fee.

This latitude approximates Kimberley or Ladysmith (KZN), the bifaciality factor I assumed was at the pinnacle of what could be achieved at the time, with the idea that this value would be commonplace by the time I got around to doing this. I chose the summer solstice as I figured this would be the day of the year that the peak disparity would be at its greatest.

If this information is helpful good luck to you.

 

 

 

 

Edited September 14, 20214 yr by phil.g00

I posted this on your other bifacial thread, but this one has way more info on it.

Bifacial factor for panels available in SA at the moment is around 70 to 80%, but will go up when N Type panels arrive later in the year.

It's an interesting topic and I've been thinking about how I'd test it out at home as well, based on articles I've been seeing about the positive performance of vertical PV systems. You would need to separate your MPPT strings into at least 3: North facing, East facing, West facing. That will allow you to maximise your power output curve. I saw a graph of this yesterday where the vertical mounting gives you a double hump output graph alongside your single hump of the North facing panels.

https://www.pv-magazine.com/2022/07/11/the-stabilizing-effect-of-vertical-east-west-oriented-pv-systems/

I've got 12x JA Solar Deep Blue 3.0 P type 540w panels on order for my upcoming system. Just installing them North facing at 15 degrees on a white painted IBR roof. Apparently we'll see the JA Solar Deep Blue 4.0 N type panels in December, at which point I'll be looking to add another 12 panels, most likely set up with an East string and a West string on the same white IBR roof. My installer uses a tool called Helioscope to do 3D positioning of your panels on satellite imagery and get estimated outputs, so once they have the data for the N Type panels I'll ask for an update

On 2021/09/13 at 8:44 PM, daniemare said:

Thanks. I forgot about this site. I normally ignore sites that advertise ex-Vat. If they ignore things like the VAT act that prohibits this, I often wonder what else they ignore - like shipping your online orders 😜

Agreed