My 5kw Luxpower is dying. I want to replace this with a 8kw inverter.

Current system includes:

10x 550w panels

2x Hubble AM2

What would you recommend and why.

The warranty is also important to me

Let's hear please

Replace it with a 5kW Deye. Deye has a good track record and good service in my mind.

Wanting a 8kW inverter is not a sound argument. You would also have to increase battery capacity if you want to do more but keep the same battery time.

9 hours ago, frivan said:

Wanting a 8kW inverter is not a sound argument

actually if you are getting close to running your 5kWatter close to its limit, putting down an 8kWatter instead is not the worst thing to consider, it'll run at a much lower level %age wise and probably run cooler and be less stressed...\

10 hours ago, Madone69 said:

Let's hear please

I'd suggest also the Deye, but the 8kW, or else the Sunsynk, although the support for the latter has been iffy at times... but both units, I believe have a good reputation and should work well.

If you do this, you should probably consider adding to the PV side and also re-look at the battery side, although 10kW battery should be ok, depending on your consumption, it may not be enough.

@Madone69 ,

The answer is in your requirements.

I have a 8kW SS, with the whole house on UPS (Electric stove, washing machine, tumble drier, big air-fryer, microwave, 7kW HP (draws 3 kW), pool pump.

And I get by with 10kW Battery. 4 in the family.

You will become the power police😁, or else get HA automations to optimize HP & Pool and Inverter behavior.

The only thing I would add is to max your panels. 8S2P at least.

7 hours ago, frivan said:

Replace it with a 5kW Deye. Deye has a good track record and good service in my mind.

Wanting a 8kW inverter is not a sound argument. You would also have to increase battery capacity if you want to do more but keep the same battery time.

Would increasing to 8kw not enable me to run my stove and geyser as well. Being able to provide more than the 5kva load at one single time?

The battery capacity is merely a storage unit - more or bigger battery equals more storage capacity

1 minute ago, Sidewinder said:

@Madone69 ,

The answer is in your requirements.

I have a 8kW SS, with the whole house on UPS (Electric stove, washing machine, tumble drier, big air-fryer, microwave, 7kW HP (draws 3 kW), pool pump.

And I get by with 10kW Battery. 4 in the family.

You will become the power police😁, or else get HA automations to optimize HP & Pool and Inverter behavior.

The only thing I would add is to max your panels. 8S2P at least.

This is great. Thanks. We manage on the 5kw already but the stove is on CCT. Thus I would add stove to the 8kw. I think as a three persons family we are conditioned in the usage aspects. My daily consumption is 12 - 15kw with geyser on smart switch

24 minutes ago, Madone69 said:

The battery capacity is merely a storage unit - more or bigger battery equals more storage capacity

No,

You need a battery that can support the max discharge of your inverter.

You currently have 2 Hubble AM2 Batteries, each rated at 1C, so if you just upgraded your inverter, you should be fine. If your batteries were only rated at 0.5C, as an example, your max discharge would be limited to 5KW even if you have an 8kw Inverter

Edited May 20, 20251 yr by madness_za

With the 8kW Deye you'd be making the type of decision to buy once and be ready for future upgrades, for installing additional loads like pool & aircons, adding more panels, preparation for loadshedding, going off-grid, family expansions, etc. It comes obviously at an extra cost of around R8K-R10K or thereabouts, but some might say it's worth it to just ignore the cost and do it.

With the 5kW Deye you could still work smartly and get by. You could still divert energy to the stove and geyser as non-essential loads on the grid port, but then that works only as long as Eskom is available. This is where these grid-tied hybrids are better than your old off-grid Luxpower. And your daily consumption is low enough that it should meet your needs for now, but upgrading potential is limited.

Either way you might find that if the stove is coming on-top of existing battery usage (no longer from CoCT), that you might need an extra battery to get you through. Personal opinion would be to first measure your consumption throughout the day, and use those measurements to make the next decision.

47 minutes ago, Madone69 said:

Would increasing to 8kw not enable me to run my stove and geyser as well. Being able to provide more than the 5kva load at one single time?

There's a reason those are typically excluded - heavy loads will drain the battery. So it's a bet you take - could you flatten the batteries if there's an outage when there's no PV?

My system is set up so that SOC will never drop below 40% whilst there is grid. When the grid is out I will always have at least 40% of the battery, but for the backed up circuits only. In your scenario the backed up circuits will include two of the biggest drains in the house.

Up to you. How often do you have power outages during which you'd want to heat water or use the stove?

Edited May 20, 20251 yr by Bobster.
speling

I have always wanted to add another battery just for safety...still want that. ...but with the luxpower dropping me now, I have an opportunity being forced on me to go 8kw🙂

37 minutes ago, Madone69 said:

I have always wanted to add another battery just for safety...still want that. ...but with the luxpower dropping me now, I have an opportunity being forced on me to go 8kw🙂

Shouldn't the Luxpower still be under warranty?

7 minutes ago, mzezman said:

Shouldn't the Luxpower still be under warranty?

Nope. 2 year only.

I just confirmed that the Deye 8kw has a 10year warranty

Irrespective of the battery capacity, the 8kW will only take 128A max from the battery for 5 minutes before tripping, when the grid is unavailable, and no solar available (at night).

That equates to 6800W of power, so roughly 3 large appliances simultaneous.

But in mitigation, it's only happened once in 4 years, so I can live with that comfortably.

Just now, Sidewinder said:

Irrespective of the battery capacity, the 8kW will only take 128A max from the battery for 5 minutes before tripping, when the grid is unavailable, and no solar available (at night).

That equates to 6800W of power, so roughly 3 large appliances simultaneous.

But in mitigation, it's only happened once in 4 years, so I can live with that comfortably.

You running a Deye 8kw?

No, SS, which is the same Hardware as a Deye, just with yellow screens, instead of blue one's.

3 hours ago, Madone69 said:

Would increasing to 8kw not enable me to run my stove and geyser as well. Being able to provide more than the 5kva load at one single time?

2 hours ago, Bobster. said:

There's a reason those are typically excluded - heavy loads will drain the battery. So it's a bet you take - could you flatten the batteries if there's an outage when there's no PV?

@Madone69 could do what we've done and put the heavy loads on the Deye/Sunsynk's Aux port, whilst specifying a minimum Aux battery SOC % - which will keep other essentials running but cut Aux loads if battery drops below the Aux threshold. You can also choose to keep Aux running (regardless of SOC) if grid is up. This protects battery SOC% whilst keeping Aux running during grid outages... saved us from cold showers when the grid's gone down, more than once!

Edited May 20, 20251 yr by JayMardern

I personally am I fan of the Solis brand. Considering that, I would suggest the Solis S6 8kw

Here is why.

• Warranty 5 years, but extendable to 10years

• 4ms swithcing time (compared to 10ms SS & Deye)

• Max PV 12.8kw (10.4 deye, SS 12.8kw)

• Mppt voltage range 90-520 (deye 125-425, ss 150-425)

• Ingress protection IP66 vs IP65

Then, from personal experience, the email support is amazing, and extremely quick to help diagnose any issues, and issue firmware updates.

You also have the option of the 6kw version.

Edited May 20, 20251 yr by Pho3niX90

Does the Solis do Pass Through like Sunsynk?

Example is eskom is on.

if there is only 2kw PV and the battery is flat but the load is 6KW will it use 2kw PV + 4kw Eskom to power the load?

1 minute ago, mossie.jhb said:

Does the Solis do Pass Through like Sunsynk?

Example is eskom is on.

if there is only 2kw PV and the battery is flat but the load is 6KW will it use 2kw PV + 4kw Eskom to power the load?

All 3 have 50A AC pass through

And yes, it does blend power from grid + PV

Edited May 20, 20251 yr by Pho3niX90

8 hours ago, Madone69 said:

Thus I would add stove to the 8kw

An air-fryer and induction plate is much more efficient than a stove.

I currently have a SunSynk 8.8 kW machine with the whole house on UPS (Essential Load) and have never tripped it due to load. At times with Eskom available I've run over 10 kW through the inverter.

I'm running 13.1 kWp of pannels and three Hubble AM-2's.

With no Eskom / off-grid take note not to use more than 8 kW.

If your budget can stretch a bit get more panels and batteries for the bad weather days. If money is no object look at the 10-12K or 16K inverters. ☺️

If you are looking for a SunSynk / Deye get one with the latest specs, not old stock, have a look below;

Sunsynk_Hybrid_Inverter_8kW_Datasheet_v22_English.pdf Sunsynk_SinglePhase_10-12kW_Datasheet_v6_English.pdf Sunsynk_Max_Datasheet_v11_English.pdf