This week we have had a couple of delays including thunderstorms which is not a great mix for anyone fitting metal rails on top of a roof. The good news is there are two teams working together and expect to be fully off the grid come Tuesday afternoon, but there is no rush as again this is reliant on the weather. The team will work tomorrow morning which will see them reach the half way point and is actually a quick installation once they get going.
The kit I bought had to have a few things upgraded like thicker cabling making it far safer. A few things was actually about 30 extra items which was roughly worth an extra $1K. I am just having to draw cash on a daily basis so I can get this completed and this will become my new toy.
The outside room where the inverter and batteries will be located needs a constant flow of air to keep everything cool so extractor fans are also required to be purchased and fitted. The costs are rising slowly and why you need to have realistic budget in mind which I expect to be well under when completed. I am already at R200K and expect to end up in and around R230K. Roughly $14K and all paid in cash which is the only way to do this for this price.
Checking around doing a quick search a similar system is 60% more and does not specify installation. I think this is more for financing a system and not paying cash which is the big difference here.
This room still needs to be painted so all the batteries and inverter will be removed beforehand. The extractor fans will also need to be fitted which means making a few holes in the wall so this should be done first. I gather this was more for mapping out purposes and will be removed before painting tomorrow.
It looks as though the wiring process will take most of the time now as even though I cannot show you there are another 12 panels on the other side of the roof. The house faces North West so both sides of the roof get all day sun and this was taken roughly 45 minutes before sunset.
I have room for two more batteries if required and will decide on Monday as I think it is not a bad idea and also to increase the number of solar panels by adding another 4. This means there is no worry and will guarantee not requiring any top ups later on. This is about leaving the grid permanently behind and never ever going back. 90% of the properties I have seen around the area have small units and are definitely more of a back up systems if the load shedding happens. These are not off the grid sized installations and they will be penalised next year for still using the grid whilst having solar. You cannot do half and half and need to go entirely off.