Nowty Towers Vs UK Grid Storage

[nowty]

Holly cow, I never noticed they had an internal hex socket.

My bodging way of screwing on the rest of the valve and twisting with a big pipe wrench still worked.

No doubt the next time I'll replace any radiators I'll have forgotten both methods.

[resybaby]

Its been so long since I'd replaced all the radiators I forgot that you need an additional valve body to help unscrew and screw in one of the connectors into the radiator. Luckily I already had one for this purpose but it flummoxed me for a while.

When Iast did radiators the valve tails (?) had a big internal hex shape and the "special tool" had a square driver at the other end for screwing in the cast Iron or brass plugs for the tops.
Recovering the scrap fittings out of old rads sometimes needed a big hex spanner around the tool, like a tommy bar... https://plumbingsuppliesdirect.co.uk/mo ... -spanners/

Thats the tool AE. Squared off large allen key thing to remove the tails, most often with a short bit of 22mm copper slipped over it to increase leverage and break the rusted up crud off the tails themselves.

[nowty]

Nowty Towers is now on full re-heat after a 3 week cold slumber.

All 3 heatpumps now on and with the COP, that’s a lot of kWh’s going in to greet us at around midday tomorrow.

[nowty]

2024 Nowty Towers "Green Crap" review

Home PV generated 12166 kWh which is a PB but only because of PV panel upgrades, I'm expecting better in 2025.

I imported 15820 kWh from the Grid and exported 12521 kWh to the grid, I'm expecting higher exports in 2025 due to more a more optimised operation.

Net profit from SEG export after all imported energy costs including gas and SC's was circa £451, I'm expecting a higher net profit in 2025.

Saving Sessions and Power Hours paid circa £400, I'm expecting near feck all in 2025.

Ripple Wind farm investments paid £1387, I'm expecting over £2000 in 2025.

Other renewable Coop's paid £50, this should be higher in 2025 as projects start to come online.

FIT generation income was circa £3900, this should exceed £4000 in 2025 with RPI uplift.

So thats all my energy free and over £6000 of income to recycle into more green crap during 2025.

[Richard77]

Well played nowty... Impressive numbers.

[nowty]

A little of that green crap booty has been spent on some upgrades.



I installed a second Sofar ME3000SP battery inverter (£250 second hand). They are both set to Timed Mode which is a dumb test mode, no CT clamps or anything. One is currently set to charge at 3kW and the other is set to discharge at 3kW but I could set them both to charge for that extra battery charge rate.



I can simply turn them on or off by WiFi sockets from my phone powering on a power contactor and active cooling fans. When they are off the Sofar units think there is a grid failure and just sit there in error mode indefinitely until I re-apply the AC to them.



Its been really working well giving me more control over extra battery charging and extra exporting, also taking some strain off the expensive SMA Sunny Island kit. They terminate along with two PV charge controllers to an intermediate DC Bus bar and had 25mm cables connecting to my main DC Bus bar. But with all the extra panels I have added onto the PV charge controllers and the extra Sofar unit I need to upgrade the intermediate DC Bus bars with larger copper strip and upgrade the 25mm intermediate cables to 50mm connecting to my main DC Bus bar.

Also adding a Victron Cerbo-S GX controller so I can access the PV charge controller info over the internet.

[Joeboy]

Nice one, how's the generation on the South Coast today? Spring is a moving point these days.

[nowty]

Nice one, how's the generation on the South Coast today? Spring is a moving point these days.

Its up and down, sometimes clear and getting 5kW, the next moment cloudy and lucky to get 1kW. Typically generating between 10kWh and 20kWh per day. Its a little less cold now so less heat demand, but my shading is bad till around mid Feb when potentially things really pick up.

I'm being quite aggressive on the export front, doing two charge and dump cycles a day which is taking a good chunk of the winter bill away.

[Joeboy]

Nice one, how's the generation on the South Coast today? Spring is a moving point these days.

Its up and down, sometimes clear and getting 5kW, the next moment cloudy and lucky to get 1kW. Typically generating between 10kWh and 20kWh per day. Its a little less cold now so less heat demand, but my shading is bad till around mid Feb when potentially things really pick up.

I'm being quite aggressive on the export front, doing two charge and dump cycles a day which is taking a good chunk of the winter bill away.

Impressive figures, liking the taking care of it yourself ethos.

[nowty]

As I have installed my "spare" Sofar ME3000SP unit to double up on export / charging flexibility, that means I no longer had a spare.



That has now been rectified as I'd noticed some of these units are now going for under £200 on fleebay.

Big box arrived today, nothing bad in the error logs, updated the firmware, changed the settings, it successfully passed my burn in test, and its now the official Nowty Towers "spare".