Balcony solar PV

[Joeboy]

Thats a shame, we have 6 bar here at the tap so we are more than a bit spoilt - although it does generate some water hammer when the washing machine solenoid valve operates so a bit of a double edged sword.

Wife has put the washing machine on here now too so the batter charge rate has taken a bit of a hit - cant stand in the way of cleanliness though, well not without getting a thick ear

Moxi

I did a brush and then waterspray on my accessible panels this morning. It was effective. Hoping we've seen the last of the snow for a while.

+1 for cleanliness, although got to admit to letting my shower regime slide to every two days at the moment. Not sure why tbh, not doing massive amounts of work and my Gillette deodorant stick is a 48hr one? Vague idea of not needing to use hot water so often. SWMBO is ok so .

Sounds boggin but I'm feeling good.

[Joeboy]

So it begins.

[Moxi]

Thats was me yesterday (although snow was not as deep), the wife actually came in the room and asked why we were not producing much power off of the main array (shes getting the bug for solar! ) so I explained that the panels were shaded by the snow. She watched the incremental changes as the early afternoon progressed and suddenly she said "right I'm putting the washer on now the panels are clear", I looked up and she was right the panels had suddenly jumped to 1.5kWp. We even managed to drag the stack up from 20% to 36% with the remains of the days sun. The very temporary side panel had to that point held the house base load more or less so we were not importing much.

I was hoping to get some work done towards putting two panels on the porch roof in a permanent fix this weekend (work is keeping me busy in the week) but alas the weather has other ideas as its forecast to be stormus and bwrw glaw (stormy and raining) here for the weekend and well in to next week.

Roll on April and some ripples !

Moxi

[Joeboy]

Thats was me yesterday (although snow was not as deep), the wife actually came in the room and asked why we were not producing much power off of the main array (shes getting the bug for solar! ) so I explained that the panels were shaded by the snow. She watched the incremental changes as the early afternoon progressed and suddenly she said "right I'm putting the washer on now the panels are clear", I looked up and she was right the panels had suddenly jumped to 1.5kWp. We even managed to drag the stack up from 20% to 36% with the remains of the days sun. The very temporary side panel had to that point held the house base load more or less so we were not importing much.

I was hoping to get some work done towards putting two panels on the porch roof in a permanent fix this weekend (work is keeping me busy in the week) but alas the weather has other ideas as its forecast to be stormus and bwrw glaw (stormy and raining) here for the weekend and well in to next week.

Roll on April and some ripples !

Moxi

When the SWMBO's are onside it is glorious, feels like one functioning brain seeing it all! Got some chopping, stacking to do and then some splitting, should be able to do all that off of todays PV generation once i've had a crack at clearing the workshop roof for its mighty 10W input. It all matters. Looking forward to seeing a photo or two of the new array extension when time allows Moxi?

Might get lucky and see early Ripples in March?

[Moxi]

Early Ripples would be an excellent outcome but for now I am attempting to contain myself to "program"

I need more hours in the day or maybe I should retire ? That might just send the wife over the edge though

Moxi

[Joeboy]

Early Ripples would be an excellent outcome but for now I am attempting to contain myself to "program"

I need more hours in the day or maybe I should retire ? That might just send the wife over the edge though

Moxi

Understood, containment is a good idea! Overzealous exuberance has its own pitfalls. I think they'll go quiet now and there will be an untrumpeted click in the night as they test them one by one. I guess it's infield infrastructure tests at the moment? I like the idea that soon it will be day count instead of month or year count.

[richbee]

Hi Joe, with your lovely colourful energy meter, how did you wire it up - with incoming from the panels, or incoming from the mains?

Not sure if I'm being daft here, I bought the WiFi version from the, same company - ketotek.
As I was wiring it up, I originally thought I needed the solar power to be on the IN side and feed out to the mains.
But when I wired up the inverter without any panels and turned on at the breaker, the energy meter was not showing any readings at all, presumably cos there was no IN power.
I've re-wired it so the IN is on mains side, and the meter lights up.
I've run a trial connection of 1 panel today, and the inverter kicks into life
The meter was reading 0.3 to 0.4A,but the kWh is not going up after 3-4 hours.

As a last resort, I read the instructions
It suggests that it cannot measure reverse direction energy.
I've connected to the app and it also shows the current, but 0 kWh.

I could re-wire it again so the solar is on the IN side, but I'm concerned the inverter might not see the mains & therefore won't pass through any solar, also, any time the panels are producing 0,the meter will be off, so no nice pretty graphs for whole days...

Do you have any helpful suggestions, or do I just need to bin the meter & get a specific bi-directional one??
Cheers

[Joeboy]

Hi Joe, with your lovely colourful energy meter, how did you wire it up - with incoming from the panels, or incoming from the mains?

Not sure if I'm being daft here, I bought the WiFi version from the, same company - ketotek.
As I was wiring it up, I originally thought I needed the solar power to be on the IN side and feed out to the mains.
But when I wired up the inverter without any panels and turned on at the breaker, the energy meter was not showing any readings at all, presumably cos there was no IN power.
I've re-wired it so the IN is on mains side, and the meter lights up.
I've run a trial connection of 1 panel today, and the inverter kicks into life
The meter was reading 0.3 to 0.4A,but the kWh is not going up after 3-4 hours.

As a last resort, I read the instructions
It suggests that it cannot measure reverse direction energy.
I've connected to the app and it also shows the current, but 0 kWh.

I could re-wire it again so the solar is on the IN side, but I'm concerned the inverter might not see the mains & therefore won't pass through any solar, also, any time the panels are producing 0,the meter will be off, so no nice pretty graphs for whole days...

Do you have any helpful suggestions, or do I just need to bin the meter & get a specific bi-directional one??
Cheers

I just went by the wee drawing supplied with the meter and it kicked in. I'm still in Spain so sorry can't check my handiwork.

[richbee]

Hi Joe, with your lovely colourful energy meter, how did you wire it up - with incoming from the panels, or incoming from the mains?

Not sure if I'm being daft here, I bought the WiFi version from the, same company - ketotek.
As I was wiring it up, I originally thought I needed the solar power to be on the IN side and feed out to the mains.
But when I wired up the inverter without any panels and turned on at the breaker, the energy meter was not showing any readings at all, presumably cos there was no IN power.
I've re-wired it so the IN is on mains side, and the meter lights up.
I've run a trial connection of 1 panel today, and the inverter kicks into life
The meter was reading 0.3 to 0.4A,but the kWh is not going up after 3-4 hours.

As a last resort, I read the instructions
It suggests that it cannot measure reverse direction energy.
I've connected to the app and it also shows the current, but 0 kWh.

I could re-wire it again so the solar is on the IN side, but I'm concerned the inverter might not see the mains & therefore won't pass through any solar, also, any time the panels are producing 0,the meter will be off, so no nice pretty graphs for whole days...

Do you have any helpful suggestions, or do I just need to bin the meter & get a specific bi-directional one??
Cheers

I just went by the wee drawing supplied with the meter and it kicked in. I'm still in Spain so sorry can't check my handiwork.

No worries, enjoy your holiday

[Joeboy]

Just reading what you've written. All my wiring to the meter was AC. So post inverters and hooked in my own AC at the house. No DC should be direct from the panels to the meter and the inverter whether enphase ot Hoymiles won't output unless they have a AC signal from the mains.

I Hope this helps. Sit down and do a wee pencil line drawing then follow it, works for me, Ole!!