With tax season coming up, we are getting inquiries about how the federal
tax credit works.
My reading on what little info the IRS has is that the 30% credit can be
taken only on your actual out of pocket expenses - that is, full cost of the
system minus any other rebates, incentive, or grants
We sell a few and have had no problems with them. Lately however we have
been a bit leery of them on concerns that the company financials are not
looking good (stock down almost 95% since 2008 and heavy debt). We prefer
the new Kyocera's with the heavier frames.
...
Yes, we used to sell quite a few. However I am pretty sure they are no longer
available unless you can find a distributor with some old stock.
http://www.xantrex.com/web/id/109/p/1/pt/5/product.asp
..
We cannot find a distributor that sells them at a reasonable price. We used to
sell tons of the old US-64's, but last time we checked on the 68's we were told
3+ month lead times. I dislike the laminates and much prefer the framed modules.
I would add the new Exeltech grid tie inverter to that question. I see their ad
in the latest HP magazine, but no info on their website about them, and no
distributor seems to know much about them.
..
There are a bunch listed here http://www.nextag.com/solar-toy/shop-html
However, I make no claims about how good/junky or anything else, it is just
a good starting point to see what is available. Obviously most of those are
made in China.
..
And the Outback Power ones are going up in price on Monday, however the new
Morningstar MPPT-60 will be out in about 2 weeks.
..
Northern Arizona Wind & Sun - Electricity From The Sun Since 1979
Solar
7;s too?
jay
peltz power
On Nov 12, 2009, at 7:33 PM, wind...@wind-sun.com wrote:
And the Outback Power ones are going up in price on Monday, however the
new Morningstar MPPT-60 will be out in about 2 weeks.
.
Around most treatment plants, moisture is not the main problem, it is the
H2S that is constantly present. At night when it cools off, you can get
condensation which picks that up from the atmosphere and makes a weak acid.
That can cause corrosion of metal parts much faster than normal.
http://e
Looks pretty nifty, only question is will it be kept up to date.
..
Northern Arizona Wind & Sun - Electricity From The Sun Since 1979
Solar Discussion Forum: http://www.wind-sun.com/ForumVB/
..
Is anyone else starting to see a few equipment shortages and/or long to very
long lead times on equipment, especially inverters and other BOS items?
Xantrex has always been famous for that, but we are also seeing it in a few
other areas, such as Fronius. So far, panels still seem to be in vast
Nearly everything so far that we have been seeing shortages in is in off-grid
equipment. We have not seen a huge increase or decrease in off-grid, but
apparently some of the mfg's decided there would be a big drop. With the
exception of a couple of particular models of inverters, we have seen no
That is what we have seen also - for past 3-4 years, off-grid has remained
pretty much flat lined, while grid-tie has all kinds of wild gyrations. But I
guess that some vendors failed to notice that and just assumed that off grid
would fall with the rest of the market recently.
I have to agree. We have done off-grid for 30+ years, so it was a very
simple transition for us to also do on-grid because the system design and
configurations are much simpler.
Over the past few years we have seen more mistakes by those that are only
grid-tie familiar or certified when design
The Concorde batteries for us have been the most trouble free of any battery we
sell or have sold, and we started selling them in the mid-late 90's.
That said, it appears that those have been severely abused and have probably
gotten heavily sulfated at best, and totaly ruined at worst. With enou
Never tried it, we usually use the free online ones by the various inverter and
panel mfg's, such as Kyocera and Fronius.
Apparently no way to see what the "advanced features" are on that site without
paying for it.
...
We have been doing them since 1979, and we have far less trouble with GOOD
sealed batteries designed for such service - like the Concorde SunXenteders. We
have more problems with people not maintaining their flooded batteries than we
do with them ruining the sealed in other ways.
The original p
Also note that for series strings, to bring up all batteries in the string to
the same state of charge, some equalization is recommended from time to time -
but not the same heavy current that you would use with flooded, where the main
idea is to stir up the liquid.
MessageDepends on which models. Few distributors (including us) stock many of
them except the most popular of the XP line. You can buy direct from Exeltech,
but the single unit price is not all that good.
...
We have seen one failure mode with sealed batteries that stands out, and that
is long term overcharging. Two reasons for that, one is from failing to set the
correct charging voltage, but another main one is not using temperature
compensation. The charging voltage for batteries should go down qu
You gotta wonder about why the customer bought such a battery layout, or why
the installer sold that kind of configuration (which ever it was) with so many
small batteries. We would never recommend going over 2 parallel banks, but
sometimes the "customer knows best...".
Yes, especially with flooded batteries where the posts are much more subject to
corrosion. I am getting too old and decrepit to get out in the field much
anymore, but in the past I have seen complete strings basically isolated by bad
cross connections, usually (but not always) due to corrosion a
d
to one end.
The results were very predictable, with the furthest batteries being
chronically under charged, and the closest ones being over cycled to a
premature death.
Ray Walters
On Dec 1, 2009, at 11:28 AM, wind...@wind-sun.com wrote:
You gotta wonder about why the customer
Vaseline simply is not very good for battery terminals. The melting point is
too low. There are other things that are much better, such as some high
temperature grease, and the silicone grease high temp greases. The silicone
is the most chemical resistant but is a bit expensive.
..
Yes, I hate Vaseline - it has a melting point of around 105 deg F, so even a
moderatly hot day will cause it to drip all over the place - except onto the
terminals it is supposed to protect.
..
North
ast.
I switch to grease, when I think I might encounter higher temps (like on
my car battery)
R. Walters
r...@solarray.com
Solar Engineer
On Dec 2, 2009, at 6:07 PM, wind...@wind-sun.com wrote:
Yes, I hate Vaseline - it has a melting point of around 105 deg F, so
even a moderatly hot day w
The correct spelling is BUS BAR or BUSBAR :)
As one that also spelled it wrong for 30+ years, I figure it is time for
payback. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buss
..
Northern Arizona Wind & Sun - Elec
Off-Grid Sizing CaseI would go with #1. The solar is obviously undersized for
the battery bank he has. Another panel + MPPT should give him about 25-40%
more, depending on temps etc.
..
Northern Arizo
ehalf Of
wind...@wind-sun.com
Sent: Thursday, December 03, 2009 9:51 AM
To: RE-wrenches
Subject: Re: [RE-wrenches] Off-Grid Sizing Case
I would go with #1. The solar is obviously undersized for the battery bank he
has. Another panel + MPPT should give him about 25-40% more, depending
I have always wondered about that statistic, and figured it had to be
something wrong with the survey - that pretty much confirms it.
It makes sense, but to add another skew to it: From Jan 2008 until now, we
have sold around $1.6 million in batteries. Of those, not a single one was
purchased
That 98c/w is for those Kaneka high voltage thin film panels. Not a bad
price per watt, but they are pretty inneficient - around 7% - so they take
up twice as much space for the same watts.
The blems that I saw were also more than just "spotting".
..
ir low production- perhaps another
reason why this email is targeting that market.
That being said, those 98c/W Kanekas look interesting...
Original Message
Subject: Re: [RE-wrenches] Fwd: Solar Panels for 98 Cents Per Watt
From: wind...@wind-sun.com
To: RE-wrenches
Date: 2009/12
Hydrocaps - they run around $30 each last I checked. We used to sell them but
gave up when lead times went from weeks to months.
..
Northern Arizona Wind & Sun - Electricity From The Sun Since 1979
Sol
We gave up on Hydrocaps after selling them for over 25years. Prepaid an order
in Jan, and 5 months later still no product. They don't even have an email,
much less a website.
..
Northern Arizona Wind
There is a list of about 30 online distributors for Bosch here
http://www.boschtools.com/WheretoBuy/OnlinePartners/Pages/default.aspx
And that company is not listed.
..
Northern Arizona Wind & Sun - E
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