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diy solar

DIY ground mount

upnorthandpersonal said:
As I mentioned in an earlier post, total (wood, concrete pillars, fasteners, L-brackets) cost: €320 including VAT and delivery.
Click to expand...
I forgot what angle in degree's you have there, looks close to 45 degrees, or darn close to it. A Hindsight thing may have been just as easy to make an A-Frame "shed" with the panels on the one side. An "A-Frame" is awfully simple to put up and many don't even consider it, but makes a good place to put lawn mower and yard gear or your solar gear if closed up etc...

PS:
1) I hope you left a bit of space between the batten & the panel sides running across the middle for expansion / contraction & a bit of movement, lest you pop the glass. PT Wood or not, it will still behave like wood.
2) I also hope that the Aluminium makes zero contact with the PT Lumber, Aluminium & PT do NOT get along well.
 
Steve_S said:
I forgot what angle in degree's you have there, looks close to 45 degrees
Click to expand...

It's more than that. Close to 70 if I remember correctly. I didn't want to turn it into yet another building :)

1) yes
2) yes, glass fiber mat in between - should have mentioned that. Some of the screws are temporary since I didn't have the right ones, but will be replaced coming week or so.
 
The reason I pop up on the PT, is that I used PT to build my rack and so I cut up an old rubber tire tube to make insulators to go between the L-Brackets for the rails & Wood and used only Stainless Steel bolts due to the issues with PT and Aluminium.

Coming Week or so.... Better get motivated, Father Winter is already poking us that he is coming and SOON and to get our butt's ready. Given how wonky the Northern Jetstream has been, even Environment Canada is warning that we will have one really variable winter... whatever that means.... 60cm snowfalls followed by thaws & more dumps or ??? Geez, I'm glad I just got another 4x4 with severe duty Muck Tires. I've noticed the woodland critters are doing their thing already which is a bit sooner than usual for them.
 
PT wood is corrosive because of the copper used to impregnate it, so yeah - stainless steel screws are pretty much required. Couple of days should be fine - even if we have a storm coming in on Wednesday :)
 
upnorthandpersonal said:
As I mentioned in an earlier post, total (wood, concrete pillars, fasteners, L-brackets) cost: €320 including VAT and delivery.
Click to expand...

$380 US
That is holding four of your 500W panels, could have held six.
Scaling from the $0.35/W including tax and delivery I paid for my panels, the structure is more than 50% the cost of panels.
Silicon. The most abundant element on earth, and (almost) the least expensive.

Not that the structures I build cost any less:

www.homedepot.com

Wheatland Tube 2 in. x 10 ft. Rigid Metal Conduit 0544310000 - The Home Depot

Wheatland Rigid Metal Conduit is galvanized steel raceway designed to protect and route conductors or cables. Made of metallic material.
www.homedepot.com

www.invertersupply.com

UniRac 310168C - Inverter Supply

Shop for UniRac 310168C at Inverter Supply for best prices online. UniRac 310168C, UniRac, 310168C, SM 168 Standard Rail Clear Anodized, Unirac Mounting Rails
www.invertersupply.com www.invertersupply.com
 
thealaskan said:
Mount looks good. Did you notice the solar shading? I noticed it in several pictures, is it trees? The shade line looks straight.
Click to expand...

My place is surrounded on three sides by forest. There is the sea in front of the property and a large meadow, but I don't want to put panels there.
Shade is something I live with. This is also why I place solar panels 'strategically' to optimize based on seasonal patterns whereby in summer I don't really care, but in winter (and late autumn, early spring) I get the maximum possible. Some of those trees need to go still (long story, but essentially turning old 'tree farm' into diverse natural forest. The canopy will open up then and some of the shading will be gone.
 
Hedges said:
$380 US
That is holding four of your 500W panels, could have held six.
Scaling from the $0.35/W including tax and delivery I paid for my panels, the structure is more than 50% the cost of panels.
Silicon. The most abundant element on earth, and (almost) the least expensive.

Not that the structures I build cost any less:

www.homedepot.com

Wheatland Tube 2 in. x 10 ft. Rigid Metal Conduit 0544310000 - The Home Depot

Wheatland Rigid Metal Conduit is galvanized steel raceway designed to protect and route conductors or cables. Made of metallic material.
www.homedepot.com

www.invertersupply.com

UniRac 310168C - Inverter Supply

Shop for UniRac 310168C at Inverter Supply for best prices online. UniRac 310168C, UniRac, 310168C, SM 168 Standard Rail Clear Anodized, Unirac Mounting Rails
www.invertersupply.com www.invertersupply.com
Click to expand...

For one, if I take that cost and break it down, it comes to (roughly, don't have the numbers in front of me):

- 110 Euro for the wood
- 30 Euro per concrete pillar, total 6x = 180 Euro
- L-brackets and fasteners 30Euro

So most of the cost is actually in the concrete, the wood and fasteners are less than half the total cost. Using metal conduit and mounting rail would make this more expensive (in part since they're not that easy to get here). I would still need the concrete pillars since I can't drive a pole in the ground or anything (thin layer of topsoil, and then it's all bedrock). Granted, I could make them myself and save a little, but I have too many other things to do.
 
Storm came and is still ongoing. Several trees down, no damage to the buildings. No problems with the ground mount and panels are perfectly fine. Power outages everywhere, except at my place :)

DSC_1873.jpg

It has been an exceptionally strong storm and much earlier in the year than usual, so birch trees still have their leaves and go down faster. It also rained a lot, so pines and spruce sit in soggy ground and also go down faster. Most of the terrain around is bedrock, so few trees have deep roots.
 
Magnificent to see your project's 1st phase has come to fruition despite hurdles set by the Corona pandemic! Just to reiterate on some aspects as also starting to plan my own project with the same 500W panels for summer 2021:
- Did you add some level of grounding now that the basic frame is made from wood?
- What was your plan for the remaining panels: expanding the row or a separate installation?
- For your next phase of the project, were you planning to leave any wind gap between the panels?
 
LaplandSolar said:
- Did you add some level of grounding now that the basic frame is made from wood?
Click to expand...

Yes, the panels themselves are connected to earthing. They have an extra hole in the aluminium frame specifically for that purpose. All panels are linked together with a copper cable (with tinned lugs) loop and then connected to the electrical earth.

LaplandSolar said:
- What was your plan for the remaining panels: expanding the row or a separate installation?
Click to expand...

They will be in separate locations. Two set-ups in different places of 8 panels each, one specifically optimized for winter.

LaplandSolar said:
- For your next phase of the project, were you planning to leave any wind gap between the panels?
Click to expand...

I might make some small adjustments but I don't think a 'wind gap' is useful or needed.
 
Wind Gap only helps to keep ice in place over the panels like an anchor. It actually acts like claws between the panel frames. I recently saw a T shaped aluminium moulding designed as a filler to cover the gaps between panels for icing prevention, allowing the panels to easily shed snow & ice buildup. Obviously another Northerner got fed up battling with that problem and came up with a nifty solution.
 
LaplandSolar said:
Magnificent to see your project's 1st phase has come to fruition despite hurdles set by the Corona pandemic! Just to reiterate on some aspects as also starting to plan my own project with the same 500W panels for summer 2021:
- Did you add some level of grounding now that the basic frame is made from wood?
- What was your plan for the remaining panels: expanding the row or a separate installation?
- For your next phase of the project, were you planning to leave any wind gap between the panels?
Click to expand...
OT: regarding those 500w panels:
Have you checked panel prices on gwl-power?

ELERIX Solar Panel Mono, Perc, Half Cut 450Wp 144 Cells (ESM-450H), Pallet 30 Pcs) | GWL Group

Pallet of 30 units of PERC Half Cut mono photovoltaic panel with rated power 450Wp. High efficiency 20,70%. Silver frame.
shop.gwl.eu shop.gwl.eu
 
MattiFin said:
OT: regarding those 500w panels:
Have you checked panel prices on gwl-power?

ELERIX Solar Panel Mono, Perc, Half Cut 450Wp 144 Cells (ESM-450H), Pallet 30 Pcs) | GWL Group

Pallet of 30 units of PERC Half Cut mono photovoltaic panel with rated power 450Wp. High efficiency 20,70%. Silver frame.
shop.gwl.eu shop.gwl.eu
Click to expand...

Yes - they have some really good deals. Keep in mind that the prices are usually listed without VAT, so you have to add 24%. They also go out of stock real quick.
 
upnorthandpersonal said:
Yes - they have some really good deals. Keep in mind that the prices are usually listed without VAT, so you have to add 24%. They also go out of stock real quick.
Click to expand...
Yeah, prices are without VAT but at least you dont pay for other customs fees.
I went trough gazillion of websites lately and gwl was cheapest source for solar cells in europe, possibly even cheaper than alibaba. Their solar cells have some Chech green energy support/funding so that might explain part of the cheap price.
 
Last edited:
So like upnorthandpersonal stated EU removed custom tariffs for solar panels in 2018/2019 so you only need to pay VAT for importing them from China. Let's hope the recent hike in shipping prices will be temporary. The quote I got from the solar panel vendor was 6 week shipping time (personally would say safe bet 10 weeks if you want them early in the summer).

The GWL ones look interesting but they are even larger in height dimension than the 500W panels was planning to get
 
I was not aware of any issues with aluminium on pressure treated wood? The stuff I buy is pine , radiata pine I think and it warps and twists a lot unless its restrained . Arn't solar panels plastic not glass? I've never checked . never had one break but they are set in a flexible silicon glue . 704 style I think.
 
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