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All this math is giving me a headache. I'm just going to cut that damn tree down when my wife is gone to Walmart.

I've read through his thread a few times and tried to stay out of it but I just can't seem to resist adding my two cents worth. There seems to be an assumption by some people that there is something wrong with people with more resources having solar (or anything else perhaps) while those with...

Depth of cycle matters. my first wife would wear me down to 0% almost daily. In 20 years I aged 40 years. Just the opposite with my forever wife. We've been together a little over 20 years and she recharges me way more than discharge every day. I now have a longer lifespan than I started with...

Just checking in since I haven't been around here for a while. We're close to Livingston in East Texas. Lost power Monday afternoon and they're saying sometime Saturday before we get it back on. We've been fine with the solar but I have been letting the Generac run since it powers a few...

Man, my old ass is tired! But we got the 16 panels installed and wiring done down to the disconnect. Do the last wire pull tomorrow and hook these puppies up. And clean the old panels. This pollen has them pretty filthy. I thought y'all said this stuff was easy!!!???

Forgot to include the photo of the mounts as we were installing them. Here it is.

I haven't ran a forum in something like 20 years. I got away from that because it was too time consuming, too expensive, and wasn't appreciated. The technology has improved a lot since then but the reasons I stopped doing it haven't. It's a pain. In fact, probably more time consuming now...

It's been a hectic few months since I started this thread, but I finally got back around to finishing the cart build. I stayed with the EG4 3KW for the inverter but went with an EG4 Lifepower4 for the battery. It doesn't have the built in heater but I don't see that being a problem where it's...

Don't sell SS short just yet. They have certainly had some problems but James and many of his team are very active on this forum and have proven, at least to me, that they are determined to resolve those problems and provide quality products and service. Obviously some here will disagree and...

Just a quick "rendering" but you get the idea. Okay, so two of the 18kpv might be overkill, but I had to try to hide the golf bags in the photo or it just wouldn't have looked right. Actually, I've got a golf cart I have on my todo list to switch over to LFP ... hmmm ...

I guess I gotta get in on this. Many years ago I bought a Limb Hog hydraulic chainsaw. It worked great but later on I bought a 50' self propelled manlift so I used that for years for tree work. It was nice and I could handle about any tree, but it got to the point that the maintenance was a...

Wow. Yeah, I'm gonna take a pass on the concentration camp thing. 40 or 50 years ago you never heard of mass shootings here and certainly not school shootings. Guns haven't changed. Society changed. Strict gun laws don't help, especially when you don't follow through with enforcement and...

You know, we laugh and shake our heads, but there was a time I was nearly as ignorant. The difference is I at least understood load vs production so when I did the math I quickly realized solar wasn't in the cards. When it did become viable I still had a lot of stupid questions. That's why I...

A picture? Sure. Let me go find my good hat and maybe put on a nicer shirt ... oh wait. You meant a picture of the batteries, didn't you?

Just curious how everyone's solar and/or batteries did/is doing during this last freeze. I'll start. Mine didn't. Let me preface this by pointing out I am heating and cooling about 4,000 sf and of that about 3000 sf has 10 ft ceilings. So, if you compare to typical 8 ft ceilings and go by...

A good number of us. There are several threads attesting to that. I'll likely never get my money back (although I WILL get back a good portion) but that was never the driving force. There are some who are primarily focused on saving money but usually they are doing grid-tied and some of those...

The truth is we'll never know the truth or have all the information. So we argue with each other while the grift continues. For me, I'm going to raise cattle, grow gardens, build solar, and try to take care of my family. And argue once in a while because it keeps my old brain active. Oh, and...

A big part of the reason for the increase in consumption is the record increases in population. According to the census folks, Texas increased in population in 2022 by 470k people. That's like adding almost the whole state of Wyoming. I'm thinking that is gonna stress just about any grid...

It used to be when people made their choice on where to live they accepted the risks. Hurricane, earthquake, blizzard, drought, etc. I grew up on a river. Sometimes it flooded. Deal with it. Moved to the coast. Occasional hurricane, deal with it. It's the cost of living there. It seems like...

You definitely do. I'm amazed at the difference in consumption, plus it keeps the house consistently cool even when we were having crazy heat. With the garage added we're cooling something around 4000 sq ft and the total usage, grid plus solar, is at least 20% lower. I have one two-ton unit...

No OCD here. I would have responded sooner but I spent all day making changes on stuff like wiring and conduit. But I'm not OCD. My wife told me at one point - don't glue any of that stuff up because you're just going to change it again like the last five times. But I'm not OCD. I'm just...

Around here we sit out on the porch with a shotgun across our lap in the morning, waiting for salesmen to show up. BTW, that's a takeoff from Second Hand Lion, in case you've never seen it.

That's not a problem. That's our life now. Embrace it! :ROFLMAO:

How about if you change the logo? Cuz @timselectric really wants it to say EG4 12K ... ?

I have to dial it down whenever anyone visits us or if I'm just having a conversation with someone. As soon as I get past anything basic like, "We run most of the house on solar" their eyes start glazing over. This forum has been a lifesaver and sometimes sanity saver (sane being a relative...

We get off on this topic and I start getting all antsy, wanting to buy a couple of those EG4 18K or maybe some of those Deye inverters like @timselectric snagged, and a bunch more batteries. I need to stop hanging out here until I recover from the last massive cash hemorrhage. Y'all are a bad...

Someone needs to come up with one of those "make me 40 again" pills. And they need to do it pretty soon! I don't think I'd want to be 20 again but 40 sounds just about right. :ROFLMAO:

Seems like there are always folks like you, busting their ass to help everyone else. And a lot of people who need help. Some of them don't have a choice. Some choose to just depend on you to help them. I hope they all appreciate you as much as we do.

I'm a middle of the road guy on most things and willing to compromise but almost everyone has topics where they feel they have to make a stand. The problem with compromise is that it can gradually erode what we feel are our rights, but without compromise nothing ever happens. So yeah, it's a...

Everything connected, buckled up, and switched back over to solar. Seems to be running fine but I may get SS to log into it and review my settings just to make sure. What do y'all think? I've never been able to get full production from my panels with the 6548s due to the voltage limitation at...

My dad, not my grandfather but my dad, was born in 1898. He was 57 when I was born, ergo the wide spread on age. My grandparents and he and multiple siblings moved from Indiana to Missouri in 1904 in a covered wagon. My grandfather died there just four years later when my dad was 10. Lots...

Here - I fixed it for you

I love em. But they aren't cheap. I think it was over $900 for enough to do 32 panels. I suppose mounting on rails may not be much cheaper though. I will say these go on FAST. The other thing I did after the first round of panels was add a roof hatch. Now I can go up stairs then a short...

I have mine at 57v. Seems to be the only way I can get the batteries to balance. @timselectric told me to drive it like I stole it. :ROFLMAO:

Thank you. I firmly believe that calm and honest discussion can usually produce good results. When it degrades to shouting and name calling then nobody wins and more likely we get pushed farther apart. I blame MSM and social media for fanning the flames with click bait and inflammatory...

Long post - sorry! I haven't been hanging around here for awhile but partly that's because I get addicted to this place so I have to back off a little. I have some fun projects I'm just getting started on so I'll post some pictures as it goes along. And more than likely whine and ask for help...

Grew up ridiculously poor myself and I agree with never going back to that. It's been my observation over many decades that some people are raised with a few advantages and complain because someone else has it better, while others take that leg up and build it into something more. Then some...

This is one of the ones gobbed with glue so it wasn't loose. Module just died. I swapped it out and put the new model on. I'll get ahold of SS on Monday about a warranty. Maybe they will just swap it out for the new model. I'm gonna need 2 when I get the other shop built. And a spare. Gotta have...

I agree but I doubt I can ever pull the plug unless I invest quite a bit more. But maybe. Who knows. For now I don't mind paying a tiny bit to the power company just so I can have them as my backup bitch. Only give them enough money to string them along ... ?

That's exactly what I do. Except I'm rarely dignified. And rarely silent. But otherwise that's me exactly.

There are a few minor things I would have done differently but with the technology and products that were available at the time not really a lot. Parroting @timselectric, I did a lot of research then I found this forum and did a lot more research and asked a lot of questions. One of the...

Investment viability in DIY solar (this is, after all, a DIY forum) is subjective no matter how you cut it. What I can say with confidence is that it is WAY more viable than it was even a couple years ago. There are different opinions on whether it will get even more affordable in the near...

If you clear a little more perimeter you could put up some ground mount to offset that loss. Be careful and don't put the claymores too close in case you have to do maintenance.

I'll add to this that it seems a little crazy for the feds and some of the states to be pushing solar with serious incentives (with our tax dollars but it's good to get some of those back) while the POCOs and municipalities, and other states, are fighting it every step of the way. Of course...

I don't think it will happen right away, but yeah, it's likely coming. The powers that be really don't like independent people. Then there's the whole idea of us paying for something once and using it for decades. It's kinda like all the software companies moving away from selling software to...

Hey! Don't be knocking us retirees. I just bought a rack of batteries from you in March! ?

I don't recall. I was just a little feller back then. 😅 But I don't see how that is relevant The point is we've had weather events as bad or worse than the recent ones for all of human history and beyond. The data for man-made climate change does not support the hypothesis.

We're all a bunch of multi-talented multi-taskers for sure!

I think the whole thing would have been a lot more palatable for average Americans if the union boss had chosen different words when interviewed. Rather than explain their stance he threatened the whole country with being crippled. A lot of people, as usual, weren't paying attention until the...

I thought I had seen some serious rain. Back in 1994 we got almost 30 inches. A gasoline pipeline burst on the San Jacinto river on the east side of Houston and the river caught on fire. We lived about 45 minutes east of Houston and got something like 24 inches...

Then maybe we need to get rid of DEI and woke agendas and get a handle on foreign policy. Maybe also get a handle on the many federal agencies that push all this garbage. But we're drifting pretty hard towards political discussion, which probably needs to be in the Chit Chat section. Back to...

The POCOs here in Texas claim to be solar friendly and all about how to reduce your usage and use, but in the real world they block you at every turn. Or least some of them do. That's how I ended up going off grid and now I am extremely glad I did so. I did it with my own money and own...

I've always said if you know how many guns you have, you don't have enough. I'm thinking that could be applied to other things, such as batteries, spare inverters, spare panels, spare wire ...

I know! But I've moved from the kw and kwh system to the Tim Scale (TS) on my solar. So it's like, okay, I'm at .15 TS on batteries, .40 TS on inverters. ...

Signature Solar came through and the batteries and rack I ordered yesterday arrived this afternoon. The freight company - meh. They called and said their liftgate was broken and could I unload it. Yep. Then the driver wouldn't come down my drive with the 53' trailer, even though there's...

I'm right up the road from you out by Lake Livingston. We're on SHECO and are paying around $0.13 per kWh. So far I have 14kw of panels, 30kWh batteries, and two of the MPP Solar LV6548 AIO inverters. I'm about $30k all in, including wiring, fuses, bus bars, gizmos, gadgets, tools, and some...

We used to do huge parties like that in the fall, mostly for clients and their staff. 100 to 150 people. I'm glad that's over. It was a lot of work. But yeah, let us know how they react. He's a pretty decent guy and owns a successful collision repair business, but he knows nothing about...

Huh. I finally made it into a 1% club! We have a coop here, which is a whole different animal and they aren't regulated the same or very much at all. I tried for six months to get someone to call me back about solar so I could try to do it the right way and make them happy. Never returned...

I'm not against EVs per se, but I agree with @Texas-Mark that mandating EVs is not in the best interest of consumers or the country. Beyond that, if you live in the city or suburbs and only drive short distances I can see the advantages. Taking a long trip in one has shown to be a trainwreck...

If they want to send me 16 I'll spring for the shop vacs.

I can't believe you solar nerds finally got me to build DIY batteries. And I wish I hadn't waited so long. :fp2

I'm thinking @ADK Homer just had a conversation with his wife when she saw the panels - Wife: Well, what else have you ordered? Homer: Not much, dear. Not yet. Wife: Well just how much more do you need for this hobby? Homer: I need some inverters. And some batteries. Wife: Uh huh. You can...

I asked my daughter, "Do you know who Gandi was?" She said, "Of course, dad. I'm not stupid!" I said, "Well I'll bet I know some things about him you don't." Did you know he walked everywhere? And he did so barefoot and his feet were at tough as leather. I knew that. He also fasted frequently...

We ended up installing a mini split in the garage to keep the system functional in the summer. The unintended consequence is we now have another 400 sq ft of climate controlled storage space, which is wonderful. I'm sure there are a number of others, but that's the one that comes to mind.

All hooked up. No smoke so far! I know y'all were worried about that ... Now up to 90kwh of batteries with another 28kwh sitting on the pallet. Those are earmarked for the new shop but we'll see if I can force myself not to add them to this setup for the house. I'll pick the tools later...

They can be a pain in the ass. I didn't remove any of mine and I haven't had any issues but I pretty much agree. Here's an alternative to GFCI - don't lay the plugged in hair dryer on the edge of the tub when you're taking a bath. Yeah, I know, I know - there's some valid reasons for them and...

Or .... multiple larger units! Redundancy problem resolved! :ROFLMAO:

Then you get those who have 8 open gas pumps but they go to the one that has the only open diesel pump then look at you like you're crazy when you're parked waiting behind them. When I'm driving my wife's Expedition I always try to leave the diesel pumps open unless it's the only one left. I...

I'll translate this. What he actually said was, "Yes, dear. Of course, dear." ?

They don't count things like food or fuel. Of course not. Who has to buy those? It's always been a fake number with a bunch of beaurocrats managing it to help out the politicians and justify their existence. Pretty much the definition of government for the past several decades. Probably longer.

Yeah, I get some of that. I try to make it clear that's not a long term option. Just had a friend and client last week tell me she was coming here if the strike caused supply problems. I told her she'd better plan on bringing her own food. I don't think she liked it much. When you prep a...

My daughter lives just east of you an hour or two. It's been pretty miserable up there. She got to use the cart I built for her back in the summer. Their tractor died on the road going to put out hay on the first bad day of the freeze. They ended up putting a tarp over the whole tractor and...

I think the hardest part of that last advice for someone new to this is that's it's very difficult to figure out exactly what you're going to buy. It's almost like you have to do some of it and get a feel for what works for you and what doesn't. I know I didn't go the "smart" route of...

Just ordered a chargeverter. Now I have to start my 10 steps count again. It has been zero days since I bought something for solar. You're not much better though so I'm taking solace in that ...

The better ones go down to 5F or even lower, but much more expensive. Mine go to 5F which is plenty for where nm I live.

Can't disagree with that. Kinda like adding DEF to diesel trucks and tractors.

It just occurred to me, if you're looking for something to do after solar I could use some help castrating a 7 month old bull calf. Not a long term project but still ...

You're going to get shading. In spots ...

This is why I hang out here. I'm getting a lot of education and not made to feel like an idiot in the process. Okay, sometimes I make myself feel like an idiot, but y'all never point it out. :)

All this discussion has just reinforced to me how important it is to do the research and ask a lot of questions when you don't have the foundational knowledge that an electrician or electrical engineer would have. It's frustrating at times but like just about everything else, the more you know...

This sounds very familiar. It was a serious learning experience for me and continues to be. I reached a point where I thought I figured it out but like most things, the more you know the more you realize you don't know. You'll get there. You're already ahead of the curve from what I've seen.

It has been pretty cool watching all the batteries balance themselves. Got the shunt re-synced today. Gonna be nice having the additional reserve.

If that was the aim you hit the bullseye. I didn't really expect you to extend the warranty but someone has to give you a hard time. Everyone else on here is always just so nice to you ... :LOL:

Agree with @timselectric . It's per MPPT. Also keep in mind that the voltage max is a hard stop - if you go over it you're at a high risk of damaging your inverter. The amp max, typically, is a soft stop. If you go over it the inverter will simply clip at it's max rating (or below). The...

Owned an IT company for 40 years this year (semi-retired now) and I agree, except for me it seems like it was about 5% of the people cause 95% of the problems. My solution was to build in what I call the bullshit fee. Figure out what I'm going to charge on a contract then add at least 10% for...

Will would ban me if I posted a picture of my ugly mug. Or worse - make me a mod.

The storm went just north of us. I didn't even know the power outage was happening. I feel for them. It's been a scorcher today again with heat index here at 114 for a little while. Definitely some people suffering if they don't have some kind of backup power, and not everyone has the...

My opinion only, but I think the best way to assess any inverters or most any other solar component is to look at reviews, watch videos, and maybe most of all use this forum to read or interact with people who have experience with any particular device. As I've said before, DIY solar is still...

The mantra of everyone who has ever done solar. I'm in the process of building a mess of batteries which will double my existing 60kwh. And I wish I had more batteries ... :rolleyes:

Got my battery problem solved. I had two cables crossed. It was hard to see in the documentation and I made an assumption that turned out to be wrong. Amy from Docan sent me a much better photo of the connections and I got the second battery right. Now I gotta buy another BMS but that's how...

I got mugged last week by six dwarves. Not Happy.

How are y'all NC folks doing? My vet called me today about a cow. He has some property out there and just got back from a "vacation" there. He said they didn't have a lot of damage to the house but they spent the whole time with chainsaws clearing the driveway etc. Then he told me how amazed...

I'm way past old enough and my body reminds me on a regular basis. I'll be 69 in less than a month. I don't have personal experience recently on the north, but the gulf water temps have been lower this year than the past several years. The storms are no stronger or more frequent that 30 or 40...

The intensity and frequency hasn't increased. What has increased is the 24/7/365 news coverage and sensationalism that we are bombarded with on every medium and device, but especially our phones and computers. If you're willing to do the digging and try to identify and throw out the info from...

Got a pallet of panels and three 18kpv inverters this afternoon. Now I have all the major components and just need to do the work. Having some issues with the JK BMS in the Apexium box (posted in another thread with similar problem), but hopefully I get that worked out soon. Need to find...

I'm thinking one of these could make a pretty nice cart build. @Gavin Stone - hint hint ?

That binder sitting on the left inverter is something I made early on. Initially I just had a printed version of the manual in it and the basic settings. I've added shutdown and startup sequences and instructions, instructions and photos on the grounding screws, a copy of the wiring diagram...