₦airaland Forum

JohnKester:
GeorgeD1

Haba, six years of no cleaning! You are putting your batteries in serious jeopardy! Unless of course your PV array is so large and can compensate for the dust. Otherwise I dare say your batteries may not have been charging fully for a while now. The drop in yield would be tremendous and you will be surprised at the difference after the cleaning. The sooner you hire that scaffold and do the needful, the better and the sooner your system will come back alive again!

Cheers

GeorgeD1 na baba. I presume GeorgeD1
- lives in a place where dust doesn't bother him that much. I'm aware everywhere in Nigeria has some issues with dust though.
- PV bank is way over what he actually needs
- rains come in spatters, even in "dry" season (perhaps he lives near river bank/beach).

I clean mine at least monthly in the dry season (fortnightly when I can spare the time) and at the beginning of the rains

dapsyra:
The brand is Kavido. It is now over six years since I bought mine so that particular brand might not be available.

Just search for induction cooker in Konga or Jumia.

Don't forget to also buy the pots.

I use a Kavido too but it's no longer available in the market. Serves very well

Chuckdee:
For the pots, they don't really have to be that very expensive types, Induction cookware must be made of a magnetic-based material, such as cast iron or magnetic stainless steel so the trick i use when going shopping for pots or pan for use on my induction cooker is to take along a tiny magnet, any pot that the magnet sticks to works..100%.

I assure you, they don't come cheap. Well, cheap varies ...

JohnKester:
I am interested in your experience with the INDUCTION COOKER. I am thinking towards acquiring one but I needed someone who had used it to share his experience.

Many thanks for sharing.

Cheers

Most consume at least 800W. Swift and even cooking. Saves time. Cooks well. Highly pot selective. Generally won't work with most conventional pots around here as they're mostly aluminium (the steel set of 3 pots I bought a few days to Christmas cost me N21,000 and were an excellent bargain, believe me). Currently use two and have two new ones in store as backup, should I need them in a hurry. That's how much I love them.

Wanna look into bio-digesters too. Them seem good to have though a hassle to maintain.

dapsyra:
For a 3KW array, 4.5KWH/day on a good weather day is very poor. This implies an array efficiency of 1.5KWH/KW. You should expect an efficiency of at least 3.5KWH/KW on a sunny day. It is either something is not optimal in your installation or your overnight consumption is very low.

I have a 3.6KW array and I harvest between 11.5 - 13KWH/day this season in Abuja. During the summer months, my harvest is between 14-17.5KWH/day. (http://pvoutput.org/list.jsp?userid=46221)

My harvest mirrors yours. 3kW currently gives me about 9kWH/day because of partial shading till about 1pm (the shadows have "moved" but will return to their "good" position in summer). The Midnite 150 Classic is a monster!

samnaija:
chairman its been miserable. but as of today 1.7kwh/day was generated. i still pump water and use my fridge. on a good wheather day highest from the system is 4.5kwh/day.

I have 3 panels which go in and out of storage as required; because I at times use an induction cooker, they're out of storage right now (back to 3kW of panels).

abunafiu:
@javid4me, honestly speaking I no fit comment.
You have done very well sir.
Will comment after reading the wind turbine link.
Congratulations.

I am sure you are now feeling like hitting a Phcn pole... Lol.
My current set up of 4kw solar array, 4kw inverter and 48v450ah Trojan Batts is firing well too. Hit absorption as early as 1pm. 16 to 17kwh daily harvest. Location is Ilorin.
I now live off grid.

@Earthrealm, let Me answer your question from the other thread. I have been considering a DC pump but I will get one next year. I decided to use the 0.5hp due to cost.
About the discharge rate of the pump I have not been able to get an accurate measurement. I assume it takes approximately 50 min to fill my 2000 liter tank. I am not sure of this sha. But I am sure it take less than 1hr to fill the 2k liter Tank.
My next plan is to increase my PV strength to 5kw bcoz of pumping water for the neighbors whose prayers keep coming all day.
"Oga how much be this solar if I wan do"...the rest na 1 minute silence. Lol

My 2.25kW of PV panels (seasonally increased to 3kW, as now) drives my household appliances, plus pumps water into 2 water tanks (3,800L and 5,000L) via my 1HP submersible pump. Surely you know these as you've inspected and reviewed my system a few times. Considering your system currently dwarfs mine by nearly a factor of 2, I'm sure you could pump water for your entire neighbourhood!

PS: The 1HP pump sends the water into the 3,800L mounted 3 storeys above the ground and fills it in under 30 minutes when empty. You're certified to start a water works!

DMerciful:
The equatorial region is really not a windy region thats why wind mills are not in vogue. You need a substantial blade length to harvest power from our slow wind and as such I won't advice wind turbine rather use that money to increase ur panels or battery capacity. I almost ordered the 400W from aliexpress long ago but around my area the wind speed will not be able to drive it.

On point

Javid4me:
Since the installation, wind has been still and i am yet to see it going fully. Occasional wind busts gets its going. It requires 3.8m/s(13.7km/hr) wind to get it going. I can't say what the output is yet as there is no CC for that info and i am yet to install the meter, but will update once on steady flow and meter on.
Many thanks again

I kinda feared this would happen. You'll get better energy harvest from your wind turbine during the rainy season

Javid4me:
Oga dem,
I wish to inform the house on my upgrade to Solar and hope this will spice up the yuletide.
..................

I'm glad you made it big in your endeavours. Awesome. And thanks for the compliment

earthrealm:
i even forgot, the batteries were used on a solar system with ep solar set to equalize every month for abt 1yr, so am guessing they may have seen their fair of unsupervised equalization. batteries are 3yrs+ old, and i hv tweaked them, and hope to get 5yrs from them, b4 i noticed the 10.7v issue , which is the same thing that killed my first set of luminous batteries--- making me conclude that luminous inverter somehow kills off 1 battery, i have seen about 2 other people with the same issue...

i put my clamp meter on the luminous, and the max current i got was 9.2amps, not even upto 15amps to cater for 2units of 150ah battery which the manufacturers recommended

If the word in bold are true, your batteries are most likely beyond salvage. Then again, 3 years is excellent battery life for SMF batteries; many don't live beyond 18 months.

chris81964:
Believe it or not you can equalize your batteries. The Victron controllers have an equalize setting for your battery type. Do the over charge as a group or individually. There is a 50/50 chance that the battery is shot. If it has failed remove the bad battery or risk damage to the other.

To be strongly discouraged. That's for pros and the daring. I'm no pro. Yes, I've done it before. Yes, worked, No, I would not recommend it. Yes, if you risk it, you'd probably have to sit through the process, taking temperatures and voltage readings often.

anochuks08:
Brand New 60A Ep Solar Charge controller available for sale. Price is 115k

No contact details?

I need viable one or two Trojan T-105 RE 6V batteries no older than 2 years. Anyone with spares lying around should please advertise here. Thanks.

DMerciful:
Upgraded my panels from 750W to 1000W.....gradually I'm getting there. Green for life

Cool!

bigrovar:
A properly designed system has layers of protection. Also remember protection priority is to first protect lives and property before protection equipment. Have *properly* sized breakers between each component of your off grid is highly recommended. CC are electrical component and even though they come built in with safety breakers.. It often recommended to have another breaker between pv and cc and cc and pv. If the battery were to get short circuited.. breaker protect the cc from battery. If cc short circuits (And it happens - google it) the breaker will protect the battery.

If the breaker between the cc and the battery trips (usually for a good reason) the worst thing is your cc is fried.

The alternative of not having a breaker between your cc and battery is, if cc short circuits.. then the recursion is much worse. Its like have the positives and negative of your battery in contact. Bad things happen.

Couldn't have said it better. Thanks

GeorgeD1:
guys,

just a page from the morningstar mppt 60 manual:

The same warning comes with virtually every other charge controller. Thanks for the documented emphasis.

idsolar:
just from experience breaker between cc & batr i think is by choice. i was calld upon to look at a fault on solar installatn & i met burnt cc. after measurement d only thing i noticed was d breaker. i changed cc, remove breaker, connect batr to cc wt thicker cable. up till today over 2yrs now no issue. observation: cc, breaker was properly sized. my take: never install something to avert a risk to create bigger risk. breaker between cc/batr is by choice.

I concur. Indeed, I had a breaker trip off once between the battery bank and CC. Sizing issues. Fortunatley, the CC was a Midnite Classic 150 so it survived without harm.

By the same measure, I've heard of burnt inverters, exploding batteries (one can never be sure of the cause of those things) and molten cables in scenarios of no breaker between the CC/Inverter and Bank. If you know what you're doing, either scenario is suitable but if you're not sure, have someone have a look rather than removing the breaker altogether. It as well allows you to service individual components/devices easier.

There's an easy work around, especially in off-grid installations where the inverter is almost always on. The breaker is where it shoud be but there's no direct link between the CC and Battery bank. The flow chart is PV => breakers => CC=> breaker => Inverter => breaker => battery bank. That way, even when the inverter -> bank breaker fries, the CC -> inverter connection ensures adequate power pull from the CC to keep it from popping, no matter how small the power drain is. I have never had issues with this kind of installation though it might have a hidden flaw.

Secondly, for high power users, it shortens overall cable requirements in length and consequently thickness since during the day when energy demands are highest, most of the power is supplied straight from the CC. In addition, Inverter gets power before batteries (shorter path of energy flow) thus lowering rate of tripping of either the inverter or breakers. In periods of surge demand, power is gotten in this manner

CC <= Inverter => Battery bank

thereby splitting the power drawn.

DMerciful:
Super yes! its the surest way to damage ur CC. Infact never install a breaker between the CC and battery cos any inadvertent trip fries your CC . Happened to a friend recently.

Hmm ...

abunafiu:
Alhaji Saipro, how u dey sir.

we both have been enjoying our systems. I am enjoying my 3kw poly system. wish I had discovered this earlier.
I must confess, 70% or 80% hmm even 150% efficiency doesn't matter again.
all I see now is 1pm 59v absorption and 3pm float.
what's else do I need.
When last did I crack my head to do energy calculations.. Except for a prospective clients.
Currently enjoying Game of thrones season 6.
it's 7.30pm here in Ilorin.

I'm grateful for the comment. I'm sorry I didn't reply right away. I'm doing exactly the same. I occassionally walk by the "power room" and glance at the CC readouts; fiddle with the inverter button to check load parameters and be sure DC voltages tally with those of the CC. For fun, I randomly read the voltage on each battery. Once a month, I open the caps of the flooded batteries to see the electrolyte levels. Afterwards, I take an SG reading (once in 3 or four months). Indeed, the lazy days are here. A toast to our energy independence !

PS: A friend sent me a message this morning saying he hasn't bothered connecting to the grid since I last looked up on his system. Thus, one less utility headache for us as individuals, a few less grid users for the power company to worry over. Very soon, there will be enough power for all. Or so I hope.

Despite having used inverters for over 13 years, did I mention that GeorgeD1 inpired me to add solar panels and Abunafiu convinced me of the need to bite the bullet? Thanks my people. Of course, Kiekie1 did the supplies (we had a few teething issues but he's really a great guy).

richmon74:
It's such a pity that in your 15yrs of electrical engineering practice you have always been limited to environments where energy conversions from SOLAR PANELS stay within 100%.

But in my 2 months of renewable energy apprenticeship I av installed 12 of 255w solarworld solar panels at Unity road in Lekki in Lagos (a very easy place to locate in case anyone wants to chexk it our) which is by calculation 3060w and the Outback FM80 charge controller records a Maximun Wattage output from it to be 3654w as shown in the pictures below. Or maybe the charge controller is faulty or I can't read the digits very well.

Maybe I need a better explanation to that readout

Heh heh heh. That's an amusing thing to quote. I 100% understand what richmon74 is saying. I think I'll sum it up as a wrong choice of words and ... well ... tempers. He sounds kinda inflammed ... but I could be mistaken - I offer my apologies in advance. It's true no system will offer you more than 100% efficiency much less 100% yield. The problem is in looking solely at the output and not the mechanics. Indeed, no solar panel is capable of 50% output at the moment. Even 25% is an overkill. The argument is about the total power output versus the rated power output. Once more, I could be mistaken but solar cells are pretty inefficient but ... we have lots of free sun so almost any inefficiency (so long as there's enough space and support for the panels) is acceptable. So, if you see a 200W panel generating 250W, consider the other variables.

By the way, some reputable companies, in order to protect their reputation, quote the minimum specs on their panels. One could almost argue they're under-rating their panels. Like Solarworld and Canadian solar. Then again, I believe that should be the norm, to guarantee customer satisfaction.

Caveat: Should I have offended anyone at all with my post, I apologise. I expect no reprissals, please. I truly am rusty and haven't dusted my books in a while but it is to my understanding that not much of the fundamentals have changed. Thank you.

EDIT: I wish to not have my head being bitten off so I'll state here that higher efficiency experimental cells exist but nothing of the sort commercially. Thank you once more

bigrovar:
theoretically yes it can.. under standard condition where sun is at the right glare and right angle to the panel and the temperature is just under 25C. When with all this in place (very rare) u still need to have the right wiring .. even with all these there is inverter inefficiency to consider...

In fact, if you add conditions of cold weather with solar glare or cloud edge insolation, you can go as high as 125% (the highest I've yet seen during winter in the USA). I've heard of Canadians hitting in excess of 150%, I guess because it's biting cold there. Thus, matching VoC to upper limits could pose a real problem as limits would be exceeded under such conditions.

Back home in the tropics, I've on occasion hit 100% and momentarily exceeded it (never more than 10 minutes at a go). Typical day for that is the clear skies of the rainy season right after a brief shower/storm with the combination of cool panels, a clear skies and an amazingly brillant sun around noonday.

And a few minutes later, we drop back to the typical 70 - 80% harvest.

bigrovar:
... the rule is to assume 77% of your panel capacity has the capacity u get in real life use after u remove things like heat coefficient, inverter efficiency and position of the sun. I usually just times panel size by 0.77 to get a useable figure I can use when sizing my system.

I always use 77% efficiency in my calculations. Saves a lot of time and headaches.
85% efficiency for inverters too (while charging batteries)

DUNKA:
Was just going through this old post on the argument on use of bottled water vs. Distilled water. Please there are companies that bottle and sell distilled water. Use distilled water for flooded batteries for longer life. Please see product below bought here in Jos sold in 1litre containers. Treat your batteries well and they will treat you well and last a long useful life

I remember that discussion. 'Twas a heated thing at the time. Learnt to be less vocal thereafter. I'm still very much around, just kinda quiet. But I'd rather be wrong than not learn.

Thanks for reminding me of the reason I'm here

chris81964:
No offense or harm created. I highlighted the differences between pwm and mppt controllers.
The reference point was the post by @dreamflygn. Two kw in panels and two pwm controllers.

While not fully understanding you, I admit to distrusting the twin PWM setup. Not that quality of PWM in the least. I'll bring up my point later under clearer examples.

midastouch:
Simple rules of grammar. You qualify a noun with "an", if only it starts with a vowel. If not you use "a".

Your sentence should start with 'A LED lamp..... ' not 'An LED lamp....'

Actually, it's the starting sound (remember phonemes?) which determines the use of "a" "an" as a precursor. Pronounced "el-ee-dee" rather than "led", the OP is right. "An lamp" is wrong but "An LED lamp" is correct. Cheers.

*runs away for fear of being insulted*

chris81964:
A new client of ours got the same from another installer same controller.
It is a pwm controller. Good for small systems under 500 watts.
I am going to guess that each 1000 watts gets its own controller. Problem with pwm is cloudy weather and low battery voltage.
Let's say that the panels are putting out 10 amps and your battery voltage is 22. Your 1000 watts I'd only putting out 220 watts. Same situation with an MPPT controller. It will step down the voltage and increase the current. The same conditions now you will have your 1000 watts producing a minimum of 396 and as much as 500 watts.
The pwm is leaving between 176 and 280 watts. This makes a huge impact in your batteries getting charged.
See pictures of the controller and what passes for wiring.

Kindly explain the above quote. My presumption is, charge controllers don't create power. Let me put it this way, energy generation by the panels would be the same in both scenarios hence overall power (assuming low light conditions). The difference should be in output voltage and current, not overall power (again, assuming low battery charge). My understanding is, the greatest difference would be while trying to charge a nearly full bank under low light conditions.

No harm meant, just clarification .

RipVanWink:
yeah, cost is a big determinant of not building in 3 to 5 days redundancy as required, i hv a 24v 200ah batt bank in the villa, due to cost...i only hv half day redundancy .... only way i instructed them to stretch the run time of inverter on rainy days is to turn off the fridge/tv/fan....n use only lights....
in naija its difficult to have 4days non stop of badweather/continous rain...........even on cloudy days..the panels generate small power still
energy is finite, cant be created from nothing, apart from turning off heavy loads, there is no way to increase ur runtime...unless u want to invest in a device called sunforce...this monitors the irridance and lets u programme the load attached to it to run on sunny days/periods etc........
some high tech inverters might hv this as a built in function.

I'm telling you, the cost of redundancy of any sort is all but prohibitive. By default, if your system is sized for 50% or lesser DoD, you already have about a day's redundancy in-built (although it's actually good practice not to exceed 50% DoD rather than a redundancy issue). To use 20% of the bank daily in the tropics is perhaps unnecessary but the latest spate of bad weather (lasting weeks; the worst I've witnessed in my 14 years of using inverters) is worrisome and has got people with high redundancies smiling. I had to do an emergency upscaling of my panels by 33.3% to meet daily charge requirements while simultaneously cutting down on my loads. It's gotten that bad. Things seem to now be picking up.

Now that the matter has been laid to rest, I can venture some gleaned knowledge:
1. Charge controller displays can't always be trusted with regards to energy generation displays. Particularly true for Chinese PWM/MPPT.
2. The refresh rate of the displays vary and oftentimes, output lags behind input. You can verify by just spending a few minutes in front of the controller.
3. The longer the cables between the battery bank and the controller (and the thinner they are or the heavier the load), the greater the disparity between the apparent power at the battery end and the actual power at the controller end. That's where the voltage sensing cable comes in.
4. The expensive CC have a reason they're expensive. I as well own a Xantrex and a Midnite. Don't berate them. Having said that, suitable cheaper alternatives exist. EP Solar makes wonderful MPPT controllers with excellent DC-to-DC conversion and pretty good overall efficiency (of course never 100% but good enough for practical use). Just don't believe everything it displays. I had issues with mine and posted details of the issue on this forum a year ago. I still own one so I can tell you it works and does its job well; the problematic one was the exception to the rule.
5. Get a trusty voltmeter and a DC clamp ammeter as backup. They'll save you a lot of worrying over apparently puzzling and inexplicable phenomena. Like input energy being lower than output energy. And be sure it's a DC clamp meter. There are people on this forum using the AC version. Ain't saying no names.
6. BEWARE: Some CC leak power back to the panels at night, even trusted names and brands. If you're having inexplicable phantom drains, cut loads for on night and see what's going on with the consumption. Or whip out your clamp meter and check the cables.
7. A significant number of problems arise from loose connections and improperly sized or overloaded (thus damaged cables). Yeah, I know, you've checked the connections and cables a gazillion times. Before you say it can't happen to you, check again. I've had it happen to me a few too many times to ignore. These are connections I secured personally. Probably just one connection in nearly a hundred but I assure you that one is significant enough to bring the whole system down. And if your system is working fine, grab a wrench/pair of pliers and check your connections every few months. A stitch in time saves nine, probably a score.
8. All can't be said at once. More talk as more issues arise.

shithapuns:
Hello epsolar users in the house.
I hv 60amp epsolar mppt CC....noticed it never enter bulk charging state.....even when the batt was flat...it will still write boosting once sunlight comes.....i dont think this is normal....
Hv checked the settings and cant see where to tweak it.
Manual says bulk to boost to float....
Can some 1 throw more light on this

"Boosting" is what is displays for both BULK and ABSORB phases of charging.

abunafiu:
Many thanks to these awesome guys ...

Nice one, as always. Cheers

richmon74:
It is so easy for people to come to this thread and air their judgment of others without telling us of what transpired between them before then
...... ...... .....
That so many things are kept from this thread is just out of maturity and for the decency of this thread.

.....

You are so right

chris81964:
I hope you all had a phenomenal week. Permit me to share a wonderful four weeks with you.
Three weeks ago we were recognized as one the top solar installers in Nigeria by Schneider Electric and invited to participate in a round table in Lagos.
.......

I'm impressed. Keep the spark alight. More power to your elbow Chris. Putting power in Nigerian homes since 1960.

Freddygaz:
Thts an interesting find. The sub Saharan beam of 36B is gotten all the way in UK with a 2.4M offset for guys to receive the early kickoff of EPL because they don't receive it on Sky Sports..for the Eurasian beam you need a Ku circular lnb to nab it...waiting for results

Invacom sells a good range of LNBs with circular polarization. The only one I own (QPH-031) works lke a charm. I think it's now outdated as the company lists it as a "discontinued" product.