Loadshedding solutions

[DJuice]

7 hours ago, Madone69 said:

So another spanner in the spokes.....

Got quoted on the Hubble 5.5 battery for R25500 new from a reputable vendor.......any thoughts or real world experiences 

Madone if the price is vat included, good price. Paid R28750 for our Hubbles. Have two of those and no compliants. Been using for 4 months, it took a few days for them to settle and charge to 100%. Apart from that, working to my expectations. We draw to 40% and then back to eskom. We dipped once to around 23%. 

[ChrisF]

Wanneer jou fiets meer ligte het as eskom ....

 

 

En dit word gelaai vanaf solar 👍👍👍

[LongDonkey]

8 kW Sunsynk inverter, 2 x 5.1 kWh Li Hubble batteries, 8 x 545 Canadian solar panels, and a whole rewiring and move of the DB. Not gonna save much on my bill a we were frugal anyway, but we have the option of going off grid eventually. Just have to move the genny closer to the inverter to keep the cable short.

Pity there are not options yet to get businesses with solar ,like where i work, to sponsor (supply) the supply of power to the frikken lights outside our work. It is a disaster with cars doing 90 kph through the intersection when power is are off.

[Frosty]

43 minutes ago, LongDonkey said:

8 kW Sunsynk inverter, 2 x 5.1 kWh Li Hubble batteries, 8 x 545 Canadian solar panels, and a whole rewiring and move of the DB. Not gonna save much on my bill a we were frugal anyway, but we have the option of going off grid eventually. Just have to move the genny closer to the inverter to keep the cable short.

Pity there are not options yet to get businesses with solar ,like where i work, to sponsor (supply) the supply of power to the frikken lights outside our work. It is a disaster with cars doing 90 kph through the intersection when power is are off.

At least you have lights.... on certain roads, close to home, big intersections have absolutely nothing. The light poles and traffic lights have been cut down (and almost everything is gone), no stop signs either. I have to watch that the people driving behind me don't drive into me when I slow down. Stopping only happens when the cops are further up the road waiting for non-stoppers to fine.

[mikkelz]

Two hours into loadshedding and sitting at 74% battery remaining. I had to turn on the aircon – it's a scorcher today in Stellenbosch. And the dishwasher wasn't quite finished when loadshedding started. 😅

[Robbie Stewart]

This sh!tsh0w is killing the economy. Small businesses can not possibly survive this. Running a diesel generator costs an average small supermarket about 300k per month on top of their current running costs which means higher prices, letting staff go and ultimately reduced foot traffic with the resultant drop in sales.

I'm not seeing the silver lining anymore. Someone needs to take responsibility for this, but no one's putting up their hands. 

Has SA finally reached the precipice?

[dave303e]

15 hours ago, Robbie Stewart said:

This sh!tsh0w is killing the economy. Small businesses can not possibly survive this. Running a diesel generator costs an average small supermarket about 300k per month on top of their current running costs which means higher prices, letting staff go and ultimately reduced foot traffic with the resultant drop in sales.

I'm not seeing the silver lining anymore. Someone needs to take responsibility for this, but no one's putting up their hands. 

Has SA finally reached the precipice?

Sometimes(not always), there is an opportunity in there. I did the maths on our family dairy operation. We can actually save on average R6000/month by ditching eskom and going to solar. Just based on losses, diesel and line rentals. It comes at a huge investment(R650k at first calculation) but the reality is this implementation can actually really improve the business( employee moral/work conditions, output volume and quality and financially). It has been a slow degradation for the last 7 years so this would essentially correct for that and take it back to 7 years ago's power/diesel economics.

 

In other news, our invertor and battery went in yesterday, panels go up today, eskom disconnected on monday once battery is charged and everything is settled and we can switch to the new backup supply

[The Ouzo]

Last week Saturday we left for a week at the coast.

As I know my alarm battery only lasts around 45 minutes without power and I did not want the house sitting without an alarm for the entire week so I plugged it into the inverter.

Also left the wifi plugged in so I could monitor somethings.

Lo & behold the first day away and our area does not come back from loadshedding. A cable fault is the reported problem. We were off for around 18-20 hours. 

Now I'm stressing. Will the inverter last ? How bad are the batteries going to be stuffed ?

I never got the sms to say the alarm lost power, and when we got back this saturday the alarm was still active, that means it never went completely flat.

 

What damage it did to my inverter batteries I dont know though. But I was pleased that it lasted.

[Paul Gleed]

On 12/8/2022 at 5:54 PM, mikkelz said:

Two hours into loadshedding and sitting at 74% battery remaining. I had to turn on the aircon – it's a scorcher today in Stellenbosch. And the dishwasher wasn't quite finished when loadshedding started. 😅

What setup are you running?

[mikkelz]

18 minutes ago, Paul Gleed said:

What setup are you running?

I linked to the post I made earlier in the thread. The little preview isn't the most obvious (unless you click on the ↗️ to go to the actual post).

Summary:

• Victron MultiPlus-II 48/5000/70-50 inverter
• Victron Cerbo GX monitor
• Victron ET112 energy meter
• Freedom Won eTower LiFePO4 5kW battery

Edited December 12, 2022 by mikkelz

[Frosty]

1 hour ago, The Ouzo said:

Last week Saturday we left for a week at the coast.

As I know my alarm battery only lasts around 45 minutes without power and I did not want the house sitting without an alarm for the entire week so I plugged it into the inverter.

Also left the wifi plugged in so I could monitor somethings.

Lo & behold the first day away and our area does not come back from loadshedding. A cable fault is the reported problem. We were off for around 18-20 hours. 

Now I'm stressing. Will the inverter last ? How bad are the batteries going to be stuffed ?

I never got the sms to say the alarm lost power, and when we got back this saturday the alarm was still active, that means it never went completely flat.

 

What damage it did to my inverter batteries I dont know though. But I was pleased that it lasted.

Alarms don’t pull a lot of power, so you shouldn’t have a problem if there were minimal other loads connected.

I pull about 290-330W/h for fridge, WiFi, alarm, pump for solar geyser, and certain lights (at night). 

However, certain batteries like to recharge fully before being discharged. That kills the battery, but like overtraining, it happens over time. The more it happens, the faster it becomes noticeable.

[M L]

On 12/9/2022 at 9:31 AM, dave303e said:

Sometimes(not always), there is an opportunity in there. I did the maths on our family dairy operation. We can actually save on average R6000/month by ditching eskom and going to solar. Just based on losses, diesel and line rentals. It comes at a huge investment(R650k at first calculation) but the reality is this implementation can actually really improve the business( employee moral/work conditions, output volume and quality and financially). It has been a slow degradation for the last 7 years so this would essentially correct for that and take it back to 7 years ago's power/diesel economics.

 

In other news, our invertor and battery went in yesterday, panels go up today, eskom disconnected on monday once battery is charged and everything is settled and we can switch to the new backup supply

Well-freakin-done

 

You mentioned last time that you want to disconnect from eskom supply - what did that process and costs entail?

[dave303e]

31 minutes ago, M L said:

Well-freakin-done

 

You mentioned last time that you want to disconnect from eskom supply - what did that process and costs entail?

the disconnection we still haven't done. But our one neighbor has done it- from what he said as eskom direct customers. You need to submit a cancellation of services in writing. They then come and pull the links. When they need a transformer they come remove it and take it away but that can take months which is not an issue other than the eyesore. They also pay you back the deposit on the transformer. But I will confirm once we have it sorted.

[Robbie Stewart]

So on Saturday a colleague of my wife dropped his old inverter and battery off by me since he decided to go solar. I got the whole shebang for 4k which was a steal. Granted its only a 1200VA inverter with a 100Ah battery, but it does the thing. I type this while at my desk in the beginning stages of a 4 hour shed period.

I am now contemplating another set for my alarm, electric fence and garage door.

In saying that I bought this chap's " old kit ", he bought it in this year still, so it's relatively used, not quite old yet. 

[The Ouzo]

11 minutes ago, Robbie Stewart said:

So on Saturday a colleague of my wife dropped his old inverter and battery off by me since he decided to go solar. I got the whole shebang for 4k which was a steal. Granted its only a 1200VA inverter with a 100Ah battery, but it does the thing. I type this while at my desk in the beginning stages of a 4 hour shed period.

I am now contemplating another set for my alarm, electric fence and garage door.

In saying that I bought this chap's " old kit ", he bought it in this year still, so it's relatively used, not quite old yet. 

yeah since experiencing the seamless always on power of the "little" inverter I'm trying to factor in the cost of a proper system into the purchase when we buy a new place.

[TheoG]

With the crappy weather, my batteries is at 57% at the moment 😞.  If they can get to 60% at least before sundown, it should be enough to get me through the night without using any Eksdom power .... 🤪.