Hello,

From my question you will clearly see that I am not an electrical nor solar power expert, however, I just wanted to know the following:

1) I have a solar system with panels, batteries and inverter connected to my house main circuit. When I switch off the mains of the house should power still be delivered from the inverter to the house? 

2) Will the earth leakage in the main circuit board still trip? And would that also stop the power from the inverter to pass through the main circuit board to the rest of the house? 

Thanks

14 hours ago, Pjs100 said:

1) I have a solar system with panels, batteries and inverter connected to my house main circuit. When I switch off the mains of the house should power still be delivered from the inverter to the house?

Generally, yes, that's the whole idea. You might not be able to run your whole house for very long though. And often, heavy non-essential loads like the geyser will be wired on grid only, so such loads will get no power during a blackout, or switching off the big main breaker.

14 hours ago, Pjs100 said:

2) Will the earth leakage in the main circuit board still trip?

If everything is wired correctly, yes, they will trip when needed.

14 hours ago, Pjs100 said:

And would that also stop the power from the inverter to pass through the main circuit board to the rest of the house? 

It depends on where it(they) are wired. If before the inverter, then the inverter can still supply power from battery, which is dangerous. That's why it's essential to have RCDs after the inverter. It's also not a good idea to any breaker before the inverter, as there will likely be nuisance trips caused by the inevitable small capacitive leakage to earth that every inverter has. It might not trip until you have a particular load configuration, so it can be confusing as well as a nuisance.

If there are say two residual current breakers after the inverter, say one for lights and one for power, then when one trips, the other circuits will be unaffected. The same as if there wasn't an inverter there.

I'm not from South Africa, so I hope I haven't gotten any country-specific details wrong.

3 hours ago, Coulomb said:

Generally, yes, that's the whole idea. You might not be able to run your whole house for very long though. And often, heavy non-essential loads like the geyser will be wired on grid only, so such loads will get no power during a blackout, or switching off the big main breaker.

If everything is wired correctly, yes, they will trip when needed.

It depends on where it(they) are wired. If before the inverter, then the inverter can still supply power from battery, which is dangerous. That's why it's essential to have RCDs after the inverter. It's also not a good idea to any breaker before the inverter, as there will likely be nuisance trips caused by the inevitable small capacitive leakage to earth that every inverter has. It might not trip until you have a particular load configuration, so it can be confusing as well as a nuisance.

If there are say two residual current breakers after the inverter, say one for lights and one for power, then when one trips, the other circuits will be unaffected. The same as if there wasn't an inverter there.

I'm not from South Africa, so I hope I haven't gotten any country-specific details wrong.

Thanks for this. It's exactly what I want to know from a South Africa perspective. What are the regulations and or standards as far as this is concerned.