Solar, inverter, battery thread

R

Rudolph Hart

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Jun 21, 2020
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840
Rudolph Hart said:
Well, I bought this today https://za.ecoflow.com/products/river-pro-portable-power-station

Not the biggest, but big enough for my immediate needs, light enough to carry, and charges quickly enough for bad load shedding. Downside is that I really wanted LiFepo4 batteries, but couldn’t find anything that ticked all the other boxes
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Just an update - it arrived today, and I’m really impressed. Packaging and build quality are very good, and it really has all the features. You can set the chafing speed on the phone app, as well as the maximum charge level on the batteries in case you want longer life span rather than 100% capacity at all times. Runs in bypass mode for when it’s charging, with a 30ms switchover to the inverter if power goes down which is plenty.

Of course there’s always a fly in the ointment somewhere and with this it’s that I discovered while using the app that there’s a second generation and checking online e that’s due to be released tomorrow. The new one has the lifepo battery I was looking for, but I suspect that the pricing will reflect that. In spite of this, I’m still happy with my purchase, it’s a very neat product and testing of it will begin tonight.
 
SauRoN

SauRoN

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Cracked my first 40+ kWh day.

982f98e0cdc37b4a6ebf2913a9d4a7c7.jpg



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biometrics

biometrics

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Stock keeps getting delays. Batteries were supposed to come in last week, now only this week. Then one last part called a fuse-switch-disconnector. Was supposed to come in this week, now only 13 Dec. Which means it's super unlikely I'm getting my install this year. So frustrating spending R200k and having to wait so long. But, I guess there is huge demand, so gotta wait...
 
Johnatan56

Johnatan56

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Vienna
SauRoN said:
I tried my best, just can’t crack 50kWh.
34d0be57940994fcc7229b8eb588ae82.jpg



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Can I haz powerz plz? Together we can crack 50kWh some day. :p
1669822441645.png
(Pinkish is my usage, dark blue is what the average was for a single person household in Vienna during the same time period, still think it's a bit off since often single person household is inherited place with no one living there = no power usage, since 2 person is 10kWh average).

My heating is via district heating though, so far I am at ~2kWh since one evening I actually upped the heating to dry clothes in the bathroom, otherwise my neighbors and PC have been heating more than enough that mine hasn't kicked in, have 24C in living room (without PC ~22C, with 23-24).
 
biometrics

biometrics

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My order is finally here on Thursday. Unfortunately can only get it installed in Jan.
 
Arzy

Arzy

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Moving into a new place end of Jan/early Feb. It has solar geysers installed, gas hob and some efficiency already in terms of lighting etc. but no backup power yet.

Going to have to do something to sort that out, I'm not concerned with going off grid and producing for myself yet, just need the damned lights, TV and internet to stay on without having to do anything.

Was thinking of installing a 8kW inverter with sufficient batteries to see me through 4-6 hours of loadshedding and of course splitting the DB into essential/non-essential.

Biggest power draw would be the wife's hairdryer occasionally. Oven, microwave, etc. would be non-essential. If you want tea, make it using the has hob kinda thing.

Any advice?
 
biometrics

biometrics

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Arzy said:
Moving into a new place end of Jan/early Feb. It has solar geysers installed, gas hob and some efficiency already in terms of lighting etc. but no backup power yet.

Going to have to do something to sort that out, I'm not concerned with going off grid and producing for myself yet, just need the damned lights, TV and internet to stay on without having to do anything.

Was thinking of installing a 8kW inverter with sufficient batteries to see me through 4-6 hours of loadshedding and of course splitting the DB into essential/non-essential.

Biggest power draw would be the wife's hairdryer occasionally. Oven, microwave, etc. would be non-essential. If you want tea, make it using the has hob kinda thing.

Any advice?
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With a 8kW inverter you don't need to split into essential/non-essential. My R200k buys me 8kW inverter, 10kWh battery and 7kW panels. Most days I should not be using Eskom. Only thing I've added is geyser timers for the two geysers so they are only on during the day.

I'm new to this though, @Spizz, @Tinuva and @SauRoN have installations so can give better advice.
 
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SauRoN

SauRoN

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495
Arzy said:
Moving into a new place end of Jan/early Feb. It has solar geysers installed, gas hob and some efficiency already in terms of lighting etc. but no backup power yet.

Going to have to do something to sort that out, I'm not concerned with going off grid and producing for myself yet, just need the damned lights, TV and internet to stay on without having to do anything.

Was thinking of installing a 8kW inverter with sufficient batteries to see me through 4-6 hours of loadshedding and of course splitting the DB into essential/non-essential.

Biggest power draw would be the wife's hairdryer occasionally. Oven, microwave, etc. would be non-essential. If you want tea, make it using the has hob kinda thing.

Any advice?
Click to expand...

8kW Inverter is a good idea if you do have plans to go Solar later but if you don’t bear in mind you have limitations on the batteries output when there is no grid to supplement.

So that’s something to take into account for how many batteries and brands etc.

Beyond that is being very sure what the max Depth of Discharge is before they shutdown. Mine has a hard limit of 15% and then they turn off and I didn’t know that up front.

I happily get through 4 hour load shed at night on 20% of battery which is 3kW or so.

Can happily use your normal kettle, it only runs a few minutes after all.


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SauRoN

SauRoN

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biometrics said:
With a 8kW inverter you don't need to split into essential/non-essential. My R200k buys me 8kW inverter, 10kWh battery and 7kW panels. Most days I should not be using Eskom. Only thing I've added is geyser timers for the two geysers so they are only on during the day.

I'm new to this though, @Spizz, @Tinuva and @SauRoN have installations so can give better advice.
Click to expand...

Like I said above without solar in the mix you can’t just invert everything as the batteries will tap out not the inverter.

I can’t run my geyser and all three aircons if the grid is gone and solar isn’t at full tilt due to the over current protection on the batteries.

If I didn’t have solar I would have put my geyser on non-essentials for this reason.


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biometrics

biometrics

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Got my order delivered last week. This morning I get a delivery of another two batteries. Confused about this, being my first solar installation, I contact them to say I already got my order and got another two batteries this morning, sent through photos of everything. Asked if this is a mistake, they reply that it looks good, no problem. So tried to do the right thing but I may or may not have received extra, sure looks that way to me. Will just store the two extras until they figure out their mistake, if it indeed is a mistake. Perhaps I paid for four? Maybe two is considered one unit. Fuck knows.
 
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