10 hours ago, PowerUser said:

I’m getting 686W at the moment. Had a peak of 1.4kW at 12pm under constant rain conditions from a 4.3kW array. 
May be you guys got the fake Chinese panels 🤣

May be all 5 brands of panels I have are fake but only when it's raining. 😂😂 Total 2.2kwh from 2.9kw string. 

Complete turnaround today, currently getting 2700w. It's a little surreal to be able to boil a kettle on solar alone and still have some power to charge the battery

We all got FREE solar panels wash! 😀

Yes today has good yield. 

As that music group A-ha use to sing : 'the Sun always Shines on Pv' 

Edited November 1, 20232 yr by BritishRacingGreen

Back to normal my side as well; currently at 20.5 kWh; on track for 26-30 units for today from my 4.55kWp PV Array. We missed you, Mr. Golden Sun.

This has got me thinking: in an extended outage during bad weather, we can still more-or-less scrape through on essentials use (because those are usually low power), but what are our options for backup water heating?

We perhaps wouldn't want to swap over to gas permanently (gas is way more expensive than free-energy-from-the-sun!), but what about a stand-by gas geyser to cope with extended outages in inclement weather for occasional use?

Is it feasible to pass electrically-heated water through a gas water heater - that gets left off the rest of the time?

2 hours ago, JayMardern said:

Back to normal my side as well; currently at 20.5 kWh; on track for 26-30 units for today from my 4.55kWp PV Array. We missed you, Mr. Golden Sun.

This has got me thinking: in an extended outage during bad weather, we can still more-or-less scrape through on essentials use (because those are usually low power), but what are our options for backup water heating?

We perhaps wouldn't want to swap over to gas permanently (gas is way more expensive than free-energy-from-the-sun!), but what about a stand-by gas geyser to cope with extended outages in inclement weather for occasional use?

Is it feasible to pass electrically-heated water through a gas water heater - that gets left off the rest of the time?

Yes gas back up geyser have been discussed in the water heating section and they seam to do the job well.

2 hours ago, JayMardern said:

Back to normal my side as well; currently at 20.5 kWh; on track for 26-30 units for today from my 4.55kWp PV Array. We missed you, Mr. Golden Sun.

This has got me thinking: in an extended outage during bad weather, we can still more-or-less scrape through on essentials use (because those are usually low power), but what are our options for backup water heating?

We perhaps wouldn't want to swap over to gas permanently (gas is way more expensive than free-energy-from-the-sun!), but what about a stand-by gas geyser to cope with extended outages in inclement weather for occasional use?

Is it feasible to pass electrically-heated water through a gas water heater - that gets left off the rest of the time?

Even on bad days you can get along using 2kwh heating a single 150L geyser once if using a heat pump. With your good day 26kwh sure there could be enough on bad days. It all depends how much of your other loads you can contain. 

5 hours ago, madness_za said:

Complete turnaround today, currently getting 2700w. It's a little surreal to be able to boil a kettle on solar alone and still have some power to charge the battery

So far already 7 times the yield of yesterday. I am expecting 97% for today of my best day this summer which was 13-14 Oct. 

49 minutes ago, Scorp007 said:

Even on bad days you can get along using 2kwh heating a single 150L geyser once if using a heat pump. With your good day 26kwh sure there could be enough on bad days. It all depends how much of your other loads you can contain. 

2kWh is half of my entire day's production yesterday - so in an outage on a day like that, there wouldn't be sufficient to run a heat pump as well as the essentials.

(Heck, my own peak production - at any point in the day - was just a measly 500W! Not enough to even start up a 2kW heat pump without grid 😐 )

 

Sunny weather like today is a different story of course: today, leaving a regular geyser powered on for twice the time required for a heatpump may use double (or more) the power for the same amount of water, but is still 100% PV since production is sufficient (over 4kW today) for several hours. Enough to heat 350l almost entirely using solar with just a basic pair of geysers.

But rainy days like yesterday are really, really different...

Edited November 1, 20232 yr by JayMardern

Yesterday was a bad day for solar but with the help of a constant load this afternoon and some cloud edge effect in the morning I managed 6,5x installed wattage for production today. some nice peaks at 6+kW this morning from my 5,5kWp array:

3 hours ago, JayMardern said:

2kWh is half of my entire day's production yesterday - so in an outage on a day like that, there wouldn't be sufficient to run a heat pump as well as the essentials.

(Heck, my own peak production - at any point in the day - was just a measly 500W! Not enough to even start up a 2kW heat pump without grid 😐 )

 

Sunny weather like today is a different story of course: today, leaving a regular geyser powered on for twice the time required for a heatpump may use double (or more) the power for the same amount of water, but is still 100% PV since production is sufficient (over 4kW today) for several hours. Enough to heat 350l almost entirely using solar with just a basic pair of geysers.

But rainy days like yesterday are really, really different...

Sorry for my wrong assumptions. With your 26-30kWh today and having a 4.55kW PV system I would not have thought on a bad day like yesterday your yield would be only about 1kWh. 

Members posted here got just less than 1hr of string value for a once in a few yrs bad day. 

It seems the gas option is the way to go. 

1 hour ago, Scorp007 said:

Sorry for my wrong assumptions. With your 26-30kWh today and having a 4.55kW PV system I would not have thought on a bad day like yesterday your yield would be only about 1kWh. 

Members posted here got just less than 1hr of string value for a once in a few yrs bad day. 

It seems the gas option is the way to go. 

I should’ve linked to the earlier post for clarity, my bad!

We had similarly bad production a few weeks back as well (once again, when it rained), this was definitely worse though!

I'm not sure what’s more surprising: how little difference light cloud cover ends up making (reduction by less than 20% even on mostly-light-grey cloudy days) or how large a difference rain clouds make (reduction by more than 80%!)

Our off-the-grid aspirations are in danger 🙂

Edited November 1, 20232 yr by JayMardern

1 hour ago, JayMardern said:

Our off-the-grid aspirations are in danger 🙂

What’s wrong with cold showers?

1 hour ago, JayMardern said:

 

Our off-the-grid aspirations are in danger 🙂

If ever you want to go off grid remember it is not for sissies and you will need to fork out fuel from time to time for that genny. 

And ja one needs a helping hand 😀😀😀

Edited November 1, 20232 yr by Scorp007

18 minutes ago, Scorp007 said:

If ever you want to go off grid remember it is not for sissies

Remember that includes borehole and french drain 😅😅

7 hours ago, PowerUser said:

What’s wrong with cold showers?

Better than no water. 

The rain here in Hillcrest kzn finally shoved off so  pollution free skies and clean panels.

I have 5.95 kw worth of panels and yesterday they spat out a high of 7.1kw while the maid was doing her bit.

They are 425 w Canadian solar.

Edited November 2, 20232 yr by Nicholas Strachan

Cloudy day here in JHB - haven't seen the sun all day - yet because they're not rain-clouds, production is a full 75% of normal (3kW vs 4kW) at present.

Astonishing how the type cloud makes such a difference, presumably because there's no rain forecast so these (thinner?) non-rain-clouds block much less irradiance than when rain is in the forecast (even before it actually rains).

So I'd guess that any automation based on whether could treat regular 'cloudy-all-day' days like today different to 'rainy-all-day' days since the former reduces production by just 25% and the latter annihilates it by 80%!

 

7.1Kwh so far despite the gloomy looking clouds

Is really not easy to get off the grid, you end up having to have a load of energy storage that you will probably only use for 2-3 days a month.

I am 90% off the grid and don't use any grid power for 25 days in the month. 

A few days of bad sun however and I need to use the grid. 

Blues is production, red consumption and purple is grid.

Am thinking that if I did want to disconnect from the grid totally, the most sensible option would be to have backup gas water heaters as they are the major consumer of energy on my property. 

Would be cool if I was able to producer methane gas (CH4) using electrolysis and excess solar power on the good days to power my water heaters/stove etc on those off days. Is being done a large scale but have never seen it on a small scale. Hydrogen gas is a just way to difficult to work with although easier to make. 

 

6 minutes ago, Sc00bs said:

Is really not easy to get off the grid, you end up having to have a load of energy storage that you will probably only use for 2-3 days a month.

I am 90% off the grid and don't use any grid power for 25 days in the month. 

A few days of bad sun however and I need to use the grid. 

Blues is production, red consumption and purple is grid.

Am thinking that if I did want to disconnect from the grid totally, the most sensible option would be to have backup gas water heaters as they are the major consumer of energy on my property. 

Would be cool if I was able to producer methane gas (CH4) using electrolysis and excess solar power on the good days to power my water heaters/stove etc on those off days. Is being done a large scale but have never seen it on a small scale. Hydrogen gas is a just way to difficult to work with although easier to make. 

 

The setup, safe production and storage costs seem to not be in favor  in urban areas. I can see it on farms definitely. 

So today in Gauteng i believe the solar irradiance is again much lower so expected lower solar production. Please keep on posting your array size in kwp the solar panel manufacturer the immediate surrounding ( Boksburg, Germiston Pta ect.) I am busy working on a model that could predict solar output by using irradiance in W/m² and i need data to compare against the model. Maybe i must start a new thread where all the data will be available for everyone.

Today irradiance  for Jhb.

Cpt,Kzn, Eastern Cape and Western Cape all have lower irradiance today with the exception of Limpopo where Hoedspruit have clear sky and good solar irradiance.

9 minutes ago, TaliaB said:

So today in Gauteng i believe the solar irradiance is again much lower so expected lower solar production. Please keep on posting your array size in kwp the solar panel manufacturer the immediate surrounding ( Boksburg, Germiston Pta ect.) I am busy working on a model that could predict solar output by using irradiance in W/m² and i need data to compare against the model. Maybe i must start a new thread where all the data will be available for everyone.

Today irradiance  for Jhb.

@TaliaB My production today, Vaaltriangle +_ 80 Km south of JHB, 12 X 410 w Csun Panels 2 strings of 6 each 2 X 5000 KVA growat inverters, also today overcast. Peaked +_ 4 KW at 9:30

1 hour ago, TaliaB said:

Cpt,Kzn, Eastern Cape and Western Cape all have lower irradiance today with the exception of Limpopo where Hoedspruit have clear sky and good solar irradiance.

Wouldn't a spreadsheet be easier? Happy to log on a fill in the details