Pre order battery's

[Andy1733]

What's your capacity now??

Also, had an update from ITS, they are now saying 21st August for delivery...will keep my fingers crossed.

I've got 4.8kw of battery's. Panels are 4kw. Inverter is 3.6 hybrid

 

[Andy1733]

Update.
Battery's have been fitted 1 month
Not sure if August was a poor month for production or I have a extremely high consumption rate..
In June and July my usage was approx 540kwh This is roughly 50/50. 270kwh self use. 270kwh imported from the grid..

August figures are
Usage 661kwh
274kwh self use
150kwh battery's
237kwh imported from grid


August my inverter produced 461kwh

274kwh self use
128kwh battery charging
53kwh energy exports

I'm not sure why the import and export of the battery's are so wide apart. I would have thought the import to the battery's would have been higher than export unless I'm reading the app wrong.

 

[Chrisbee]

If it helps, these are my numbers for August. Very similar system. In the Midlands.

 

[Andy1733]

Yeah m8, Figures are very similar.
You produced a lot more kwh than I did. Location? Orientation of panels? Ect. Though your send back to grid is a lot higher

 

[Chrisbee]

My panels are on two roofs. One faces SW and the other SE. So I get quite a long day of Solar power but I never get a middle of the day peak because when sun is highest, both strings are at a 45deg angle to it.
I'm tempted to have another couple panels added to each roof to raise the peak kw nearer to the inverter spec.

The export figure does include some water heating (that the inverter can't measure). So I'm using more than those figures show.

 

[Andy1733]

Approaching installed, 6 month for solar (in 10 days) and 3 month for the batterys (today)

 

[Andy1733]

Something apparent from the figures is. I need to swap My supplier for a cheap overnight tariff (octopus go). To take advantage of the battery's.
And it will take a long time for the break even on the batterys, compared to the solar.

Recently I have juggled my pond equipment to make it more Efficient and turned off the beer fridge. Obv only for the winter
This has reduced my baseline usage from 0.55 down to 0.44. not loads but 20% ...

Any other suggestions or tweeking that would benefit my setup would be appreciated.

 

[glenns]

Definitely switch to a cheap night tariff, doing that and my small solar array saved me £76 for October... it's the first month that I've had to top-up the batteries from the grid, just pulling 4-5kw from the grid between 00:30 and 04:30 and the solar output has meant we barely used anything from the grid during the day.

We also run the washing machine at night now which is very convenient as it's all ready to go on the line come the morning.

As for other tips, I've just rigged my parents pond (pumps and UV's) with a 4 way sonoff switch. It's setup to only run the pumps in the day and can be voice controlled from the house, works well for them and has saved them quite a bit.

 

[Andy1733]

Thanks Glenn. Fitting a sonoff switch was one of the tweaks I fitted to my pond though I've not connected the pumps. Just the UV ATM.
I think The big one is the low night tariff. As you say. Run a load of washing. 4 hours of low cost charging.
My only problem is my daytime usage. Between 6am and 6pm I'm using around 15kwh. If the sun ain't shining the octopus tariff is higher at these times so would need to do some sums on overall cost.

 

[glenns]

Thanks Glenn. Fitting a sonoff switch was one of the tweaks I fitted to my pond though I've not connected the pumps. Just the UV ATM.
I think The big one is the low night tariff. As you say. Run a load of washing. 4 hours of low cost charging.
My only problem is my daytime usage. Between 6am and 6pm I'm using around 15kwh. If the sun ain't shining the octopus tariff is higher at these times so would need to do some sums on overall cost.

Our usage in usually around 7-9kW per day, that's why I went for the 2 big US5000's, essentially we can do a full day from the batteries, I should have really gone for 3 to give us more of a buffer but we've only had one day since installation that we've had to draw anything significant at the peek grid rate.

The cost of batteries is only creeping upwards as demand and inflation increases but if you can afford them I think they will pay for themselves pretty quickly when combined with the low night tariffs.

My electricity cost for September was less than £6 (excluding standing charge), £16 for October... I would have been paying well over £100 pre-solar & battery system

 

[johnb2713]

The cost of batteries is only creeping upwards as demand and inflation increases but if you can afford them I think they will pay for themselves pretty quickly when combined with the low night tariffs.

There are some good deals around if you're prepared to deal with China.

 

[Jedw]

my thoughts, the shipping on a 100kg plus drop from China to the UK will be substantial. I for one wouldn't go near that offer as it isn't commercially possible so I can't imagine what would arrive. Then try sending it back ! and no tax.?...tell HMRC that when they assess your 10KW ( not even 10kWh) battery for import duties and VAT . John, you do make the 'deal with China' point.

 

[johnb2713]

my thoughts, the shipping on a 100kg plus drop from China to the UK will be substantial. I for one wouldn't go near that offer as it isn't commercially possible so I can't imagine what would arrive. Then try sending it back ! and no tax.?...tell HMRC that when they assess your 10KW ( not even 10kWh) battery for import duties and VAT . John, you do make the 'deal with China' point.

Entirely your call, I have done many deals on Alliexpress and Alibaba over the years, not really had any problems at all. The shipping costs are really good because they're subsidised by the Chinese government. My batteries came from China and the ones in use are fine, the ones I'm about to put into use look good too. Where do you think the batteries come from widely used in the solar and automotive industry? in fact most things, panels, inverters, BMS etc the majority will be made in China.

If you look further up the advert you will see it say 10240Wh so they did get it right.

I find the stereotype of Chinese goods widely inaccurate these days, there is a LOT of quality gear made in China.

 

[Andy1733]

I've been importing Xiaomi phones from China a few many a year and well before they opened stores in the uk. Never once had a problem though expect a min 3 week wait.
If anyone hasn't tried them I would highly recent them. Infact I'm typing this from a Poco phone. Mum, wife and daughter are using redme pro phones which are all branches of the Xiaomi brand.
The UK didn't know much about Xiaomi but they are the largest electronic manufacturers in China (or they were) IMO You can keep your Samsung/iPhones.

 

[Jedw]

I have bought laptops and tablets for my business from Chuwi direct from China without problem ( except they sell 12v and 5v PSUs with an identical connector) and drops of thousands of Bluetooth modules direct, I have also bought batches of 18650 Li Ion batteries which turned out to be outer 18650 shells containing what looked like small cells salvaged from old laptop packs and complete rubbish. I agree there are respectable manufacturers, but I also know that tax is unlikely to be prepaid and returning heavy items problematic if not impossible. I hope everyone does have great experiences but I'll pay for properly electrically tested , cert'd and UK supported battery packs rather than stay awake at night worrying about my home insurance.
Just me in this case, normally I like to seek out the best deals too. happy shopping everyone
PS I have very recently bought chinese tech, 4* US5000 Plyontech and a 6kW Solis hybrid inverter, but only after research and from a reputable UK reseller.

 

[glenns]

I've no real issue buying from China but back in April I paid £1180 + VAT for the US5000 from ITS... They are just a middle man shipping stuff in from China anyway so annoyingly the pylontech units are up £350 since then.

Problem I'd have with the ones suggested by @johnb2713 is I've already bought into the Pylontech units and doubt I could mix and match with a single inverter. It's just like power-tool batteries.

 

[Andy1733]

Since the last post. I've swapped over to the octopus go tariff and today I've ordered a us5000 battery to add to my 2 us2000 battery's.
The octopus tariff has made a big difference to my battery usage as they are now fully charged each morning and are mopping up my base rate throughout the day. they take approx 2 hours to charge on the low 12p tariff. Hopefully the additional battery will take advantage of the 4 hour low cost rate and take me to around 7pm before they are flat.

 

[Andy1733]

Btw. I've read there's no problem mixing us2000 and us5000 battery's. Advice which would I be best using as the master battery? Should I keep the setup as it is and add the us5000 as a slave battery or should I make the us5000 the master and use the us2000s as the slaves?

 

[binky]

Btw. I've read there's no problem mixing us2000 and us5000 battery's. Advice which would I be best using as the master battery? Should I keep the setup as it is and add the us5000 as a slave battery or should I make the us5000 the master and use the us2000s as the slaves?

From what I've read elsewhere, making the new battery the master seems the most popular course of action.

 

[Andy1733]

Cheers m8. I've just been reading about this.