Solar power experience.

[VS 5.0]

Apparently the money hungry gas companies in Aus have pre sold so much gas to foreign clients we are i for a price hike and gas shortage for several years to come.

At least WA had enough foresight (for a change) to legislate for minimum domestic reserves, unlike their eastern states colleagues.

 

[losh1971]

I wouldn't buy a battery system yet. There must be another quantum leap coming soon.
Personality I'm staying away from Gas too.
Apparently the money hungry gas companies in Aus have pre sold so much gas to foreign clients we are i for a price hike and gas shortage for several years to come.

i think gas is the go for your stove. I installed lpg and just use 9kg bottles so no rent. Just fill them or swap when someone has a good deal on, like bunnings.

 

[losh1971]

Just off the record i have seen a bloke once fill his 45kg out of the pump at the servo. He had some sort of adapter. The other way is you get an old car lpg tank and make an adapter to drain the lpg into smaller 9kg bottles. I have done that before. Just need to make a hose up and connect 12v to the switch.

 

[Wozza]

5.67kw system here...put in march last year, didnt really meet my expectations but they were way high
Our normal summer bill is around $600 this summer was $218 (feedin tariff 11c.....36.75c/kw supply charge) ...not bad as we are fully electric and old style gravity feed hot water system, which is now run by a smart switch so its partly solar now

 

[greenacc]

Sounds OK Wozza, saving over 100 a month. Do the panels face north and get full sun or was that not possible

 

[Wozza]

northish and next door has a big f**ker of a tree which clips the late afternoon sun...

 

[Calaber]

northish and next door has a big f**ker of a tree which clips the late afternoon sun...

northish and next door has a big f**ker of a tree which clips the late afternoon sun...

That's another point where we were so fortunate. One neighbour has a smaller version of the Royal National Park in her back yard (completely covered by tall trees) but our roof isn't in shadow after about 7am. On the other side, I recently helped the neighbour clear every tree from his back yard because they were all cocos palms which he hated.

 

[MasterOfReality]

This is relevant to my interests.

We churned through an average of 35.5 kWh per day in the last quarter with a $900 bill.

House has two ducted aircon systems with a total of 26kW, four pumps (1 pool pump running 8 hrs a day, 1 pool solar hot water pump running 10 mins a day on low setting, and 2 septic pumps), electric hot water, 1 fridge and the usual tv's and laptop. We use the aircon in sleeping quarters at night due to humidity lately. During the day we use ceiling fans mostly. Pool is on a controlled load tariff and hot water on off peak tariff.

House has a skillion roof so perfect as we won't see them from the street. House faces north south.

Should we be looking at greater than 6kw systems? Fairly new to this so haven't really started researching. We are on 3 phase power, are there inverter implications?

Cheers

 

[losh1971]

We are on 3 phase power, are there inverter implications?

Cheers

Surely your whole house is not on 3 phase? That should just be for your aircon units. We had three phase and single phase when I lived in Adelaide and it was no issue with panels.

 

[Calaber]

When the electrician fitted our inverter, he had to swap wires around to even out the load across the circuits. At the time I think he stated we needed 3 phase because of the pv output and the load imposed at maximum consumption.

We have 2 split system a/c's running consecutively. The new pool pump is more energy efficient than the very old unit it replaced. A new 520 litre fridge and a bar fridge add to the demand. We have a new flatscreen TV and a PC usually on standby. Microwave timer clock and that's about it for power draw. Gas for stove and hot water.

With the pool pump and both ac's running, the pv generates excess for the grid. Add the TV and it still does, depending on cloud cover. When you've put in a system as big and exxy as ours, it's natural to defend your choice but as it obviously exceeds normal daily needs for two people, it would probably cope well with a larger family's needs.