Recently I commissioned an install in Cochran GA. It is still not completely as I want it, but it is a working system nevertheless. It is a 675W Solar Energy System, with a 800 Ah battery bank. There is three 225W solar panesl up on the metal roof, on a rail system. The rail system is grounded common with grid power and it is fed through a roof entrance gland junction box, into the small laundry area inside the house coming in throught the ceiling at a vent entrance. I was lucky to find such entrance in that area because that is where the main inside power panel is. I put all equipment in this small area including batteries and the 8000W LF inverter. Initially the batteries and inverter are stacked up in three different coffers. But I will take the inverter out and mount in on a wall shelf away from the batteries. These batteries are wet cell so I really dont want a hot inverter right on top of them. The system was electrically designed and mostly installed by me. I had help installing the roof panels and some of the inside equipment from a gentleman called Ken on 7/10/15. I finished the install on 7/14 and plan to go back to put finishing touches on 7/16. It is a working progress and I had issues with the inverter. The system primary purpose is to power a 240V well pump. But this pump draws large amounts of amps at start up. Up to 39A. So the 8KW inverter is struggling. Since 240VACx39A=9360W, still well under the advertised 32K peak wattage. The inverter blows fuses, and the pump just quits at times while on inverter power. I contacted the manufacturer and have not gotten a clear answer, they said to put another fuse and try again. The system took some time and funds to build because it required a dual power switching method, a transfer switch wired in. And, it required a large inverter for the kick start of the well pump. I hope the project ends up as a sucess for the running of the pump, but worst case scenario where the expensive inverter just wont keep up with the pump, I will try to convince the customer that the best use for it is to power the kitchen with it. Too bad this project is in a remote area away from home and it makes it costly to do anything to it. The largest hardware store around is a small Ace and its about 10 miles from the site. This was really a challenging project but it is one with much potential. The customer is environment and economy conscious and is very happy to have the potential to use solar power in the event of any power outage.
2015Aug17 Update
About a week ago from today I removed the system from the customer's home. Although the system was installed as safe as possible with current resources; the inverter failed to work for the pump. It was a gamble from the begining as the pump was only rated to work with a 1200W water pump (per manufacturer). In the end the gamble did not pay off, as the customer did not want to keep a system that did not support the pump. The customer could not be convinced to use the system for the kitchen, as no guarantees could be made for that either. I think the removal of all equipment and a full refund was the best thing for the company and the customer; so it was done. A full refund was issued on 14August. And, everyone was happy. I will attempt to test for the failure to support the pump, but it may take time. I will attempt to regain the loss by selling equipment or other more profitable install with same equipment.
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