I have Sunsynk 5 Kw inverter with 10 x 550w JA Solar panels (2 strings of 5) and 5.5 kwh Hubble AM2 producing power for 4 days.

1. I had read when I was considering systems that the best you can expect from your panels is 80% of their rating. I have not seen close to that. 5500w at 80% = 4400w . 

The most I have seen is =-3200w during "mid-day hours". I understand the Sunsynk only takes from the panels what is needed and therefore have created load of between 4500w and 5000w but still only 3200w from panels. It has been clear sky's. Both strings mounted at 26% inclination facing north west so get good sun. This week (mid winter) the panels 'work" between 10h00 and 16h00. Out of these hours just a couple of hundred watts. 

The question is, is there something that needs to be tweaked ? I asked the installer as he was demonstrating the system working (before I had noticed the above point) what he would suggest to optimise the system, considering from a return on investment perspective, adding more panels or increasing the battery capacity. He said "maybe another 3 or 4 panels". 

From a cash outlay point  the panels would be 4 X R 2500 - R 10 000 vs another AM2 - R 25 000

2. My next question is why cant you mix battery brands ? I would have thought if the battery's are both type Lithium or LifePO4 the brand should not matter . 

3. The pricing of battery's seems to suggest a price fixing environment. Considering like with like I would have thought battery's from the east would have a lower entry price point than the local equivalent. Sunsynk or Dye vs Hubble ?? pricing is the same. Also considering a bigger battery doesnt lower the price of 1 Kw storage capacity. 

My analogy, If i go to Checkers and I compare 2.5kg Hueletts sugar to the 1 kg Hueletts , the 2.5 Kg pack works out some 13% cheaper per kg. So why not for battery's ?  

Point 3 is not really a question but just an opinion so I dont really expect an answer. 

 

49 minutes ago, ZaOracle said:

1. I had read when I was considering systems that the best you can expect from your panels is 80% of their rating. I have not seen close to that. 5500w at 80% = 4400w . 

The most I have seen is =-3200w during "mid-day hours".

 

The Winter Solstice (in the southern hemisphere) was yesterday, so we're at the lowest-PV-production point in the year. My own arrays are producing around 67% of maximum rating; so you're not too far off. Wait for spring and you'll be more impressed; my daily kWh production is much higher in late spring/early-summer than it is now.

 

49 minutes ago, ZaOracle said:

2. My next question is why cant you mix battery brands ? I would have thought if the battery's are both type Lithium or LifePO4 the brand should not matter . 
 

Because they can't communicate with each other (eg: different protocols) and hence can't report to your inverter via BMS. Some people do still run same-voltage+same-chemistry+same-cell-count+same-C-Rating batteries from different manufacturers in parallel but you'd have to forgo battery communications to the inverter (and run in Voltage mode) to do so. This can work - but if the BMS does a good job, it's arguably the preferred option. I've been really happy with BMS-inverter communications performance (after a firmware upgrade!) on my pair of Hubble AM-5's.

 

49 minutes ago, ZaOracle said:

3. The pricing of battery's seems to suggest a price fixing environment. Considering like with like I would have thought battery's from the east would have a lower entry price point than the local equivalent. Sunsynk or Dye vs Hubble ?? pricing is the same. Also considering a bigger battery doesnt lower the price of 1 Kw storage capacity. 

My analogy, If i go to Checkers and I compare 2.5kg Hueletts sugar to the 1 kg Hueletts , the 2.5 Kg pack works out some 13% cheaper per kg. So why not for battery's ?  

Point 3 is not really a question but just an opinion so I dont really expect an answer. 

 

Expensive electronics don't really work the same as consumables (and these are rather specialized electronics, too), but do keep an eye out for specials, they absolutely happen. I picked up my second Hubble AM-5 (as well as a second inverter and another 10 panels), all for a boatload cheaper than current pricing; late last year when demand dropped due to load shedding being reduced. Black Friday also had some amazing deals last year, leave a few store tabs open and monitor and the deals will find you.

 

Edited June 21, 20242 yr by JayMardern

42 minutes ago, ZaOracle said:

The question is, is there something that needs to be tweaked ? I asked the installer as he was demonstrating the system working (before I had noticed the above point) what he would suggest to optimise the system, considering from a return on investment perspective, adding more panels or increasing the battery capacity. He said "maybe another 3 or 4 panels". 

From a cash outlay point  the panels would be 4 X R 2500 - R 10 000 vs another AM2 - R 25 000

Don't add 3 or 4 more panels. The inverter's maximum PV input is 6500W. You'd be able to get away with adding 1 more per string, but you won't be getting much bang for your buck since you're already over 5000W. A bit more power in Winter, but in summer your panels will mostly be idle considering the amount of battery installed versus the panel power. Unless you can shift a lot more loads to the day and add more battery power to charge during the day as well.

Maybe just do a sanity check that there's no shading on the panels, but if not, as above, best is to wait until Spring and Summer to get a better feeling for what your system is capable of.