New to solar, looking to DIY for solar setup. Where can one find a drawing of how to connect a Grid tied system with batteries? How to size the components?

1 hour ago, HennieJH said:

New to solar, looking to DIY for solar setup. Where can one find a drawing of how to connect a Grid tied system with batteries? How to size the components?

Hi Hennie

Welcome here, between all the guys here you will here many opinions, but all will lead in the same general direction.

A good start is to determine what your current consumption is. How many Kwh a day you use on average.  

Secondly. it will be wise to start looking at alternative heating methods for your Geyser as well as Gas cooking, LED lightning throughout your home ext. Conserving power in these areas will dramatically  influence the Size of the system you will eventually install. 

The third bit of advice I can give it to decide what really needs to be on the Solar system (Critical Loads) and then what you would like to be on the system. You will find a system in between those two parameters that will suit your requirements. 

The connection part we can always get to after you have done the above as your decisions will influence the way everything will be configured as well as  connected. 

 

 

Thanks Jaco for the reply. Current consumption at the moment ranges between 24 to 30 units / day. Geyser was converted a few months ago to vacuum tube heating, have already been seeing a reduction in the consumption. Majority of lights is LED, in process of changing the last few lights.

Currently looking at a system as follows:

Goodwe ES 4.6kW Hybrid Inverter x 1

Canadian Solar 330W Super High Power Poly PERC HiKU x 15 Panels

Pylontech US3000 3.5kWh Li-Ion Battery x 4 (Might be less permitting funds)

Plan is to do the installation myself according to regulations. Challenge is the design to ensure the right components are in the right places, correct ratings used for components, wires, etc.

58 minutes ago, HennieJH said:

Currently looking at a system as follows:

Goodwe ES 4.6kW Hybrid Inverter x 1

Canadian Solar 330W Super High Power Poly PERC HiKU x 15 Panels

Pylontech US3000 3.5kWh Li-Ion Battery x 4 (Might be less permitting funds)

Well sized sir, this will cover your current consumption with a little bit to spare and a nice buffer for the night. With the rest we can assist. 

Important areas of concern is Combiner box, battery fuses and decent AC protection. Where do you want to start?  

Thanks Jaco. I would like to know how to connect the whole setup, to be honest, not sure where to start off. Areas I would like to consider is following:

Panels DC setup, i.e. How many strings? Panels per string? Combiner box circuit? Protection on the aforementioned circuit?

Battery setup, i.e. How the batteries connect to the inverter? Protection for the circuit?

Inverter setup, i.e. How the inverter connects to DB, Essential vs Non Essential DB layout / setup? Protection on this circuit?

I suppose one should start with the easiest setup???

14 hours ago, HennieJH said:

I would like to know how to connect the whole setup

I have a system in operation using the same inverter you are considering. Attached is the wiring diagram how it is set up. Please only use the information to get a basic idea how to do it because the system has not been approved yet.   

16 hours ago, HennieJH said:

Thanks Jaco for the reply. Current consumption at the moment ranges between 24 to 30 units / day. Geyser was converted a few months ago to vacuum tube heating, have already been seeing a reduction in the consumption. Majority of lights is LED, in process of changing the last few lights.

Currently looking at a system as follows:

Goodwe ES 4.6kW Hybrid Inverter x 1

Canadian Solar 330W Super High Power Poly PERC HiKU x 15 Panels

Pylontech US3000 3.5kWh Li-Ion Battery x 4 (Might be less permitting funds)

Plan is to do the installation myself according to regulations. Challenge is the design to ensure the right components are in the right places, correct ratings used for components, wires, etc.

 

15 hours ago, Jaco de Jongh said:

Well sized sir, this will cover your current consumption with a little bit to spare and a nice buffer for the night. With the rest we can assist. 

Important areas of concern is Combiner box, battery fuses and decent AC protection. Where do you want to start?  

Looks like you have decided to buy a very nice set indeed! About the PV side of things I would not suggest a combiner box. See these specsheets for the inverter and for the solarpanels. As you can see technically there is space for 6500/330=19 panels. So if the budget is there and the surface is big enough you should consider to buy 4 more of these panels. Do that before you buy all the batteries if your budget is insufficient because solarpanels often are suddenly not available anymore in the same size or specs. About the combinerbox: not necessary cause you can hookup 13 or 14 of these panels (depending on wintertemperatures) in series per mpp tracker voltage wise.

Edit: In the mean time I wrote this Fuenkli posted a very nice diagram. He has adden some surgeprotectors as well. Thats a nice lightning protecion I would recommend. @Fuenkli what did you use to produce this diagram?

Edited September 14, 20196 yr by RikH

7 minutes ago, RikH said:

About the PV side of things I would not suggest a combiner box.

Hi RikH, In South Africa, they expect some kind of protection and or Isolation method as close as possible to the panels. What would you recommend rather than using a Combiner Type setup. 

39 minutes ago, RikH said:

what did you use to produce this diagram?

I used ProfiCAD. It is a free app.

Hi.

I am new to this forum and that is the same route I would like to follow.I will follow this thread with interest.

14 hours ago, Jaco de Jongh said:

Please Check your PM

Here is a basic circuit. I hope i did not leave something out. 

16 x 330 watt Canadians in 2 strings of 8 (Goodwe can handle 6500whp) - going into a PV combiner box with fuses on  + & - of each string, connected to a surge arrester and a suitably rated isolator. From there, depending on the distance I use 6 mm to a small 2 way db at the inverter with a double pole DC breaker to disconnect the PV at the inverter should I need to work on the inverter. From that Db i run wires straight to the Inverters PV connections. 

Battery side. 4 way db with 2 x 125 Amp fuse holders connected to the Battery Connections Of the inverter. You will also require a coms cable between the inverter and the Pylontechs. 

AC Side: From grid to Main DB. Power split, one side to non essential loads and other side to an AC db at the inverter, depending on the location of the inverter. All these components can be inside your main db if the DB is big enough and there is space to mount the Inverter at the DB.  The output of the inverter goes back to the essential loads. 

I forgot to draw in the Changeover switch that will be used to bypass the Inverter in the case of a failure. 

also forgot to include the WiFi module for coms... 

I hope this gives you an Idea of what components are needed. 

EDIT: I made a mistake, just remembered the Goodwe has 2 MPPTs, so the components in the  Combiner box as well as DC DB 1 should double up, I will redraw tomorrow. 

 

 

Thanks, much appreciated. 

Just now, HennieJH said:

Thanks, much appreciated. 

Hi Hennie, 

I have send you a private message. 

3 hours ago, Fuenkli said:

I have a system in operation using the same inverter you are considering. Attached is the wiring diagram how it is set up. Please only use the information to get a basic idea how to do it because the system has not been approved yet.   

Thanks, much appreciated. 

Good day. 

 

I have an Account borehole pump which is 0.55kW (0.75HP) which is currently being run with a 2.8kva generator. We want to switch to solar power and wanted to know how many solar panels and batteries we need to run it at least 2hours per day. We are hoping to compensate the high starting wattage of the motor with the generator as it only lasts less than a minute and switch to solar while it's running using a UPS to connect both AC inputs.

 

Pump specs:

Voltage: 230v AC 

Current: 5.1A (max current, has a 5A breaker)

Run time 2 to 3hours daily.

 

We need the following info:

Number and power of solar panels

Number and Amps batteries we need.

Size of inverter we need. 

16 minutes ago, Jaco de Jongh said:

Hi RikH, In South Africa, they expect some kind of protection and or Isolation method as close as possible to the panels. What would you recommend rather than using a Combiner Type setup. 

Well I just made a simple box for 1 string appr. 800V. As you can see it has surge protection and a breaker/fuse. Don't expect the fuse to trip in short circuit situations, the range between Imp and Isc is to narrow for that. So I just use it as a switch. On the side of the inverter I would suggest a switch like the one shown below. @HennieJH should of course make it double with the appropriate values since he has 2 strings. 

Thanks.

21 hours ago, Fuenkli said:

I used ProfiCAD. It is a free app.

Found it and installed it. That's a very nice piece of software, thanks for pointing me in that direction Fuenkli!

hi, i have recently had a 15kva off the grid system installed, the problem i am having is, there is a power dip for a split second when the inverter is switching from solar to battery or utility , is there any fix for this? 

30 minutes ago, Yegz said:

hi, i have recently had a 15kva off the grid system installed, the problem i am having is, there is a power dip for a split second when the inverter is switching from solar to battery or utility , is there any fix for this? 

you need to give more info on your system and symptoms

13 hours ago, Yegz said:

hi, i have recently had a 15kva off the grid system installed, the problem i am having is, there is a power dip for a split second when the inverter is switching from solar to battery or utility , is there any fix for this?

While you don't give any details about your exact system, this is pretty normal for some systems that are designed as 'Off grid'. If the Inverter is not capable of running in parallel with the grid (or not allowed to because of regulations), then the inverter has to stop as it switches to the grid with most regulations stating that there must be at least a 20ms break. The same is true when it disconnects from the grid again, it must first disconnect and then start inverting. So I assume that this is the type of system you have. True hybrid inverters that can run in parallel with the grid and therefore use a mix grid, battery and solar power at the same time do not have the same problem because the inverter never stops when it connects to or disconnects from the grid.

thank you for the replies, i do not know the specific details of the system, the stuff i do know is : 

3 X Axpert 5kva inverters 

24 X solar panels (do not know the rating) 

12 X 12V 200ah led acid batteries 

i did have the guy who installed it over today and he told me that he has the same problem with other installations he has done, he suggested i get a grid tie inverter, up the number of panels to a total of 40 and run the house with that and push excess power back into the grid and use the current setup (batteries) as a backup in case of a outage, he said the grid tie does not switch and therefore my problem will go away. 

is this a good option or would it be better to upgrade the inverter to a better brand

my apologies for the gap in information and if any questions seem silly i am not clued up with solar, i do appreciate the replies very much.