openinverter forum

alright, so the first problem is there is no aggrreggatted (sp?) TOTAL

and the second problem is the Smart Plugs display our hard earned solar production as usage aka consumption

note the graph in green as in solar production "saving the planet and such"

so I also figured out how to get Total Usage using just the Smart Plugs if you happen to have multiple Inverters like I do (yes I know we are back to usage aka consumption instead of generation but again bear with me)

in order to do so in addition to the Smart Plugs one per inverter plugged in to the wall sockets I went out and bought this Emporia Vue WiFi monitor (this is Gen 1, but it does the job) on eBay for $25 bucks, and all I got was the little white box just the monitor well technically and it's power supply, but no additional current sensors at all

the idea is that when you have a Vue monitor you can then nest the Smart Plugs under it, and this aggregates the totals by default

so normally you are supposed to shove one of these white boxes into your electrical panel and wiretize it to one of the breakers, but that's not how The Greg rolls

wow just came across this listing on eBay for one of these 1000 watt inverters and what I like about this one is that it is the higher input voltage range, this is one lesson I learned that if I was to do it all over again I would buy in at the 24 volt system instead of the 12 volt, its more efficient and you can use thinner aka higher gauge solar panel wires or make longer runs

anywho anytime the listing says Best Offer I [wait for it] ... send them a best offer, ha ha so I would offer them $75 and see what they come back with

this is NOT my listing I am not vested in this at all, just trying to help you out if you are interested in playing with one of these animals

Get some of those high quality solar wires that Damien uses!

so just documenting the impact of shade on the same four 100 watt panels originally pointed South that I rotated West to capture the sun later in the day and unfortunately a large tree is in their path now


Pointed South no tree in the way

Pointed West with a tree in the way

Hm... for your total and variations you can mount two AC wattmeters one on the input and one on the output of your inverter. That way you know what you consumed and what you added.

€ 11,89 26%OFF | Din Rail Single Phase Energy Meter Reset Zero kWh Voltage Current Power Consumption Counter Electric Digital Wattmeter 230V AC
https://a.aliexpress.com/_u9xbBT

Edit: i just rotated my south 8x 400W panels to get more sun late in the afternoon. I am not sure about this... i get 1.6kW peak now when before i got 2.4kW facing south.

arber333 wrote: ↑Thu Oct 06, 2022 7:17 amEdit: i just rotated my south 8x 400W panels to get more sun late in the afternoon. I am not sure about this... i get 1.6kW peak now when before i got 2.4kW facing south.

you said south twice which way did you point them when you noticed the production drop

Gregski wrote: ↑Thu Oct 06, 2022 1:40 pm you said south twice which way did you point them when you noticed the production drop

Well i faced them west because i am on the northern hemisphere . Production dropped but now i have more on time untill sunset. Tradeoff?

arber333 wrote: ↑Thu Oct 06, 2022 3:22 pm Well i faced them west because i am on the northern hemisphere . Production dropped but now i have more on time untill sunset. Tradeoff?

ah yes, that is exactly what I am doing or trying to do since I have obstacles in the way

yay my cheap Amazon inverter made it 1 year without setting itself on fire

isn't the cloud wonderful

SMUD is my electric company

The solar grid-tie inverter converts the direct current (DC) power produced by the panels into alternating current (AC) 200 watt solar panel that your home and grid can use. Net meters monitor how much power you're sending to the grid and how much you're pulling from it to determine your monthly billing and credits.

soleantasr9 wrote: ↑Mon Apr 10, 2023 2:53 pm The solar grid-tie inverter converts the direct current (DC) power produced by the panels into alternating current (AC) 200 watt solar panel that your home and grid can use. Net meters monitor how much power you're sending to the grid and how much you're pulling from it to determine your monthly billing and credits.

not all of them, some meters are too dumb to do that, here in the States still

Today is gonna be a good day...


why is it every time we about to take off on Holiday for the weekend FedEx says here's your junk ... early

Welcome to Solar Summer 2023 where The Greg will be upgrading his 100 watt 12 volt solar plates with 200 watt 24 volt ones

I may have said this before but in case I didn't the arbitrary magic number for solar panel cost in my brain is $1.00 dollar per watt. So I don't want to pay more than $100 dollars per 100 watt solar panel, and in this case I scored these 200 watt solar panels for $185 bucks each on eBay, using the Gregonomics Method [ Contact seller and say I will buy 5 if you offer a 10% discount, the worst they can say is NO ]

sometimes you can get an idea for the quality of the product by the way it is packaged, and Newpawa did a great job of tucking them in

Wow, they are a perfect fit !

Top Tip for the Young Padawans: I don't like to install my new solar panels right away, I treat them like gold fish and first allow them to acclimate to their new surroundings. Usually the garage will do, but the wife insisted we put them on display in our fine dining room, and who am I to argue.

Eat your heart out Elon Musk, the Gregsta Powerwall

alright it's SCIENCE TIME


and I'll be honest with you I feel a little duped, the 200 watt panels are just twice as big as the 100 watt ones, I was expecting more better efficiency out of a similar foot print, filing this under Lessons Learned !


the little guys have three rows of eleven 3x5 cards, and the big panels have four rows of sixteen, so not quite double but double(ish)

Rome wasn't burned in one day, ok need to do a Home Depot run for some more of them "Quick Release" metal brackets

and there it is One Thousand Gigawatts of Power for just under $1,200 bucks


here's the brackets I used, they used to be $4 bucks now $6 and now HD gives you less metal

adding this update from the future in here so you know how this system is doing/performing, in mid May of 2023 it is capturing 5 kWh of sun per day, that makes The Greg very pleased
it is important to note the following imperfections of this system

• it is deliberately pointing West instead of South (the more ideal direction)

• the panels are not adjusted at the ideal angle they are just laying on the pitch of the roof

• the house casts a shadow on at least one panel for the majority of the day

• as I write this the panels are dusty and dirty from the last rain