OK. I think I'm getting it...at least I'm understanding more than I did...you are a wealth of knowledge. Can't thank you enough.
the Vmp is what I was lookin at around 40.9v. The Voc is around 49.2. So that would mean 4s3p should get me pretty decent power for starters and 50Voc of cushion. The spec sheet is below. Also the battery spec sheet.
battery says 100A constant max charge current. The nominal voltage is 51.2V and charging voltage is 58V.
As far as the audit, I've listed everything that "might" run at the same time anytime during the day or night (my wife is a night owl artist). I'm calling those continuous. If the big ac and the 2.5 hp water well both surged at the same time AND everything else was running, it could hit close to 34K. If a fridge or window ac or anything else surged at the same time as the ac and well...I would hope the fuses and breakers would do their job. With no surge, if everything was going it would be around 20K.
Then there are what I'm calling intermittent. Blender, drill, microwave, instapot, air compressor etc...Those add up to at least 20K with likely surge of no more than 3-5K. I would absolutely do I think they call it shedding...turn off fridges, ac's, water heater, etc whenever I would use intermittent equipment. That's where I came up with the need for the 36K surge capability of that inverter.
I plan to time the refrigerators, freezers, window ac/big ac, to lower the total draw. I also plan to put a switch on the water heater to only come on before we need it...assuming we're totally off grid and surviving on only solar. That beast is around 5500Kw. Same thing for my 5ton ac I rated at 7K in my chart. Nominal voltage says 230 with max 30A fuse so I bumped that up to 7K. Turn off those two and half my usage...way more than half my surge. At 2.5x surge, the ac comes in at 17500.
I'm also working on a large water storage system that would allow me to only run the well intermittently. I'm working on 1200 gallons under pressure as well as raised for gravity feed if needed. We'd get a few minutes with pressure if the well was off but quite a long time with fair pressure with the well off. That could be a big bonus since it's a big hog at around 2K and 5K on the surge. the only time I'd really need (want) high pressure is for showers. Everything else doesn't need high pressure. With that much water stored higher than the tap, you already get pretty good pressure just from gravity.
We live in S Texas so we have lots of sun...which is good BUT we have LOTS of need for refrigerated AC with humidity often in the 90% range in the summer. Some years...like last year!...we need a week or so of constant heat. Most years only really need (want) constant heat in the night and a little in the day.
I plan to have as many batteries as I can afford in the next 4 years...that's my plan...to be done in 4 years. A second inverter is not out of the question some day...just not this day! As for the batteries, I assume same brand and model is optimal...Is it "bad" to mix other brands? I would only want lifepo4 but might find better deals on different brands. With my limited electrical knowledge, I would think as long as the specs are close, mixing brands would be OK...??
My average usage last year was 83Kwh per day (2485/mo). With the hvac being the biggest draw by far, that can mostly be spread over 24 hours pretty evenly since it runs day and night in the extreme seasons. I don't know what that comes to in DC. Haven't learned that far yet.
I think 12 panels in 4S3P would get me around 4800W at the Vmp.
Using Voc and Imp, 196.8V at 9.78A per series row and 196.8V at 29.34A with the 3 series wired in parallel. Max watts = 5774W. Did I get that right?
Adding another 8 panels in same configuration would be and additional 3849W max.
3849 + 5774 = 9623W. Here are some numbers I found in a peak sun hours by zip code chart.
Jan: 3.94
Feb: 4.26
Mar: 4.82
Apr: 5.43
May: 5.68
Jun: 5.83
Jul: 5.86
Aug: 5.98
Sep: 5.64
Oct: 5.18
Nov: 4.4
Dec: 3.82
NO SHADE in my planned mounting area. Would the 20 panel arrangement be safe pointed in different directions?