Hi Guys

I have also only recently discovered this forum and have been looking around. This looks like the place where I will feel at home. Lots of very knowledgeable people who are more than willing to help.

I have been "kicking the tyres" with solar for a long time now and have to say that with the current situation at Eskom and what electricity will need to cost in future to fix the problem (working with the somewhat shaky assumption that the Government and management that allowed Eskom to be mismanaged into the state that it is currently in will be willing and able to fix it) solar is becoming more and more of a proposition each day.

I have been playing with solar on a small scale and experimenting with building my own solar charge controllers etc on small 10 and 25 panels to charge gate and alarm batteries etc. and have attended a course on designing and building solar systems. The emphasis was on the design so I am still lacking on the actual building of the system.

Due to budget I am thinking of adopting a phased approach. My thinking is to get the geysers onto solar and to start using those savings to contribute to a system that would ultimately allow me to go off-grid. As an example when I finished a second part of the house as an office/granny flat (with the one kitchen directly adjacent to the other) I installed a gas stove there so cooking is already not an issue in the event of load shedding.

I am fortunate in that I have large roof surfaces facing almost perfectly for PV panels although the pitch of the roof is a bit high. I also have a large garage with perfect positions to place a solar installation.

I have a number of challenges which are more of a practical nature and I still need to research further and gain knowledge on to find solutions. Some of the challenges/issues I face are:

The first is a simple one. What is the best way and how does one mount the panels to a corrugated roof. I gather aluminium rails are the best. I would appreciate some advice here but admit that I still need to search this forum more for the information that is undoubtedly there. Clearly one should drill holes in the sheet but it it an issue to get and keep the holes waterproof? What about the additional weigh loading on the structure? 

The second is that the idiot who designed my house has placed the DB in a position that is not reachable from any outside wall and would almost certainly require major construction of routes unless someone with more experience can spot a practical and neat way to get to the DB. There is also no more room to expand the DB or add to it without lots of grinding, chasing and refinishing. i.e. expenses that could have been spent on buying solar equipment.

The third is that I have three phases coming straight to the only DB in the house which is then split there so I need to understand what the implications are wrt 3 phase system or separate systems for each phase etc? There are a whole bunch of questions I actually have about this. One benefit that I can see is that one phase feeds most of the house, one phase the garage and one the outbuildings such as the staff quarters and lapa. So one can probably do the house as a start as it is the most critical.

Another challenge is that I run an irrigation system with a borehole and pressure pump for the house and garden which would mean additional demand on the system over and above the household requirements and ideally would like to irrigate the garden very early in the morning which means speccing the system for that draw etc.

I am very grateful for this forum and for the excellent knowledge available here and intend to learn a lot and hopefully also contribute a little more as time goes by.

Thanks

Marnus

Welcome Marnus. Jip, we have all the answers here on the forum. 🙂

My suggestion is to read as much as you can on the forum, search for topics, lot of derailments in threads but there are awesome titbits inbetween that covers all you are asking.

Start here: https://powerforum.co.za/files/
Check your local regulations, indepth descussion here : https://powerforum.co.za/topic/2109-is-your-system-legal-capetonians-have-till-28-feb-2019-to-register-their-systems/
Decided the equipment you want to use, start here : https://powerforum.co.za/topic/2946-victron-grid-tied-setup-from-scratch/

Hi TTT

Thanks for the info. I'm not really inclined to go Grid-tied. The compliance issues and future tax/penalty issues and I am not interested being disrupted anyway when the Eskom grid goes off.

32 minutes ago, Mars67 said:

... The compliance issues and future tax/penalty issues and I am not interested being disrupted anyway when the Eskom grid goes off.

Hybrid grid tied ensures you are not disrupted.

I have been thinking the same over the years, with the new forced registrations I thought, hold on, let me play them back at their own game like in:
- If I follow the existing CoCT install guidelines I can be assured all is 100% safe and legal, for me, not them.
- The CoC and engineering sign-off costs are for my benefit, not theirs.
- With us saving the most we can on Eskom cost, being grid tied, till something changes, if it changes.

And IF, not a surety, IF there are future tax/penalties, at that time I can go off-grid at a fraction of the cost, for that legislation will take years to come into effect, with probably a number of court cases to boot.

That is my take.

Edited March 28, 20197 yr by Guest
Improved a bit

All good points to consider. Thanks

Hi Marnus and welcome to the forum. 

w.r.t your installation. How steep is your roof? You get certified solar panel brackets, made of aluminium, with stainless steel bolts. They're made to withstand fairly windy areas and last for may years. There's specific roof hooks for corrugated roofs, with water proofing. They're designed in such a way as to not cause damage or leaks to your roof. The weight of a 60 cell panel is about 25Kg, and a 72 cell panel about 30KG. And then it's spread over 2 sqm so it's very little weight added. If you can walk on your roof with ease, the panels won't be a problem. OR, if you've never been on the roof (or anyone else) and don't feel like checking the structural integrity, see if you can see on the house plans how strong its built. Or get an engineer to check. 

 

Regarding your DB, can you post some pics? Generally you only run 2 cables to / from the invert to the DB board. But you probably need to split some circuits off and would need to install a double pole isolator leading to the inverter, and another one coming from it. And you'll need another Earth Leakage.

If there's 3 phase, the same rule as above applies. But then you decide which phase you want to put on backup. If you want to put certain circuits  from the different phases onto the inverter, you would first need to identify and split those circuits onto it's own. i.e. get all the lights from all three circuits and put it on the blue phase. Then select the plugs you want to run off the inverter and put it on the blue phase as well. Then evenly split what's on the blue phase that you don't want to run off the inverters onto the other phases and make sure it balances out properly. Many electricians know how to do this. 

Taking your geyser off the grid, one way or another is always a good idea. I prefer to retrofit existing geysers with PV panels and an MPPT controller, then you don't need to worry about plumbing and leaky roofs, and you can control the temperature a bit in summer. 

Or, in my own case, I use the surplus power I have and run my electric geyser off my existing PV system from 14:00 onward. By then we've done all the heavy work like washing dishes or clothing or ironing

Hi SN

Thank you for the reply and the info. I will get back with the info you requested but things are a little hectic at the moment.

 

Well at least I have taken the first positive step and am now the proud owner of a 3 phase Effergy monitor. So that will go in this evening so that I can start measuring and knowing.

I can just picture midnight tonight, with Mars stalking around the house looking for all those little glowing LED standby lights.. LOL. Good luck!

18 minutes ago, DeepBass9 said:

I can just picture midnight tonight, with Mars stalking around the house looking for all those little glowing LED standby lights.. LOL. Good luck!

Or he gets gatvol looking all over and with Efergy in hand, switches of all the breakers at the DB, switching them on one by one, seeing which circuits have power on ... totally riling up the family! 🙂 

On 2019/03/28 at 7:06 AM, Mars67 said:

The second is that the idiot who designed my house has placed the DB in a position that is not reachable from any outside wall and would almost certainly require major construction of routes unless someone with more experience can spot a practical and neat way to get to the DB. There is also no more room to expand the DB or add to it without lots of grinding, chasing and refinishing. i.e. expenses that could have been spent on buying solar equipment.

Does your L1/2/3 from the Eskom go straight to your db in the house? it would be weird for a three phase system to be like that. usually it terminates somewhere outside and from there goes to your house's DB as well as split to other parts of the yard.

On 2019/03/28 at 7:06 AM, Mars67 said:

The third is that I have three phases coming straight to the only DB in the house which is then split there so I need to understand what the implications are wrt 3 phase system or separate systems for each phase etc?

Do you have any three phase equipment?  If not you always have the option of running single phase. There are various pros and cons. i've been through the 3P to 1P conversion. It helped me a lot. had i done this earlier i would have probably saved money on an inverter or two,, but note, this is not for everyone. and i did the conversion on home only and left the rest of the place 3P

For a standard 3P setup you can either get a 3P inverter, or get 3 separate inverters and let them sync phases,  there are countless options here.

 

29 minutes ago, The Terrible Triplett said:

Or he gets gatvol looking all over and with Efergy in hand, switches of all the breakers at the DB, switching them on one by one, seeing which circuits have power on ... totally riling up the family! 🙂 

Probably this!!!

Hi Stoic

Yes indeed. The three lines go into the DB and are split there to different parts of the house/Property. I do not have any 3 phase equipment and do not have a need for it. It would probably be very easy to convert to single phase in the DB. There are two DBs directly adjacent to each other. Here is a pic of the main one. The other db which the red phase feeds gives single phase to the main house.

Edited April 3, 20197 yr by Mars67

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