chicagoandy
Solar Enthusiast
Buying the 10-rack with 5 batteries may be the way to start off. I'm certainly happy with the 10-rack, but well - it's a lot of battery.
Granted that it's certainly better to have too much battery than too little,
In Atlanta right now in June I'm having trouble charging it. I often see people say "My batteries are full by noon", and that certainly isn't the case for me.
I do charge the battery with inexpensive overnight power, to 40%. When we wake up, morning Air Conditioning use typically pulls it down to 35%. Then solar slowly comes alive, and by 3:30pm the SOC is typically 85%, but then the Air Conditioners are really working hard and the SOC starts declining.
My System specs are :
Sol-Ark 15K
10.9 KW of REC Alpha Pure 2 420 panels.
Advantage of the current approach: Since the batteries never get to 100%, I can store all the PV power, and never waste any.
Disadvantage of the current approach: Since the batteries never get to 100%, they don't top-balance.
[I do not get credit for any Grid-sell, so that's waste].
I'm thinking I'll charge them to 100% once a month just to balance them.
Longer term I may need to add a few more panels. We'll see what happens when it cools off and there's less AC.
Granted that it's certainly better to have too much battery than too little,
In Atlanta right now in June I'm having trouble charging it. I often see people say "My batteries are full by noon", and that certainly isn't the case for me.
I do charge the battery with inexpensive overnight power, to 40%. When we wake up, morning Air Conditioning use typically pulls it down to 35%. Then solar slowly comes alive, and by 3:30pm the SOC is typically 85%, but then the Air Conditioners are really working hard and the SOC starts declining.
My System specs are :
Sol-Ark 15K
10.9 KW of REC Alpha Pure 2 420 panels.
Advantage of the current approach: Since the batteries never get to 100%, I can store all the PV power, and never waste any.
Disadvantage of the current approach: Since the batteries never get to 100%, they don't top-balance.
[I do not get credit for any Grid-sell, so that's waste].
I'm thinking I'll charge them to 100% once a month just to balance them.
Longer term I may need to add a few more panels. We'll see what happens when it cools off and there's less AC.