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I have an AiLi battery shunt monitor on my system which has 2 12v 100ah batteries in parallel. I am having trouble with accuracy. I have the monitor set to 200ah and I recently fully charged my batteries and reset the monitor to 100% as per the manual. I have let my system sit idle for a few...

On the little power banks, like the ones to charge phones, how do I convert the mAh to Wh? Do I use the USB voltage of 5v? Some have USB-C that can output more than 5v. So I am unsure how to calculate the Wh. I want to be able to calculate how long the bank will last if I am using it for a...

What is the best way to compare solar generators like the Bluettis or EcoFlows etc? I get overwhelmed by the choices. Many of them seem to have similar features. How do I find the best value? Do I compare by Wh/$ of the battery? The inverter sizes all seem adequate for my needs so that doesn't...

My Weize 12V 100ah ran down to 7.8%. I hooked up a 10amp AC charger to charge the battery. My AiLi battery meter froze at 7.8% and didn't move or indicate the battery was charging. When I disconnected the charger, the AiLi was still frozen. I unplugged it and replugged it back in and it works...

I have 4 x 100W Renogy panels 2s2p into a Renogy Rover 40a SCC. I am only getting 60-100W out of the panels. Not a cloud in the sky today. The panels don’t seem to be in any shade by my visual assessment. The potential sun-blocking trees have lost all their leaves. This setup was getting me...

I am going into my first winter with my solar setup. I have 400W of panels. In the summer, I was getting 300-325 W in good midday sun. What can I expect for output on sunshiny winter days? To generalize the question, how much worse is winter solar production vs summer? I am in the Midwest about...

I have a Renogy Rover 40a SCC. The specs say it can take 520W at 12v. I have 600 Watts of panels 3s2p. I am well within the voltage limit which is 100v. Panels are 24.3V times 3 for the series. I doubt I would actually hit 520W except on summer days. Am I safe with this level overpaneling? If I...

I have a simple solar system with a 12v 100ah Weize from Amazon. If I want to expand my system (batteries in parallel), should I get another Weize or are all the common 12v 100ah batteries interconnectable?

I am trying to figure out how to run small devices on DC off of a 12v battery instead of going through an inverter and AC plug that will convert back to DC anyways. I am talking about things like WiFi routers (Google Nest) or a network splitter box or my Google Fiber fiber jack. Often times, the...

I would like to fool around with some 300-400 watt panels on the cheap. What would be a good starting point locally? I don't see any on Craigs List. Do I call local solar dealers and ask if they have used panels? I don't want the buy new for a DIY experiment and I wouldn't be ordering in any...

My battery has bolt type terminals. What order do the parts go? Specifically the flat washer. Is it battery then flat washer then lug then split washer then terminal bolt? I guess my question is should my lug be directly on the battery and the washers push down from above? Or the washer is...

How much can I trust the battery capacity monitor on my SCC? I am looking for a percentage or bar graph type of gauge. Is a shunt type battery monitor better? I am a little wary due to the price of the Renogy one but the off brand ones on Amazon seem too good to be true price-wise. My set up is...

I just put together a renogy 400W premium kit that has a Rover 40a MPPT controller. It is hooked up to a Wiese 12v 100ah LiFePO4 battery. Within 30 seconds of hooking up the panels, I get a battery overvoltage error and the voltage reading on the SCC goes up to 17-18V. I confirmed that voltage...

Are there any weather websites that have information of the degree of cloud cover for particular days? For example, if I wanted to keep a log of my solar panel production compared to the percentage of cloud cover for a day, where could I find that information?

I am putting together a little system with 4 x 100W panels set up in 2s2p configuration. I know in the morning, a deck railing will cause some shadowing on two panels. Am I better off arranging the panels so the shade falls on the 2s or the 2p panels?

So we beginners can learn from our more experienced members, can you share your biggest mistakes when you were building your first system?

I know this is a kind of vague question and depends on the specifics of a computer system. What parts of a computer system draw the most? I have an office workstation running 4 monitors, 2 of which are medical imaging level resolution. It draws up to 4.4 kWh on my workdays and about 2.6 kWh on...

If I want to charge a tool battery (Harbor Freight) that is 80v 2.5a, that should be 200w. But how much is lost in inefficiency and loss from the AC charger? Anyone have a guess on how many watts I will actually use to recharge a 200w tool battery?

For battery disconnect, do you recommend a cutoff switch or something like an Anderson SB175? (I can't figure out how to put an Amazon link to show you which items I mean.)

I am putting together a 400w Renogy kit. I got a 1000w Renogy inverter and it came with 4 AWG wires. I am outputting from the 40a SCC with 8 gauge wire to the bus bar. If I hook the inverter to the bus bar, doesn't that mean my bus to battery connection also has to be 4 gauge? and would a 100...

I know a lot of SCC have bluetooth connections so you can see what is going on and change settings. Are these proprietary to their own brands or do they use some kind of standard format allowing for better, more full featured third party apps? I think we all have experience with apps that come...

What are the load terminals actually useful for on an SCC? Most of the info I have seen says the not use them. I guess my question is why are the even there if most authorities say don't bother using them.

I have an energy monitor plug on my big freezer. It draws about 100w when the compressor is running. But about once a week, it draws 400w which I assume is for the auto-defroster? How do I size the inverter assuming the compressor start will require 3-7x of the running watts for surge? I assume...

I have seen some inverters on Amazon that come with two smaller wires instead of one big gauge wire. What is the math for determining equivalent amp carrying capacity for 2 smaller wires vs. 1 big wire? I see on an ampacity chart that a 4 AWG will carry 100a and a 6 AWG will carry 50a. Is it as...

I see that the Renogy 40a Rover can take up to 1040W of solar in 24v mode. What do I do if I want to use 200w panels? I believe that I can't use an odd number of panels so I would either have to do 2s2p or 3s2p. But 3s2p would put me at 1200w. Can the SCC safely take that amount of excess? The...

I am looking to build a simple 400w 12v system. Am I supposed to use bus bars to connect everything? Is there anything that shouldn't go through a bus bar other than PV input? And do fuses go after the bus bar near the target? (i.e. fuse right before battery positive terminal) For example...

If I buy a 12v 100AhLFP battery from brand X, do I need to buy the same brand if I want to expand my battery bank? Or are the various brands interchangeable? Any rules for mixing and matching batteries? Similarly, If I have two 12v batteries in series and I want to expand, can I add a 24v in...

Does anyone have creative mounting options for system components? I want my system to me semi-mobile. Not talking about going camping, but more moving it around the house or basement storage area. I am envisioning multiple SLA batteries in addition to charge controller and inverter. Would you...

I am looking into a midrange solar generator system like an AC200Max and about 1kw in panels. (I am not confident in my handyman skills to try and make a system from scratch, not withstanding the many available YouTube tutorials including Will's ) My purpose is having emergency power for a...