Clean It Up
UK Window Cleaning Forum => Window Cleaning Forum => Topic started by: Spruce on January 06, 2018, 09:25:08 pm
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Hi Rich,
As we are deep into winter but on the right side looking forward to summer, how are you managing with the solar panels?
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Hey , Happy New Year matey :D
If im totally honest , not been great , but then i was never expecting miracles !
In general its been poor in terms of no bench intervention , once the sun had taken its low position in the sky it was a totally different ball game , in the summer i was getting more in than going out , winter was more a case of on average 1 Amp in and 10 Amps out , and thats shorter hours done than most others .
I was running the 80 and 40 panels in paralell at the time , if i got a bit of sun it was not too bad , but overcast saw the yield drop to as little as half an amp all day .
I decided to take a different approach with the wiring , i ordered some hopper cables that enabled me to swap from parralel to series wiring in seconds , the results were far better .
If the sun is out i run in parralell , i grab the higher amps and lose the open circuit 18 volt which is cut down to 14 volt or so .
If overcast i run in series , i grab the highest voltage available , possible 36 volt and convert anything over 14 volt with MPPT.
This i have found to give me at least 30% more yield being overcast with series wiring .
On Thursday it was a mix of sun and overcast so i left the wiring as series , at current settings my pump is pulling 3.5 amps .
10 am until 3.30 pm on run of the mill houses ........3 amps in with 12 amps out .
I think i have gone as far as i can with the gear i have got , the only place to go now is a tilt mech on the roof to maximise yield.
I am fairly confident that in winter i could get away with 1 maybe 2 benches a week , and summer not bother to bench at all .
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Hey , Happy New Year matey :D
If im totally honest , not been great , but then i was never expecting miracles !
In general its been poor in terms of no bench intervention , once the sun had taken its low position in the sky it was a totally different ball game , in the summer i was getting more in than going out , winter was more a case of on average 1 Amp in and 10 Amps out , and thats shorter hours done than most others .
I was running the 80 and 40 panels in paralell at the time , if i got a bit of sun it was not too bad , but overcast saw the yield drop to as little as half an amp all day .
I decided to take a different approach with the wiring , i ordered some hopper cables that enabled me to swap from parralel to series wiring in seconds , the results were far better .
If the sun is out i run in parralell , i grab the higher amps and lose the open circuit 18 volt which is cut down to 14 volt or so .
If overcast i run in series , i grab the highest voltage available , possible 36 volt and convert anything over 14 volt with MPPT.
This i have found to give me at least 30% more yield being overcast with series wiring .
On Thursday it was a mix of sun and overcast so i left the wiring as series , at current settings my pump is pulling 3.5 amps .
10 am until 3.30 pm on run of the mill houses ........3 amps in with 12 amps out .
I think i have gone as far as i can with the gear i have got , the only place to go now is a tilt mech on the roof to maximise yield.
I am fairly confident that in winter i could get away with 1 maybe 2 benches a week , and summer not bother to bench at all .
Thanks for the update. :)
We are on the right side of longer days so it can only improve from now into summer.
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Do you have a box with the series and parallel circuitry wired up so you can switch it over. Or are you manually swapping wires about on the panels?
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I just have to place these into the wiring , with them in place I can run parralell , without its series , takes about 1 minute to do .
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Ah i see.