Solar System (on your house, not in the sky...)

djgra79

djgra79

My name is Graham & I love flashing lights!
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This thread is blinky related because we need power to run our pixels. With that weak disclaimer out of the way...

Thanks to thousands of Aussies & Kiwis buying bubble wands, homewares dupes and suspect camera glasses, I have come into a little spare cash at the end of the financial year and was looking to invest by ticking off something that's been on the "nice to have" list for many years at Evans Central: a household solar setup (eg panels, inverter & battery.)

I know many people already have these systems and I'm using this thread for both personal research gains but to also help any others who may have been interested to know what others have chosen and what they'd do differently if they could do it again.
Like most technologies things can change pretty quickly in a few short years and it sounds like from the limited research I have done, prices of batteries have come down a little and the power capacity of panels has gone up, so perhaps now may be a good time to invest in a system just in time for this year's blinky season.

So for those that have systems already and are willing to share some details, please do so by listing things like:
* What panels you have (brand & wattage)
* How many panels and what size in total it SHOULD produce
* What brand/size invertor
* What brand/size battery (if you have one)
* Were you happy with the installer company (if it wasn't your own doing) you went through?
Again if you're willing to divulge on the interwebs, a rough total outlay cost, and any other pieces of info myself and potential other solar newbies would be pleased to know or avoid before adding to cart would be greatly appreciated.
 
There is a change coming to electricity pricing in a few weeks. Because solar and wind are making electricity so cheap and because solar has excess power during the middle of the day there is an incentive to use power during the peak supply time. I saw a YT video (
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jltRq_KlGH4
) that explained a bit about electricity prices and solar etc. In the video she spoke about upcoming energy tariff changes etc and the big news is that to get people to flatten the "duck curve" there will be free electricity during the middle of the day. 3 hours in some states and 4 in others I believe. Vic details are in this link https://www.energy.vic.gov.au/households/save-energy-and-money/victorian-midday-power-saver
With access to free electricity it may be far more cost effective to just get a battery and charge it during the 3 hours of free electricity and export it back during peak periods.
 
well, we got in early when many of the Rebates were good and massively oversized at every occasion..

15kw of solar on the roof cost around $20k 10? years ago still blasting out 60+kw on a good winters day

around 6 months ago we slapped in (during the peak of the battery rebate) 50kw of battery behind a 12kw inverter for another $8k

then the Mrs car got hit a few months ago and the new BEV has been charged entirely off this battery ever since, power bills are between $3 and $7 a month all said and done using Globird Zero Hero, many changes coming but it mostly looks like supply charge increases.
 
Some companies lock down their inverters so you can’t update the firmware yourself. Once you’ve got it, you’re basically stuck with whatever firmware they give you
 
Katekate said:
whatever you get make sure it can run in offline mode for backup in an outage.
Click to expand...
Ironically I opted out of this as I don't like how it's implemented, speaking to the installers who are coming back in a few weeks we've agreed to stick a few power points in the garage as just in case on the EPS, the last power outage was probably 5 years ago
 
burnt said:
Some companies lock down their inverters so you can’t update the firmware yourself. Once you’ve got it, you’re basically stuck with whatever firmware they give you
Click to expand...
yeah as long as it's stable I'm mostly ok on this, suggest guys do some checking to make sure whatever they have is Offline HA compatible so they can control it even if the companies servers go down
 
I've just installed myself a SigEnergy Sigenstor 10kw hybrid inverter and 2 x sigenstor10 batteries (9.2kwh approx each) with the gateway that will allow me to continue using the power if the grid goes down. My existing inverter is hooked into this system and produces power that the Sigenstor system can utilise to charge the battery when excess power is detected instead of it being exported for near nothing in terms of payback from the power company.

10kw inverter was chosen because it should run 99% of the household in an outage without issue and with 2+ batteries (a 3rd is being added soon because I can make use of it) it will be able to run at it's full potential.
The Sigenstor system was chosen because it's stackable upto 60kwh approx storage, literally just lift the invert off, stack another battery on, put the inverter back on top, no wiring required.
Gateway because it's able to island the house and keep the other grid tied inverter running on a "mini grid" when isolated from the actual national grid. Yes, the Grid tie inverter will run when the power is out at the street keeping the batteries charging and the house fed.

No rebates or payemnt schemes used here but I paid trade price for the equipment.

Bonus is, free power from 9pm-midnight 7 days a week, the battery gets charged to 100% for free and most of that power lasts me the remaining time between either the next charge, or the next time there is enough sun to charge the battery.
 
Last edited:
Recently Installed a 30Kwh battery. and 9 kWw on the roof (all that would fit)
In August I purchased 49.67 kWh from the grid
In July I purchased 307.86 kWh from the grid
In June I purchased 147.14 from the grid
My biggest problem has been the times when there is minimal sun 2 or more days in a row.
If I had of gotten a bigger battery of 40 or 50 kWh I would have been ok

Whilst the upcoming solar saver program with the free power midday means I can recharge the batteries for free from the grid, Just be aware that the daily connection charges have gone up 30% to cover some of the costs.

Installer I used for the panels was O'Brien Electrical
Installer I used for the battery was Chromegen
installations done 6 months apart

I will never use either of these companies ever again.
Chromagen took 120 days between first failed install until commissioning
O'Brien HoHoHoty install, some panels installed upside down, never return calls
 
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andrewa said:
Recently Installed a 30Kwh battery. and 9 kWw on the roof (all that would fit)
In August I purchased 49.67 kWh from the grid
In July I purchased 307.86 kWh from the grid
In June I purchased 147.14 from the grid
My biggest problem has been the times when there is minimal sun 2 or more days in a row.
If I had of gotten a bigger battery of 40 or 50 kWh I would have been ok

Whilst the upcoming solar saver program with the free power midday means I can recharge the batteries for free from the grid, Just be aware that the daily connection charges have gone up 30% to cover some of the costs.

Installer I used for the panels was O'Brien Electrical
Installer I used for the battery was Chromegen
installations done 6 months apart

I will never use either of these companies ever again.
Chromagen took 120 days between first failed install until commissioning
O'Brien HoHoHoty install, some panels installed upside down, never return calls
Click to expand...
ZeroHero does a $1 discount per day that you don't import between 6 and 9pm, then a credit for the first 15kw exported at 10ckwh so you can smash back out your daily charge, then it's just a fight to last till midday when the free import (up to 50kw) kicks off again.

that's a crazy install story, I suspect there is a lot of this :|

somewhat of a silver lining is there is talk that the sodium batteries will bring a decent decrease in install costs, I'm also surprised how little the 50kw install has gone up even with the subsidy reduction
 
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