Brian's Solar Electric System (All panels are installed and producing, 3120 Watts Peak) date range KwH avg per day 2010-10-11 - 2011-10-22 14.16

Pictures of System

What wisdom can I offer in having done this?

Spreadsheet of Components & Costs

California Solar Electric System Incentives

State of California's Power Production (Stage Alerts, etc)

LBL picture of CA Power Status (more detailed)

Overview

I started this project in 1999. My 2400 Watt system went online in 2000 and for 6 years it was pretty much a disaster. On August 13th, 2007 I discovered that the manufacturer of the panels (Kyocera) was willing to swap the defective panels they had sold me for new ones. I still wonder why Arizona Wind & Sun never mentioned this known problem to me. Time will tell if things have improved.

News

10/08/2011 System is again online

• My system was offline for a couple of years.
• It is online again with $3500 in "improvements".
• The system has a new view of the sky which should allow for a full days production.
• Unfortunately, as a part of the upgrades I lost my realtime data feed (from a Tristar TS-60) and now only have cumulative data. I will post updates on how it is performing probably weekly.
• It was party cloudy today. Taking a gander at the control panel while the sun looked to be out it reported 2.0KwH production

• After all those years it is amazing to see the system actually working.
• For those of you adding up all the numbers, the system puts out about 2/3rds of expected total power. This is due to a tree. The system loses about 1/3rd of it potential total output to shadowing from a large oak tree.

• Nice charts above are from data collected from the Tristar TS-60.
• The low results at the beginning in early march are due to a bug in the TS-60 firmware. The technical support people at Morningstar did not respond to my queries, but someone at the info@ email address did and that avenue lead to a resolution to my problem. (a firmware upgrade).
• The chart data is generated real-time, however, due to security concerns I manually copy it up to the site every once in a while.

• When kyocera replaced my panels I got KC-130s in place of my original KC-120s. The result was the total power produced exceeded the ratings of my Trace Engineering C40 charge controller.
• I replaced the C40 with a Morningstar Tristar 60.
• I have to say, the Tristar sure has a lot nicer feature set and it was cheaper too.
• I have it hooked up to a computer and will be producing real time charts soon.
• This also means that after 8 years all 24 panels are producing. Except it has been overcast the last two days.

• Installed the last 8 panels.
• However running all 24 panels generates too much current for my C40. I have a Tristar 60 amp unit ready to be installed.
• So at the moment I am peaking at 38 out of 40 DC amps on 20 panels.

• I still dislike the Mercury toxicity of CFLs, the future disposal problems, and the breakage risk. However, some bulbs are nearly making it to acceptable, and the PG&E rebates are making the bulbs nearly free.
• The Globe 13-Watt Ultra-Mini Compact Fluorescent Spiral Bulb is nearly acceptable. The light quality is great, the startup is acceptable. However, they are not sealed and still pose a breakage risk and the power factor is probably around 0.5. None-the-less I installed 4 and we will see how they do.
• The Feit R30 HHRCFL (High temperature, Reflector CFL, Part # BPCE15R30H) is nearly acceptable. The color is acceptable, and the bulb is sealed. However they vary quite a bit in warm up time, some taking minutes. I also have a question. Printed on them is 15W 120VA 60Hz 250ma. 250ma @ 120VA = 30W, not 15. What is going on? I assume the power factor is 0.5, which allows the statement to make sense.

• After 6 years of effort.
• Hmmm. My C40 says its taking in 30amps. And that is with only 16 of 24 panels.
• If I add in the other 8 I will go beyond the units rating.
• How did that happen?
• Maybe the DVM panel is not particularly accurate.

09/18/2007 Replacement panels were delivered today

09/14/2007 Replacement panels from Kyocera

• About 3 hours after I sent an email to Kyocera asking for a tracking # I got a call from Fedex asking if they could deliver the panels on Monday.
• Coincidence or the squeaky wheel?

• Well, kyocera said they would FedEx freight the panels out around the 9/1
• Nothing has shown up.
• Is FedEx Freight that slow from Arizona to California?
• I asked Kyocera for a tracking #.

• There was a mistake in bank 5 on the chart I generated on 8/12/2007.
• banks 5 and 6 both generate 0/0
• I corrected the chart

• In case it is not clear from the log of events, each year or two, I go through the entire array and re-arrange the banks, by removing and re-installing the panels, such that similar performing panels end up in the same bank.
• I have also shifted the highest performing panels to the left, and the lowest performing panels to the right.
• Overall this strategy has kept the system performing in the 25 to 33% of expected energy output range.
• However, the labor of doing this each year or so, has grossly offset the dollar value generated in electricity.

• I sent the RMA powerwork to kyocera
• They offered to replace the panels and include paying for the labor of an electrical contractor to do the swap.
• I declined, being a do-it-yourself kinda guy, and asked them to send the labor dollars to a charity. Sadly, they declined.

• After my last status posting I received some information that my panels may be part of a bad batch from 1999-2001 and indeed it seems they are.
• I talked with kyocera and they say will replace them.
• I started the paper work today.

• I went through the panels again testing the open voltage and amperage. Tested this day 11:30am to 12:30pm on a bright cloudless day.
• The C40 panel measurements where done by turning off all the banks via the combiner circuit breakers, turning one bank at a time on, and noting the watts and amps on the C40 display panel.

• I went through all my panels. 6 of them are performing dismally and one is dead. The poor performers were evenly spread through the banks of panels such that only one bank was really producing any power.
• I have concentrated the good panels all into the same banks and now have 4 banks (out of 6 total) producing the expected output.
• 5 years and almost 30% of the panels are down for the count? This does not bode well for 20 year life times.
• I guess it is time to talk to kyocera.

• Now that the sun is out I find my array is putting out about 25% of its rated power

• Moved my solar array from one propery to another

• It just failed too much. Electronic failures, leaks, belt falling off, spouse complaining it didn't clean well. I have a Sears Kenmore Ultra now.

• 
  I measured the open voltage of each panel, and then of each module (bank of 4 panels) back at the combiner. With this information I found far less variation of output than was reported in the 03/03 news item. I believe this tells us that the meter in the Trace Engineering C40/DVM is highly inaccurate, at least verses a Fluke 75.

• Panel Bank	A	B	C	D	E	F
  Watts	271	273	164	217	328	328
  % of STC	65	67	39	52	81	81

  
  What do you suppose is going on? All panels had a clear shot of sun. I checked the connections and interconnections on panel banks C & D. No change.

• My system was running only 9 months of 2001. And most of that time with only half the panels. Well, the numbers are in. In 2001 I saved $502 (post taxes) in electricity costs.

  Projections for 2002 are $1000+ if the panels stay where they are, and $1500+ if they are moved to their planned final location.

11/06/2001 Got my CA rebate check!

• My California Buydown rebate check showed up today! Boy was I lucky, got to buy everything before the Xantrax price increases.

9/22/2001 Where is the power going?

• If you look at the power production chart you'll notice a rather precipitous drop in power. Basically a neighbor's tree is shadowing 50% of the panels for about half the day. This will get worse as the sun moves lower in the sky. Those panels are not in their final location, which should be safe from the shadows for at least this year. That actually means that 1/2 the panels are obstructed half the day by one tree, and another half of the panels are obstructed half the day by another tree.

9/03/2001 All panels online

• The last set of panels is installed. They didn't go online until 10:30am so we'll see the first day of full output tommorrow. Now 1/2 of the panels are obstructed part of the day by the tree, and 1/2 have full exposure.

8/25/2001 Rearranged my panels

• I moved my current panels around in preparation for the last set. So for the time being they are not in the optimal positions. Hopefully this week I will get the last 1/3rd online.

7/17/2001 Trace Engineering vs. Vanner

• I'm sad to say, that having spent thousands of dollars on their products, you'd think I could at least get the time of day out of the people at Trace Engineering. However, they have never responded to any query that I've made. I don't see you have much choice but to go with Trace if you are doing a 48 volt system. But if you are doing a 24 volt system go for the Vanner system. It has lots of nice features including 240 volt 1 phase output in the base system, and people who will actually talk to you.

7/10/2001 Install of another Solar Electric System

• I'm starting the ordering for a 2nd system. It will use a SW4048 or 5548 inverter, 36 KC-120-1 panels, and 48 volts x 460 amps worth of batteries.

6/18/2001 My first component failure

• A SquareD HOMT 20amp AC circuit breaker failed in my AC subpanel. This is a tandem breaker and I suspect it wasn't overloaded because both circuits of the breaker have failed. They simply will not reset. It won't reset either circuit even now that its out of the box and sitting in my hand.

6/11/2001 Why is my production slowly going downward?

• Best I can figure, as the Sun gets higher in the sky, the tree shadow covers some of the array slightly longer each day.

5/19/2001 Changed array to Spring/Summer Angle

• My panel mounts are fixed, but are elevation adjustable. In the evening I changed them to their spring/summer position. It will be interesting to see what kind of output I get tommorrow.

4/24/2001 Loss due to tree estimated at 30%

• After the first day of operation of the 2nd set of panels. Estimates are that the first set are losing 30% of their possible production due to shading by a tree.

  The CA government predicts I will generate, at this time of year, 7.95 kWh per day with my current configuration. My actual production, adjusting for the shadowing, is 7.61 kWh per day.

4/23/2001 New panels online

• The 2nd third of my panels are now up and ready to produce electricity. The first third are shadowed part of the morning, generally till 11:00am, by a tree. My estimate is that I'm losing 25% of their possible production. We will see when I compare the unobstructed output of the 2nd set against the first.