I did a thing! Sunny Island, growatt min ac coupled system

[1201]

hi guys,

I finally got my system set up after 1 SOLID year of researching solar PV here there and everywhere and 5 years of solar home building research and planning.
I built my passive solar house with pv in mind. No penetrations on the south side. The optimizer said 32° roof angle facing 4 degrees west would be optimal. my house has a 35° roof angle facing, wait for it, 4 degrees west.

huge thanks to @timselectric and @Hedges , without whom I couldn't have done this. the copious amounts of help they provided in private was invaluable. THANKS!!!

The system:

two sunny island 6048 low frequency inverters from ebay. They are well used. 70k hours each, from 2012, work as good as new, at least for now
-fans dont come on until after 10kw and even then they are very quiet. Ive only heard the fans once.
-they LAUGH at surge loads, not even a thing. these things have 100a surge capacity combined
-they perfectly ac couple my growatt inverter
- oh, and only 50watts total idle load!


the grid tie inverter is a growatt min 11400tl-xh-us
-its fanless and quiet, up to 98.5% efficiency.
-4x 600v mppts, up to 22kw of pv input
-during the day it adds to my total inverter capability so 12kw from sunny islands and 11.4 kw from growatt for a total of 23.4k of inverting capacity.
-works with solar assistant
-and will throttle the output based on instructions from the sunny island

batteries:
-currently total 28kwh CATL 280h packs from batteryhookup.com
-jk 200a bms for each
-nader 125 a circuit breaker


panels:
-28 canadian solar cs6r 400w panels for 11.2kw of output mounted to my r-panel roof with
-s-5 protea brackets and
-iron ridge rails
-two strings of 14 panels each, voc of 515v

very near Future plans are to add another 5.6kw of panels and I ordered an additional 28kwh of batteries today from battery hookup. Good thing I left space on the roof for a 3rd row of panels

once stage 2 is done my power bill should be zero every month and the poco should owe me 9/12 months. currently im not tied to the poco.

 

[timselectric]

Awesome

 

[1201]

Added another 28kwh of battery storage. Never thought the first 28kwh wouldn't be enough but here we are. 56kwh better be enough lol but at a cost of $1400 per 14kwh I don't mind adding more if I need it.

This forum is bad for my wallet but at the same time good for my wallet. Crazy to think I can add that much storage for that little.

I got the lexan cover from the trash bin at Lowe's. They store their off cuts next to the cutting station. The Lowe's person sold it to me for half off.

 

[Hedges]

Batteries, but no drywall.

(I know, who am I to talk!)
Difference is, my batteries aren't lithium anything.

 

[1201]

Batteries, but no drywall.

(I know, who am I to talk!)
Difference is, my batteries aren't lithium anything.

Is drywall required by code or something?(I'm not familiar with electrical code)

 

[Hedges]

Just thinking that drywall is a pretty good fire stop.

Wasn't sure if I was looking at a small power shed or a larger building that is a home.
Some people have put smoke alarms in their battery room. Linked to others might be a good idea.
I've always had non-linked alarm (but employees remodeling a unit in a mall kicked up dust that set one off ?‍?‍, after that we had a bag over the alarm.)
I picked up three linkable ones I'm going to put in my "new" house. They are combo smoke and CO, and have instructions to locate well away from gas appliances. Apparently to ensure we breath the correct amount without being panicked.)

 

[MajicDiver]

Non diy typess are out there paying upwards of $10k for 14kwh

It all depends on how you want it “packaged” and if you have the skills necessary to build it as neatly as you need it to be. Everything is a trade off of many pro’s and con’s.

Also, your pricing reference is a little old. The Growatt ARO 19.9kWh battery can be had on eBay for $8,776, free shipping. From Solar Equipment Outlet. Other stuff I’ve recently bought from them shipped from Renvu so I’m assuming that’s who is behind that store front.

 

[1201]

Just thinking that drywall is a pretty good fire stop.

Wasn't sure if I was looking at a small power shed or a larger building that is a home.
Some people have put smoke alarms in their battery room. Linked to others might be a good idea.
I've always had non-linked alarm (but employees remodeling a unit in a mall kicked up dust that set one off ?‍?‍, after that we had a bag over the alarm.)
I picked up three linkable ones I'm going to put in my "new" house. They are combo smoke and CO, and have instructions to locate well away from gas appliances. Apparently to ensure we breath the correct amount without being panicked.)

This is a shed but a smoke alarm is not a bad idea.

It all depends on how you want it “packaged” and if you have the skills necessary to build it as neatly as you need it to be. Everything is a trade off of many pro’s and con’s.

Also, your pricing reference is a little old. The Growatt ARO 19.9kWh battery can be had on eBay for $8,776, free shipping. From Solar Equipment Outlet. Other stuff I’ve recently bought from them shipped from Renvu so I’m assuming that’s who is behind that store front.

No I meant people who pay a company to do their install for them. The aro battery is a far better deal than many of the battery storage options available to regular consumers. Most installs I know of use either enphase or solaredge. Check out the prices on adding batteries to those systems, and that's before the installer addon? I've heard of $1k per kWh on this types of systems

 

[timselectric]

Is drywall required by code or something?(I'm not familiar with electrical code)

Forget code, it's a diy battery.
But, the paper on the insulation would be a spark concern for me.
A simple solution is to either drywall over it. Or lay it over the battery.

 

[MajicDiver]

A simple solution is to either drywall over it. Or lay it over the battery.

Putting over it would also help in the case of a roof leak.

 

[1201]

Forget code, it's a diy battery.
But, the paper on the insulation would be a spark concern for me.
A simple solution is to either drywall over it. Or lay it over the battery.

Thanks. So replace the lexan cover with a drywall cover?

 

[timselectric]

Thanks. So replace the lexan cover with a drywall cover?

Didn't notice the lexan.
You're fine.

 

[SilverbackMP]

I decided that I want to fabricate removable wall panels from plywood and car siding (think ship lap) and have no drywall in my shop. Metal lining is out as it’s a pain the ass for wall mounting and internal wiring (all mine is MC cable).

So I bought this (no red dye version): https://frctexas.com/interior-fire-retardant-for-lumber-plywood/

I also have I joists in my mezzanine and those things look like pure tender.

Coupled with that flame retardant, I’m also installing plenty of fire blocking and stuffing wall cavities with mineral wool (there’s already two and three inches of closed cell foam in the walls and roof).

Probably overkill but I’m paranoid.

Everything short of a sprinkler system.

 

[1201]

I thought about using threaded rod to compress the cells but there is no consensus on if they need it or not. I thought this was a good, fast, very affordable compromise. It's not going to compress like allthread but I think it should keep them from expanding

 

[bedwards]

I thought about using threaded rod to compress the cells but there is no consensus on if they need it or not. I thought this was a good, fast, very affordable compromise. It's not going to compress like allthread but I think it should keep them from expandingView attachment 188422

What are you using for battery Managment? How are you getting multiple batteries to communicate?

 

[1201]

What are you using for battery Managment? How are you getting multiple batteries to communicate?

I use 4 jk bms in parallel. No communication between bms

 

[1201]

Christmas in February. Let's go!

$1250 for 6kw of brand new pv panels. Wow!
This will bring the total to 18kw and the system will produce more than I use every single month.

I'll be cramming all this onto my 11.4kw inverter for now and using cheap mounts I bought for $500. My rough calculation shows the long term marginal cost of adding the extra wattage at less than .01/kwh

 

[MajicDiver]

Christmas in February. Let's go!

$1250 for 6kw of brand new pv panels. Wow!
This will bring the total to 18kw and the system will produce more than I use every single month.

I'll be cramming all this onto my 11.4kw inverter for now and using cheap mounts I bought for $500. My rough calculation shows the long term marginal cost of adding the extra wattage at less than .01/watt
View attachment 197768

When you going off grid? That’s the logical next step!

 

[1201]

When you going off grid? That’s the logical next step!

Not anytime soon Lol. my darn poco is paying me too much to sell to them and my darn house uses too little energy some months.

I'll be ready though, for when the music stops

 

[Johneb]

Christmas in February. Let's go!

$1250 for 6kw of brand new pv panels. Wow!
This will bring the total to 18kw and the system will produce more than I use every single month.

I'll be cramming all this onto my 11.4kw inverter for now and using cheap mounts I bought for $500. My rough calculation shows the long term marginal cost of adding the extra wattage at less than .01/kwh
View attachment 197768

What wattage and where did you get them?