Boilermaker's Solar Journey and Build

[blrmaker]

We are ordering the steel this weekend and hope to have the equipment cover erected early summer. The electrician that was wiring our house was deathly afraid of "solar"! when I met with him and the builder, before we even signed the contract, he said he knew nothing about it and seem very agitated when I showed him the schematic from EG4 diagram 4.5 of the 18kpv manual. I finally made a pdf of the picture below explaining what he would be installing and the remainder I would be installing. He calmed down some and then we were able to move forward.
Once the rough electrical started going in, I went home and started with laying out on the bare wall some of the equipment was going. I originally planned on 3 wall mount batteries per inverter however there was simply not enough wall space inside of my garage.

 

[TacoMeat]

Have you seen this? EG4 is coming out with a "stack" setup for the batteries.

After going through my install, if you can run 1.25 or 1.5 conduit do it!

(6min mark if this doesn't work)
[NEW EG4 PowerPro WallMount Batteries - Solar Surge]

*I'm just sharing a video I saw that might help you in your planning - I'm a random dude with zero links to Solar Surge dude.

 

[blrmaker]

Have you seen this? EG4 is coming out with a "stack" setup for the batteries.

After going through my install, if you can run 1.25 or 1.5 conduit do it!

(6min mark if this doesn't work)
[NEW EG4 PowerPro WallMount Batteries - Solar Surge]

*I'm just sharing a video I saw that might help you in your planning - I'm a random dude with zero links to Solar Surge dude.

Unfortunately everything is purchases at this time.

 

[blrmaker]

This is the way the inside wall of my garage is laid out. I hope to add 2 outdoor wall mounts when the funds allow. The dotted lines are within the wall. One is the 2" conduit coming up from array #1 across the yard. The one coming down is a 1" rigid that will run to array #2 on the garage roof.

 

[TacoMeat]

Unfortunately everything is purchases at this time.

That just means MORE can be purchased I'm not even fully up and running and looking at a 4th battery because... why not?

 

[TacoMeat]

This is the way the inside wall of my garage is laid out. I hope to add 2 outdoor wall mounts when the funds allow. The dotted lines are within the wall. One is the 2" conduit coming up from array #1 across the yard. The one coming down is a 1" rigid that will run to array #2 on the garage roof.View attachment 297536

Not sure about the door, they (code) might not like the inverter behind it?

The other thing I would THINK about right now is maybe NOT using the EG4 wire trays and just getting a large continuous wire tray from your local supply house. I'm already wishing I would have just done that for my batteries / inverter.

They're nice and all but EG4 REALLY needs to supply (sell) a blank top without all the knock outs.

 

[blrmaker]

Not sure about the door, they (code) might not like the inverter behind it?

The other thing I would THINK about right now is maybe NOT using the EG4 wire trays and just getting a large continuous wire tray from your local supply house. I'm already wishing I would have just done that for my batteries / inverter.

They're nice and all but EG4 REALLY needs to supply (sell) a blank top without all the knock outs.

Yes. We already knocked out the big slot in one of the EG4 boxes by accident. Wifey had to JB weld it back in place. The boxes also don't like extra holes popped into the tops.

 

[blrmaker]

We didn't take into account the electrical would be right outside of the bathroom window. I am sure this will not be the first mistake in lay out that we made. The floor plan of the garage wall where all of the electrical is located:

 

[OhYou_]

It happened that we had some other concrete to be poured for the house so we used the same truck/mix to fill these up. I believe it was 4000psi concrete with fiber added. When the steel shows up this summer, we will see if my layout was correct. LOL if not, I know a welder. That blue tarp under the tree is the 3 pallets of panels just itching to be mounted and producing electricit
View attachment 297273

I'm not really an expert on footings, but is this okay to run the pipe through the slab like this? The ground itself changes height a tiny bit in the summer and winter as ground moisture content changes.

 

[blrmaker]

I'm not really an expert on footings, but is this okay to run the pipe through the slab like this? The ground itself changes height a tiny bit in the summer and winter as ground moisture content changes.

I hope so. The only positive is the concrete is 2 foot below the frost line.

 

[OhYou_]

I hope so. The only positive is the concrete is 2 foot below the frost line.

oh that works, from the other pics it looked like you just poured concrete down onto the ground with some drainage rocks inbetween.

 

[blrmaker]

Outside the garage will be the future outdoor batteries. The circles in both drawings at the conduit box locations are pass through 2" PVC conduit. The exterior of the house is brick so needed to get them in before the brick was installed. I rather the brickies cut around then me doing core drilling.

 

[blrmaker]

Generator pad poured and prewired. Lay out for outdoor electrical on the wall.

 

[blrmaker]

Fuzzy picture of the 2" conduit I put through the wall before the brick went up. I probably need 2 more if I want to add the extra batteries. Guess I will be core drilling after all.

 

[blrmaker]

The electricians bringing power lines to the meter. I finally have them understanding the AC side of what is needed. The gutter will have the feeder tap. From left to right: meter, main disconnect, feeder tap disconnect, manual transfer switch, and not installed yet is the generator combiner box.

 

[blrmaker]

Feeder tap installed along with the generator combiner box. Manual transfer switch wires landed. They ended up breaking a few bricks when the trenched up close to the wall. Bugger.

 

[blrmaker]

It's hard to tell but the inlet combiner box wires are tied into the feeder tap connections. This is where my portion of the install is starting.

 

[blrmaker]

After the foam insulation was sprayed in, I laid out the inverter spacing and batteries again.

 

[blrmaker]

Then as I was starting to install the cement board I realized that the inverter mounts were not going to land on the studs like they are designed to. I ended up removing the cement board after this picture.

 

[blrmaker]

Decided to put up 1/2" plywood underneath the cement board.

Progress!

 

[blrmaker]

Cement board going up...again. I used the same pieces and was able to get them in a close proximity to where they were. This should allow me to mount what ever and where ever I want and not be limited to the stud locations.

 

[blrmaker]

All of the important cement board installed. I will fill in the remaining at a later date as I am getting excited to get started on the batteries, inverters, and combiner boxes.

 

[TacoMeat]

I don't know how many times I said to my buddy during my install, why do something once when you can do it 2 or 3 times before moving on.

 

[TacoMeat]

I'm sure you've ran into "where did I put <insert tool that was JUST in your hand>?" look around, walk around, scratch your head, get pissed off, walk back to where you said where is this tool, JUST to find it sitting RIGHT where you placed it but you're too blind "looking" for it that you skipped right over it. :\

 

[blrmaker]

I'm sure you've ran into "where did I put <insert tool that was JUST in your hand>?" look around, walk around, scratch your head, get pissed off, walk back to where you said where is this tool, JUST to find it sitting RIGHT where you placed it but you're too blind "looking" for it that you skipped right over it. :\

I have gotten to the point in life where I have to put everything in the exact same place each time or I will never find it again. Which sucks because that means putting every tool away each night and then tooling up again in the morning.

I set up a plastic folding table with all of the tools right next my work area. That table is clean when I am done at the end of each day. SMH