WannabeOwner
Well-Known Member
I expect you know, and I am not familiar with the correct technical terms, but there are devices that will monitor overall consumption and turn off (e.g. immersion) when other usage is high.
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Solar Panels UK - is it worth it?
- Thread starter jdwuk
- Start date
I expect you know, and I am not familiar with the correct technical terms, but there are devices that will monitor overall consumption and turn off (e.g. immersion) when other usage is high.
Do you want to borrow a spirit level!
RedMod3
Member
Try: Suppliers of high quality Canopies - Kovertek
We got the Mayfair one.
Looks like they have stopped selling them.
but see
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Made in the UK from highly UV resistant polymers that, unlike GRP, won’t fade or crack. KoverTek canopies are quick self-assembly units that are easil...
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I recently had my panels fitted and went with bird protection as a neighbour had problems and retrofitted mesh.
They run out to complete it, and had to return the next week. Two days after the panels went up over the weekend with only a little corner exposed they were in there! Luckily my feathered friends had buggered off for the day when the installers came back to finish it.
my car is full, my battery will be full by 11am. I know its starting to be sunnier but I need more stuff. Starting to tempt me for a second battery and getting an induction hob fitted and perhaps looking at hot water options although no space indoors really. Can I build a little outhouse at the front that will eventually be absorbed into a fuller front porch extension but is standalone for now.. let me turn the gas off for hot water so it'd be properly off all summer..
Induction is amazing. Control and power of gas, as easy to clean as the work to next to it. As in significantly easier than even other ceramic hobs.
I also struggle as work is doing free charging just now. With out the car to soak it up in also dumping a fair bit into the grid
I'm fine* with excess going to the grid if there is nothing meaningful that can be done with it. Perhaps some of the next things in the list are more painful like tearing out boilers and putting tanks where there is no space. And maybe they don't make immediate financial sense. I should probably have a long term plan and include transition in it. But I would like to get rid of gas. My radiators seem mostly well sized for a HP (I got rejected by octopus for noise reasons which seems nonsense to me I haven't got much space but more than some) so I'm sure that is something can be overcome with a small wall or something to the neighbours, so perhaps holding off on HW until a fuller solution is available at a semi-reasonable price and I do HP at the same time. Also allows for HP HW tanks to maybe get more available.
short term feels like induction hob + HP tumble dryer are easy wins. Hob reduces gas use and uses more electric (might eventually need more battery but lets see); HP tumble dryer just makes the current electric go further with less fussing when its switched on (even overnight?)
*not really but lets pretend
short term feels like induction hob + HP tumble dryer are easy wins. Hob reduces gas use and uses more electric (might eventually need more battery but lets see); HP tumble dryer just makes the current electric go further with less fussing when its switched on (even overnight?)
*not really but lets pretend
Hi @Rooster6655 , I have had several quotes. The one I am now looking at is suggesting the following, which does seem eye-wateringly expensive (though so do the other quotes I have had). This setup has some nice parts to it:
17 x Longi 500W Solar Panels (21.5% efficiency, 84.8% performance after 25 years)
3 x GivEnergy 9.5 KwH Batteries
2 x GivEnergy HY5.0 Hybrid Inverters (to allow up to 10KW of power use at once)
Full Islanding electrical solution (to allow operation of the whole house from battery packs in case of Power Cut - as long as the batteries have power in them!)
COST: £25k
Their calculations have the system generating an expected 5,400 KwH per year. Our consumption is 11,500 KwH per year, and is subject to a Technical Survey at which time they will finalise the configuration (I have asked them to maximise the panels, even on the less-optimal North facing side of the house... They have assured me they will)
The company (Envo Energy / Bee Solar) are registered with various schemes including HIES, MCS, EPVS. And they are national in scale (part of a much larger group, so a company that is likely to be around for a while.)
I have been pushing to get a smart meter installed, so far stuck in the Customer services queue.
But the above system will apparently let me draw down 10KW at once from the batteries... and, even without a Smart Meter to prove it to myself, I do not expect to ever hit that level of drawdown at once, so I should be able to charge the batteries at low rate overnight (something like Intelligent Octopus) and then operate from solar and battery power during the day without dipping into the grid.
Payments would be made out of savings, so although there would be no financing involved, it would lose the opportunity cost of earning interest, which would eat into true benefit calculations.
But I am thinking this does make some financial sense (my primary concern) as well as being good for the environment. (an important secondary desire).
I am very happy to have another set of eyes review my thinking, and you kindly offered!
Thanks in advance!
i have another issue with induction hobs...
currently with gas hob, 6 burners, specific width.
checked the cut-out - there are no induction hobs that use such cut out - this means I need to increase the cut-out by few cm...
but at the same time I have double oven underneath - and I've read that induction hobs do not go above double ovens (maybe due to size?) - anyone know anything about this?
currently with gas hob, 6 burners, specific width.
checked the cut-out - there are no induction hobs that use such cut out - this means I need to increase the cut-out by few cm...
but at the same time I have double oven underneath - and I've read that induction hobs do not go above double ovens (maybe due to size?) - anyone know anything about this?
otovo were ok price wise. That quote might look expensive, but its a big system. You could phase it and do half and half?
My 10x400w panels, 9.5kwh givenergy inverter AC coupled was £11.5k installed. Thats a little more than my old Eon quote from mid last year that they didn't deliver on and that was a very good price at the time.
Definitely consider your data before jumping in - usage patterns etc to see if you really need 10kw discharge and I think the 9.5 batteries are limited to 3.6kw discharge anyway - thehybrid lets you combine solar and battery so you'd only see 5kw if its sunny as well.
My 10x400w panels, 9.5kwh givenergy inverter AC coupled was £11.5k installed. Thats a little more than my old Eon quote from mid last year that they didn't deliver on and that was a very good price at the time.
Definitely consider your data before jumping in - usage patterns etc to see if you really need 10kw discharge and I think the 9.5 batteries are limited to 3.6kw discharge anyway - thehybrid lets you combine solar and battery so you'd only see 5kw if its sunny as well.
phil4
Member
i have another issue with induction hobs...
currently with gas hob, 6 burners, specific width.
checked the cut-out - there are no induction hobs that use such cut out - this means I need to increase the cut-out by few cm...
but at the same time I have double oven underneath - and I've read that induction hobs do not go above double ovens (maybe due to size?) - anyone know anything about this?
Probably a heat issue... the underside of an induction hob is a big heatsink and fans. It doesn't extend down too far, a few cms. But I suspect they're not best happy being heated by an oven under, when the surface being heated is trying to cool the hob.
From what I was told these are Gen2 batteries / inverters etc. and the combined output would be 10KW.
I do not think I would need such a high simultaneous discharge ...but I think I may need more than 5KW (or 3.6KW). I have a friend who has two of the first Gen hybrid inverters and he is limited to 3.6x2 KW - but he says he hardly ever dips into the grid at over 7KW of discharge.
WannabeOwner
Well-Known Member
And, IME, without the waste heat of Gas into the kitchen space. Also, in our eco house, gas was apparently a problem - ventilation to outside I think? so not having that air-exchange will help with draughts / heat loss etc.
I don't bother to (free) charge at work in Summer ... I'd prefer to use my own solar. Back when I was commuting to work every day I needed the free charging - 'coz car was there during the day
but now its "not every day" the car can charge at home in-between.I haven't had gas for 5 or 10 years, so no exact side-by-side comparison, but I don't think my induction hob uses a lot of juice ... it seems efficient at transfer of power-to-pan-heat ... but maybe I am kidding myself?! The oven OTOH ... but I have an air fryer for small quantities of food so as not to have to do oven-pre-heat for 5-10 mins followed by 30-40 minutes to warm something up. Air fryer is immediately at temperature, so no preheat, and less than 10 minutes cooking time for any small-portion things that I do. 13AMP plug, so it can't be as greedy as my oven is
That's just stoopid, isn't it. Just make them all the same blinking size ...
Stupidly left my Breville liquidiser-thingie shake/juice bottle behind the other day ... went to buy a new one from Mr Amazon and loads of feedback saying "Doesn't fit my old base unit". How stupid is that? They've lost my business forever.
Went to Ikea for a bog-standard drinks bottle. Choice of Glass, Plastic, Metal bottles .... Hmmm ... they only have "ordinary lid" ... Click-Click-Click ... ah! a Sports Lid available for a £quid. "Fits any of our bottles". Right, that's it. Happy to give Ikea my business ... bought £100-quids worth of other stuff whilst I was there.
We have an oven under ours ... is a "double oven" a wide one? as I don't think there is enough height for two-ovens below ...
We have a wide oven (width of the 6 ring hob) below the hob, with a normal "cube shaped" oven in a separate stack - with Microwave, Oven, Warming draw
WannabeOwner
Well-Known Member
Gotcha. I was doubting that a pair would fit under work-surface height, but I now see that those ovens are "less tall than I expected"
Is two ovens, specifically, the problem? Given I've got one under by hob (and below that a wide draw for "oven trays" etc.)
I can't see how a vertical one like that would make any difference? hobs are often on top of ovens and will have insulation (both oven and hob) to help prevent heat being an issue?
confusion for me is all the different variants - 13 pin plug, hard wired etc. I'm hoping hard wired is more a 'race to idle' so overall energy use is the same for any job but they can ramp up higher for things like boiling a pan of water quickly and have multiple rings on at the same time at a higher power? I think we can do that and our oven is a plug in one which surprised me when I replaced it. Assume they must be ok otherwise they wouldn't sell them.
confusion for me is all the different variants - 13 pin plug, hard wired etc. I'm hoping hard wired is more a 'race to idle' so overall energy use is the same for any job but they can ramp up higher for things like boiling a pan of water quickly and have multiple rings on at the same time at a higher power? I think we can do that and our oven is a plug in one which surprised me when I replaced it. Assume they must be ok otherwise they wouldn't sell them.
WannabeOwner
Well-Known Member
Mine have a "boost" option on each ring, and some (the bigger rings) can double-click the boost for "Extra boost". Heats a pan of water quickly - I don't know how it compares to gas, but seems to me that some of the gas burner will escape around the edges of the pan, so Induction might be similar?
I can boil a big pan of water and record temperature / time if you like? (I would normally fill a pan from the boiler tap, rather than heat a pan from cold)
I don't think there is a restriction on mine - I've never noticed that having multiple rings on boost causes anything to "disable" ... but I can check that. Deffo needs a dedicated supply for that, a 13AMP plug wouldn't hack it!
My annoyances with Induction hobs are:
Flat controls rather than knobs. I know that is easier to clean, but they are a tiny bit laggy and same as phone in terms of mis-keying and so on. Minor irritation.
Turns off if something boils over. That's good of course, but if you put something on it - a bottle of oil in the wrong place - it will turn off. All rings. And not remember what settings you had, so you have to re-remember what each ring was set to.
The rings all have individual timers and "repeat program capability". Good luck with that, have to get the manual out each time, because there is no obvious "display", so its all "Press this once, then hold for 2 seconds" type interface and trying to figure out which ring has a timer set, and for how long (and whether there is also an "all rings off" timer running) is hopeless.
WannabeOwner
Well-Known Member
I was bored ...
7L of water (in a big jam pan) heated up, from 20C, at 6C per minute on the biggest ring on double-boost - using about 3kW. No idea if that is good, bad or indifferent.. Dunno how long double-boost will stay on, might be a limit on that. I ran it for 4 minutes and it was up to 43C
I am not sure.. I just saw on appliances direct or something mentioning that induction hobs not suitable to be mounted above double ovens.
maybe a gap is too small or something. it is a very strong magnets after all
