Schnavel

This is exactly why all my wheels go to David - top notch service and attention to detail

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As already mentioned, the cables required depend on your load requirements. You will also need various protection breakers, and a change over switch. Also, is the cable run inside the garage, or does it go outside at any point? This will also affect the type of cable required.

As usual, nothing will happen... Until there are consequences, people won't change their behaviours.

You will be surprised at how much cooler the unit runs, with just a bit of cross flow draft. I have windows on the opposite side of my garage, which I leave open. I recently installed one of those extractor fans in the wall near my inverter (the one with the louvres on the outside that open when the fan is running) - what a massive difference it has made to my inverter temperature. On the really hot days, the inverter was reaching a maximum temperature of around 76 degrees. With the extractor fan running (based on temperature of the garage and time of day), the resulting draft means that I have now only seen a maximum of 67 degrees

With your current setup, the inverter is connected directly to the batteries. As you have the Dyness battery with BMS (battery management system), the batteries are feeding information to the inverter (SoC, charge rates etc.). The issue with this is that often the cheaper inverters (Lux power, Axpert etc.), when compared with lets say Victron, is the charge managemnet and control isn't that great - it gets the information from the batteries, but the software isn't that good at interpreting and using that information. With the Pi setup, the Pi becomes the "brains" of the operation. You need to plug both the batteries and the inverter into the Pi (no direct communication between the inverter and batteries). The Pi then uses the information from both the inverter and BMS to determine the correct state of charge etc. I use ICC to control my setup. Here is a screenshot of the information received from the batteries:

You problem is setting 27 - float charge voltage. You need to drop this to 51.2V (nominal voltage). As it presently stands, the bulk and float voltages are the same, meaning that the inverter "thinks" the battery is fully charged, even though it isn't. In addition to this, why are you allowing the inverter to control the system? Plug both the battery communication cable and the inverter USB cable into the Raspberri Pi and let Solar Assistant tell the inverter what to do.

Yes and no. I agree that they are much better than the Axpert units of old, but they are remarkably similar to the new Axpert units (the 2nd gen units with the round screens). I don't think you can go wrong with a Luxpower unit TBH.

I agree with all the comments to go for a 1x11 setup. 10 speed components are becoming harder to find and, in addition to this, all 10 speed derailleurs were designed to run with either a 2x or 3x setup. 11 speed was the first time where rear derailleurs were specifically designed to run in a 1x setup. I have ridden both 1x10 and 1x11 and the shifting is definitely better with the 1x11 setup.

I don't have a Luxpower unit, but I have installed a 3kW unit at my friend's place. They seem to be decent quality and are built on similar software to the Axpert units. The unit has been running for the past month with no issues and load shedding is now a thing of the past for him (he lives in an apartment).

My house was built in the early 1900's and it's almost as though they built it with solar in mind! Roof faces almost due north and the pitch is almost perfect for the latitude required to get optimal solar.

That's the head unit you are using, not the Varia. In my group, we have varia's connect to 520's, 530's, 830's and 1030's. The volume from the 830 and 1030 is considerably louder when compared to my 520.

Exactly! I do a lot of road riding and will never ride without my Varia. I also have a bright Bontrager front light that is set on flash, no mater the time of day - visibility is crucial!

Agreed, but 40A is too large for a 5kW install! 40A breakers will only trip in excess of 9kW (40 x 230) - you should rather go with 25A breakers. I have an 8kW unit and have installed 40A breakers (AC in and out).

As mentioned, good inverters won't have any issue - the are designed to be able to provide excess power for surges (normally double the rated capacity) for a short period of time. Following this, it should then switch off and reboot. As with everything however, if you continually push your equipment on the upper end of its design capacity, it will eventually give in.

Exactly - I'm practically off-grid with my 8kW, and I run 2 electric geysers during the day, as well as my electric oven (gas stove top). I do have 14.2kWh of battery storage and 7.7kW of panels on the roof, which helps a lot!

I have always said, if I wasn't racing on the road bike, I would have already sold it and bought a set of road wheels for my gravel bike. Due to the conditions of the road, a large amount of my road riding is done on my gravel bike with gravel tyres - makes it much more comfortable, and you have less concern for potholes etc.

Also, if possible, run on a 5Ghz wifi network. The 2.4GHz also causes interference with bluetooth connections. As already mentioned, check for other bluetooth devices trying to connect. Sometimes, it causes your phone to switch momentarily and then you will have a drop-out. ANT+ should help solve this issue.

Although putting in the lithium batteries into alarms and gate motors will be much better, as they should last a lot longer, the problem is the chargers that are built into these units. The majority of the chargers that installed are designed for lead acid batteries, meaning you won't be able to make full use of the new lithium batteries. The chargers limit the current and the lithium batteries are able to handle much higher charge currents. The other concern is the charge voltage. Usually these chargers charge at a higher voltage which can damage the lithium batteries. Something to consider when changing out the 12V 7.2Ah battery in your 10 year old alarm system.

I built a little "box" with a Sonoff TH16 smart switch and a 25A contactor. The contactor does the heavy lifting to supply the power to the geyser and the contactor is controlled by the Sonoff. I did a small retrofit with the TH16 temperature probe that allows me to measure the temperature of the geyser. My PV system is controlled via ICC on a Raspberry Pi. This connects directly to the Sonoff and allows me to not only control the time of day the geyser runs, but all also set parameters such as temperature cut offs etc. The brilliant part of this setup is that it allows the Pi to switch off the geyser if the load of the house gets too high. I have an 7.2kW inverter and it is a 4kW geyser. If the dishwasher and kettle are also run at the same time, it would ordinarily overload the inverter. Instead, if the load goes above 6500W, the Pi switches off the geyser until the house load reduces and then switches the geyser back on. Works like a charm.

When I moved house last year, I looked at this exact scenario. I have 2 geysers that I need to heat, and with all of the load shedding, I already planned to install a PV system with batteries. The shear cost of converting 2 geysers to Geyserwise solar geysers made no sense. Instead, I just added an additional 6 panels to my PV system, which all in only cost an extra R15k. This allows me to heat my geysers, run the house and charge the batteries.

Can you confirm your tablet dimensions? I have one lying around at home that I'm not using - if it fits, you can have it

I am fully supportive of the regulations being enforced, in the majority of cases, they are their for safety reasons. Nothing frustrates me more than seeing a CoC being issued when an installation isn't compliant. What frustrates me is the amount of red tape that the regulations bring, as well as the different "interpretations" of the regulations. If you speak to one electrician, he will tell you something different from another electrician, although they both quote the same regulation / standard. I recently installed an inverter system at my old man's place (house purchased in the last 3 months) and had to remove the old inverter which was far too small. How a CoC was issued I don't know. The original inverter only fed certain plugs in the house and garage, but absolutely nothing was labeled, there was no DB split and no warning of a dual feed on site. Imagine you are a contractor coming to site to work and you switch off the entire mains feed and the plug you test is off. Then you move onto the next plug and it's live! I spent more time fixing the mess than I did installing the new inverter!

I use Sonoff equipment, but it doesn't really matter - HA integrates with almost everything!

This is definitely the way to go! I have a small PC dedicated to this, and as time allows, I'm slowly adding all of my smart switches, inverter etc. It does take some getting used to though, but it is super powerful