Sol-Ark/China

[timselectric]

This I did not know? I assumed they were American Veterans?

That's what they were counting on.

 

[ArthurEld]

Solark realizes that they made a mistake.
Even if engineering means cherry picking Chinese products, Solark did a good job of it.

 

[Quattrohead]

I don't really care where anything is made anymore, cuz most of it is made in the far East. Maybe I'm not American enough lol (Brit ex Pat) What I do care about though, is good customer service.

 

[timselectric]

Still not getting the point of this thread.
Everyone wants to deflect it to something else.

 

[robby]

Still not getting the point of this thread.
Everyone wants to deflect it to something else.

What we don't get is that your not Interested in buying a Sol-Ark yet you spend almost half your post bashing it. Why not move on and find a product that you like?

 

[timselectric]

What we don't get is that your not Interested in buying a Sol-Ark yet you spend almost half your post bashing it. Why not move on and find a product that you like?

I already have one.
And your math is way off.
And I didn't start this thread.

 

[Brucey]

So Sol-ark designed the inverters than contracted with Deye to manufacturer them? And Deye sells them themselves outside of the USA (where Sol-ark has exclusive distribution rights)?

 

[Tulex]

Still not getting the point of this thread.
Everyone wants to deflect it to something else.

Actually, what I don't get is how the OP got the wrong impression. Certainly not from the current website.

 

[timselectric]

Actually, what I don't get is how the OP got the wrong impression. Certainly not from the current website.

I don't know either.
It's actually pretty easy to figure out, now.
There are threads like this everywhere.

 

[timselectric]

Actually, what I don't get is how the OP got the wrong impression. Certainly not from the current website.

Google search "where are Sol-Ark inverters made".
From their website.

 

[cs1234]

Their website has changed much over the years. I can certainly see where people might get the impression from them that they are American Made. They seem to have gone down kind of a SignatureSolar path.. start small and DIY friendly, get larger, change focus away from DIY / smaller systems. They are both pretty good at marketing, that's for sure.

https://web.archive.org/web/20170615063846/https://www.portablesolarllc.com/

https://web.archive.org/web/20190104171438/https://www.sol-ark.com/

https://web.archive.org/web/20191203223825/https://www.sol-ark.com/

This one is where the American Made picture was from.

 

[timselectric]

Their website has changed much over the years. I can certainly see where people might get the impression from them that they are American Made. They seem to have gone down kind of a SignatureSolar path.. start small and DIY friendly, get larger, change focus away from DIY / smaller systems. They are both pretty good at marketing, that's for sure.

https://web.archive.org/web/20170615063846/https://www.portablesolarllc.com/

https://web.archive.org/web/20190104171438/https://www.sol-ark.com/

https://web.archive.org/web/20191203223825/https://www.sol-ark.com/

This one is where the American Made picture was from.

View attachment 169545

View attachment 169546

I'll give them credit. They have cleaned up their website, quite a bit. I haven't looked at it for a couple of years. They just need to double check each page. And get rid of the last pieces of false information.

 

[mvonw]

Don't lose sight of the difference between 'engineered', 'manufactured' and 'assembled'. Products are created, built, and distributed all over the place to take advantage of the economies of scale.

Anyone who says 'At any cost' is being disingenuous. "The data on that hard drive is extremely valuable, I don't care what it costs, lets send it off". "Okay, I need a cashiers check for $5000, this is non-refundable. Then it's going to cost another $100/MB for any recovered data up to a maximum of another $5000". "Say what? no way". "But you said you didn't care what it costs?". "Well yea but I thought it would be more like..."

Much of this stuff is engineered/prototyped here in the states from components manufactured overseas somewhere, Final assembly is generally close to where the bulk of the components come from if possible and the items are small. To beat tariffs, and actually save costs for bulky items which are hard to ship (a car for example) it will get assembled here in the US from the easier to ship smaller components made overseas. Supply chains went global years ago, what you probably want is something engineered and supported by a western based company. Apple doesn't have to build phones in China, it just helps keep the costs down. You are not going to by anything that has a semiconductor in it that wasn't made offshore. The bottom line is people in general will not pay 10 times as much just to say "It was 100% US made". We all care what it costs. Nor does it really benefit anyone to make something here that can be done for a fraction of the cost elsewhere. It's just being spiteful.

We should do here what we do best and most efficiently. If someone figures out a way to do that here in the US, then by all means, and we should always be looking for innovative ways to make it cost effective to do the work closer to home.

"Disingenuous" is the right term. A high-end AIO designed and manufactured entirely in the US would probably be $20k. It just couldn't compete. There would be way too small a market for such a product. Certainly way too dear for the folk on diysolarforum.

 

[Tulex]

Here is about what the American made award was for. Even our own government was duped........

 

[robby]

Here is about what the American made award was for. Even our own government was duped........

2020 was long after they released the 8K.
They never said the Award was for the Inverter design, but it does once again prove that they have an active engineering team working on electronic designs.

 

[rhino]

They never said the Award was for the Inverter design

Isn't that the point? You can't tell one way or another.. It falls under the category of "dark pattern" that intentionally misleads customers.

 

[cs1234]

2020 was long after they released the 8K.
They never said the Award was for the Inverter design, but it does once again prove that they have an active engineering team working on electronic designs.

They "never said" lots of things, like the Veterans they were talking about being Chinese. Assuming @timselectric research is correct.

EDIT.. turns out my source, @timselectric is a funny guy. I guess we'll never know the truth.

 

[ArthurEld]

Solark is still a privately held company. They have done pretty well.
I bought my Solark so I could have cheaper batteries. And because it was easier for me to wrap my mind around the whole system.

I imagine there will be cheap powerwall clones in the near future. With liquid cooling and an AC charger.
So the batteries can be in any environment or far from the main breaker panel. And much safer.
Musk is smart as hell.
It will be interesting to see where solar goes from here.

 

[timselectric]

They "never said" lots of things, like the Veterans they were talking about being Chinese. Assuming @timselectric research is correct.

That was an assumption on my part.
If the units are made in China and made by veterans.
They must have been referring to Chinese veterans. lol

 

[G00SE]

2020 was long after they released the 8K.
They never said the Award was for the Inverter design, but it does once again prove that they have an active engineering team working on electronic designs.

Some “feat”
They propose utility companies being able to pull from residential battery banks. Even more reason for me to continue to not do business with them

https://www.sol-ark.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/02/Solarprizepressrelease-final.pdf