Solar Install - Story From Start To Finish

[Nifty]

Updates and all the details of our solar decision process: http://www.nifty-stuff.com/solar-panels-energy-part-1.php

 

[Lady Henevere]

Wow -- you have lots of good information in there. Keep us posted!

 

[miron27]

WOW sounds great i have been thinking about getting solar but just don't know how to go about getting started make sure you take pictures of the process

 

[Nifty]

We passed the building inspection and the solar got turned on today for the first time!!!

I'll be updating my solar blog over the next few days, but here is a screenshot of my monitoring system:

 

[Nifty]

Okay, I finally posted all the details of the install. Better late than never! http://www.nifty-stuff.com/solar-power-installation-california-bay-area-part-2.php

 

[On Our own]

Nifty? 409 Wh?? Doesn't that mean 409 watt hours??

What is your usage?? You can live on this?? That would be 1/3 of our usage!

We stopped because the cost (over $50 grand) was only going to get us 1/3 of our use.

We built the house to make maximum use of passive solar and with two roof sections specifically designed for solar panels! But, we're stuck on cost.

 

[Nifty]

The 409 in that picture probably isn't accurate. That spot shows the total production for the day. I was at about 25 - 26 kwhs but with the days getting shorter we're doing more like 20 kwhs.

 

[sillybirds]

That's great that you got solar! I've been wanting to for a long time. I'm with you, I don't necessarily want to pay for a large enough setup to supply all my needs, just enough to get the charges out of the upper tiers. I don't know about up there, but down here where I live, once you get above Tier 2, the cost per kWh doubles!

Until I can put up a "real" system, I'm putting a couple panels on our trailer for dry camping.

Congrats on your system!

P.S. My first time to your new-to-me forum. I like it.

 

[Nifty]

Great first post!

Ya, being up in those higher tiers can be a killer! Paying for $0.40 per Kwh electricity can really get expensive. That's why we embarked on saving electricity , but when that basically maxed out we looked into "going solar"

There really needs to be a plug and play / easy to setup solar install. I mean, even a few small panels would pay for themselves VERY quickly if you're in the $0.40 Kwh tier.

 

[Wifezilla]

Yes, plug and play would be a big help. It is made way too complicated....and I actually took solar engineering classes for 2 years!