diy solar

diy solar

Sol-Ark not a good company to deal with 12k

I needed 60-80kWh/daily. Two 12K, 20,640W pv, 143kWh LFE and 10kW Honeywell LP Gen did the trick. Off-grid completely for five months. Power shed cooled to 68-75F with my Fujitsu 9K 33 SEER. No problems other than learning the proper settings and a bad wifi dongle. Sol-Ark has excellent customer service. That is very hard to find nowadays. I'm happy to pay extra for the 10 yr warranty and good customer service. I'm waiting on SS receive their next load, so they can ship my two EG4 6.5's. They'll be in my shop and cooled too. So will see how they do in comparison.
Edit: 8/25/22...my two 12K's shut down yesterday when I pulled the trigger on my Dewalt circular saw. I tested my hospital grade Tripplite 2000W backup power supply/inverter with 48V 9aH (4 SLA in series) and 120vac 16A pass thru, filtered. It started right up. Hooked up my new EG4 6500ex, it started right up. Moved the saw 200’ away from power shed and it worked fine with steady readings on the 12k. Sorry I can’t explain it.
 
Last edited:
MurphyGuy said:
My guess is that in about 5 years, we'll start to see these Sol-Arks failing.. and once the warranty claims become too burdensome, the company will go out of business.

I'm curious, does anyone here own a high frequency battery inverter that has been used for more then 5 or 7 years and is still working? I'm not talking about a grid tied unit, I'm wondering about the off-grid battery inverters.
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I've not heard anyone say they got 7 years out of a hf all in one yet ? ? ?
 
With the talk of UL listed inverters getting higher quality components, that could make a huge difference.

I haven't found data on HF battery inverters yet.
Probably anyone compiling data treats it as proprietary, internal use or presented to paying customers.

My experience running 4 or 5 Sunny Island GT PV inverters for 17 years resulted in 2 failures (3, if you count a wire soldered to pin of a chip falling off, a kludge to add a feature.) Only calculating with the two solid failures, 35 years MTBF. Considering average 6 full sun hours, 83,000 full load hours MTBF. Considering 12 hour days of varying load, 166,000 operating hour MTBF.
Those were hitting 80% or so of full load for a few hours daily, but not the abusive sudden stressed a battery inverter experiences.
If operating 24/7, could have been 17 year MTBF.

Found this report on UPS.
23 systems with 143 operating years, 8 failures. Inverters averaged 156,000 hour MTBF.
They brag that their ferro-resonant inverter as 2 to 3 times more reliable than others. All LF, obviously.




This report on central inverters quotes 59 hours MTBF!

blog.avisolar.com

Failure Analysis Of Central Inverters.

Inverters Failure can lead to huge loss as it generates power.
blog.avisolar.com blog.avisolar.com


A thread on Solar Edge, appears one model did quite badly.

https://www.reddit.com/r/solar/comments/cm4zl7
 
For the benefit of those considering a Sol Ark, I can add that my experience with the 12K has been flawless, both in terms customer/tech support and the basic functioning of the system. I just commissioned my first (very DIY) (off grid) system (10kWp solar with 30kwh battery and 7000w generator) with the sol ark, and it has worked without a hitch since the day I connected the last wire and hit the “on” switch. In my experience with electronics of most kind, this is not typical.

My advice (FWIW) is that you need to research and understand the limitations and applicability of any inverter/battery for your specific needs. There are tradeoffs with all of them. My biggest regret is not buying batteries from the Sol ark supported list, like the Simplifi or Fortress, etc. Of course this would have dramatically increased the cost my system, probably adding another $15K, but probably would have been a better value in the long run.
 
mvonw said:
For the benefit of those considering a Sol Ark, I can add that my experience with the 12K has been flawless, both in terms customer/tech support and the basic functioning of the system. I just commissioned my first (very DIY) (off grid) system (10kWp solar with 30kwh battery and 7000w generator) with the sol ark, and it has worked without a hitch since the day I connected the last wire and hit the “on” switch. In my experience with electronics of most kind, this is not typical.

My advice (FWIW) is that you need to research and understand the limitations and applicability of any inverter/battery for your specific needs. There are tradeoffs with all of them. My biggest regret is not buying batteries from the Sol ark supported list, like the Simplifi or Fortress, etc. Of course this would have dramatically increased the cost my system, probably adding another $15K, but probably would have been a better value in the long run.
Click to expand...
China inverter with primo American price. Gee, sign me up.
 
mvonw said:
I've been to China many times. Hard working, family-oriented people all in all. I don't share the hate. I've got the money, so I can afford the best, but I understand many don't.
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It has nothing to do with that. It has to do with its made very cheaply on the backs of Chinese workers. And it should be priced according. It like buying a pair of nikes. Your paying for a name. In return you get the same average quality. It's not on the same level as midnite solar or outback. If you like to waste money on a greedy company that doesn't care about anyone go for it.
 
73powerstroke said:
It has nothing to do with that. It has to do with its made very cheaply on the backs of Chinese workers. And it should be priced according. It like buying a pair of nikes. Your paying for a name. In return you get the same average quality. It's not on the same level as midnite solar or outback. If you like to waste money on a greedy company that doesn't care about anyone go for it.
Click to expand...
Well, I certainly agree the Chinese people are led poorly and corruptly.

My wife is in senior management at Nike, so I have a little bit of insight into their reality ;) I'm afraid the globalization ship has sailed. Corruption and greed are not an eastern monopoly.

All I know about Sol Ark is that it was very DIY friendly. My place is remote, so it critical I can service it myself and get support. I'm sure other units are great too. I would have bought a Schneider if I thought the diy support was there. It's clear from their marketing, its not their target.
 
73powerstroke said:
It has nothing to do with that. It has to do with its made very cheaply on the backs of Chinese workers. And it should be priced according. It like buying a pair of nikes. Your paying for a name. In return you get the same average quality. It's not on the same level as midnite solar or outback. If you like to waste money on a greedy company that doesn't care about anyone go for it.
Click to expand...
The radian 8048A was one of the inverters on my short list for whole home systems this year. I ended up going with the Sol-Ark 15k instead for a few reasons:

1. Efficiency: the radian CEC effeciency is only 92.5%. That means it wastes over twice as much power as the Sol-Ark.
2. Low pass-through current: I can't even tell by looking at the specs sheet right now what it is but it seems to be only either 30 or 50a. That's means I need a minimum of 4 units (or possibly 7) to get 200A of passthrough.
Price: an equivalent radian system costs much more than a sol-ark 15k based system.
4. Ease of installation: the sol-ark is much easier to install due to needing fewer units and having a lot of the breakers built in.
5. Warranty: The standard sol-ark 10 year warranty is free. With the radian you only get 5 years unless you pay extra.

Even if the radian system was half the price of the sol-ark I'd probably go with the Sol-ark.
 
mvonw said:
Well, I certainly agree the Chinese people are led poorly and corruptly.

My wife is in senior management at Nike, so I have a little bit of insight into their reality ;) I'm afraid the globalization ship has sailed. Corruption and greed are not an eastern monopoly.

All I know about Sol Ark is that it was very DIY friendly. My place is remote, so it critical I can service it myself and get support. I'm sure other units are great too. I would have bought a Schneider if I thought the diy support was there. It's clear from their marketing, its not their target.
Click to expand...
Yep. Yeah a bit commercial maybe. If you're happy and you have the means then it works till it doesn't work.
I wish the mpp solar stuff or growatt and those types were more rugged with remote support better.
 
73powerstroke said:
Yep. Yeah a bit commercial maybe. If you're happy and you have the means then it works till it doesn't work.
I wish the mpp solar stuff or growatt and those types were more rugged with remote support better.
Click to expand...
My Growatt has been running for 6 months without a single hiccup. Can't say anything about support, because I haven't needed any. I hope that it lasts longer than I do. Just have to wait and see.
 
mvonw said:
Well, I certainly agree the Chinese people are led poorly and corruptly.

My wife is in senior management at Nike, so I have a little bit of insight into their reality ;) I'm afraid the globalization ship has sailed. Corruption and greed are not an eastern monopoly.

All I know about Sol Ark is that it was very DIY friendly. My place is remote, so it critical I can service it myself and get support. I'm sure other units are great too. I would have bought a Schneider if I thought the diy support was there. It's clear from their marketing, its not their target.
Click to expand...
Schneider too came in second for me, due to their poor customer service.
 
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