Ronski's Solar & battery DIY build with whole house backup

[Ron-ski]

I was similar as a youngster, we lived in a very large house (52 rooms - sold in 1986 for just £90k!!!), but we would often go up ladders and help him paint it, or even on the roof and that was 3 story's. I bought a house in the early 90's, and used his tripple extension ladder, that was three story's as well, got half way up and the wooden ladder was almost vertical!!! I came down, my younger brother went up instead.

Heights never bothered me, although I've never climbed a 125m radio mast, that might well do!

 

[Ron-ski]

Just need to get the scaffolding taken down now

Scaffolding came down this morning, less than 24 hours from making the call, now that's got to be a record for scaffolding to come down.

All went well apparently, no issues like there was when it went up.

 

[Ron-ski]

 

[Ron-ski]

She took a bit of convincing, I said it will also help keep the bird muck off the bi-folds

 

[Ron-ski]

I'll be honest i'm not convinced with wall mounted ones. Theres a house near my parents with none on the roof, but the walls are covered. I'd imagine its planning related

I think there's a massive difference between my installation and theirs. They are almost certainly a very poor DIY install, not only do they look unsightly they must be heavily shaded, so not very effective. Clearly the home owner didn't have the skil or knowledge to do a roof installation, and didn't want to pay for a proper install.

The roof may also be in very poor condition and is effectively at the end of its life.

I'd be very surprised if that roof is at end of life, it will just be as I've said above

And as Fraser says, very unlikely to be planning related, it won't be a listed building, could be a conservation zone, but then they'd still need permission for wall mount.

 

[Ron-ski]

Perhaps we should start a thread for really bad solar installs.

 

[Ron-ski]

I don't personally know anybody that's built one, or even anyone I know on forums, obviously Andy's Off Grid Garage has.

If you want ultimate savings, then probably direct from China, if you want a bit more support should something go wrong and less chance of dodgy cells then Fogstar - although they seem to be out of stock of complete kits.

You used to be able to order off the Fogstar Wholesale website for a bit of extra discount, but I see you need to register now, but if order a large quantity of cells may be worth requesting a bulk price.

DIY case and 16 x 314AH grade A EVE cells, thus 15 kWh battery for £1800, great value.

Actually, by the time you've paid shipping, and potential import/vat duties I'm not even sure if you can get them for that price from China.

There are also some concerns about cells laying on their sides, I've no idea whether it is actually a problem though.

Seplos V4 ?

https://www.fogstar.co.uk/products/seplos-mason-280l-and-x16-grade-a-eve-lf280k-battery-bundle-copy "Active Balancing Colour Screen DC Breaker Easier Assembly White, Black and Silver Options" I cannot find any reference to this on the Seplos website

diysolarforum.com

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[Ron-ski]

During my solar additions earlier in the year I had to remove my battery heater system, it was also rather messy as well.

So I came up with a bit better solution. As the relays in the Cerbo GX can't handle the current of the heater mats, I've had to use external relays.

My solid state relays are now mounted on a little PCB, in a box, the relays have built in heat protection, but hopefully that won't be a problem anyway.



And the new setup.

 

[Ron-ski]

The forecast is looking a tad on the cold side isn't it

The batteries do tend to keep themselves warm to a certain extent, charging and discharging generates heat, IIRC last year it only tended to get cold enough for the heating to come on around 1am, then the charging kicked in at around 2am so that would warm them up.

Might be a colder winter this year though, don't think it was particularly cold last winter.

 

[Ron-ski]

It's incredible how cheap cells are now, but I really don't need another battery.

Surprisingly I don't have a smart watch, but always have my phone with me, although I own a normal watch I very rarely wear it, as a mechanic wearing a watch is a bad idea, so I'm just use to not wearing one.

Have you seen the new Venus OS, I've not yet upgraded, but it looks good. Dynamic ESS looks interesting, and works with Octopus, I haven't tried that either yet.