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Just for your information .....

Back in mid-Sept, I asked if anyone had any recommendations for Solar Battery Installers .... Well, Buyer Beware!!

Back in 2020, having a bit of money to spare, I had a 18 panel, 4.5kW Solar Panel system installed and now, having more money to spare, I paid Solar Battery Group just over $8,000 to install a 5kW Battery, thinking that would give me Power security .... but NO!

Yesterday, at about 7:15p.m., the local Mains power went out and I was left in darkness. Surprise, surprise, when the Mains back on about a min later, so did my Power. At about 10:00p.m., when I checked my Power System, the battery was still indicating over 60% full.

So this morning I rang the Solar Battery Group, the supply/install firm, and they said the Solar Battery arrangement had worked as expected. The system wasn't meant to maintain power in place of Mains power, it was only meant to supply power WHEN THE MAINS WAS AVAILABLE so "in place of" NOT "in the absence of" mains power.

The SOLAR BATTERY GROUP will, however, sell you, for $1,300 or so, an optional extra, a Power Outlet connected directly to the Battery System which will supply up to 3kW maximum .... but, still, during an outage, you'd have to go out to the Battery (or the special power outlet adjacent to it) with a extension cord to plug in your most desireable (less than 3kW) devices!!

I suppose, eventually (if I live long enough), I'll get back my $8,000 for the battery and $2,500 (I think) for the original Solar Panels .... but who knows!! ;-(

Just FYI .... if you are considering getting a Battery installed.

Reply to
Daniel65
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You also need to check that the system will be able to charge the battery from the solar panels during a power outage. This appears to be not a given either.

The ability to do that saved us from the effects of an outage that lasted more than a day (and a week for some people in my area).

Sylvia.

Reply to
Sylvia Else

Bugger!! Guess what my Power Supply Company has scheduled for me on Monday 15/1 (9:00a.m. till 5:00p.m.)??

Reply to
Daniel65

Yes to power the house when the grid's down you're required to have extra circuitry to make sure that it definately can't feed power back into the grid and zap someone working on the line.

I guess that's a lazy way of them meeting the requirements, some people (in Australia) do have systems that switch over the house wiring to battery/solar when the mains goes out, but I guess that's not offered by all installers. It is a surprisingly expensive option from what I saw online.

An alternative to their system would be to just buy a UPS. It'll need a separate battery, but you could keep it inside, and it would switch over automatically for devices connected to it.

It looked too doubtful that I could make back my money before the batteries died when I considered it. But I haven't even got around to setting my solar panels up yet to be honest, too many other jobs.

Reply to
Computer Nerd Kev

Phil Allison wrote on 6/1/24 1:41 pm:

<Snip>

AH!! Brings back 'fond' memories!!

I was in the Army for twenty years, in R.A.Signals. At one time, maybe late 70's, I was at the H.F. Transmitter Station at Digger's Rest, Victoria.

One evening, the Mains died, so one of three 300KVA Blackstone Diesels started up, as it should, but the lights, etc., were cycling on and off, on and off.

As were the lights, etc., in the homes at Diggers Rest.

Seems, rather than losing the three phase mains, we had lost the Neutral line, so the Generator started up as it "should" .... but, with-out the Neutral to reference, the Phase Voltages were wandering all over the place.

And the Three Phase supply hadn't been 'lost', so the Mains CCT Breakers hadn't dropped out, so the Army Camp was trying to supply "wobbly" three phase power out into the real world.

Opps!!

Reply to
Daniel65

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