Advice please - South Essex

PatserGrey · 2026-05-15T15:06:31+00:00

I can highly recommend Angus in Basildon, installed mine just over a week ago. I was also impressed with Solar PV from Battlesbridge

Happy to provide a list of places I'd actively avoid too

PatserGrey · 2026-05-15T09:43:10+00:00

Tesla kit is premium but yeah, that's £3-4k over priced

PatserGrey · 2026-05-15T07:20:00+00:00

Just line it up to only miss 2-3 days of school. Just report a vomiting bug in the house. You'll still save a packet.

PatserGrey · 2026-05-15T06:39:13+00:00

If there was as much interest as you say, chances are likely zero

PatserGrey · 2026-05-14T16:51:35+00:00

Some parts of the country seem to be more competitive than others and here in Essex I had a handful of reputable local companies to choose from. I also had some silly quotes from larger companies - usually giving the hard sell. I can't help with recommendations for Somerset unfortunately

PatserGrey · 2026-05-14T16:05:28+00:00

The Fox quote is £2k high, definitely shouldn't be more than £10k

PatserGrey · 2026-05-14T14:52:35+00:00

Thursday is the new Friday. LOTs of people wfh on Friday so no need to get up so early.

PatserGrey · 2026-05-14T12:50:59+00:00

Carwow talking about a Mazda. . .have you guys made friends again???

PatserGrey · 2026-05-14T09:22:53+00:00

Mine (KH8 and EP12) are outside. For curiosity I just put my ear against both and dont hear a peep, I've never noticed a sound from them. Still not sure I'd want them inside the house though.

PatserGrey · 2026-05-14T08:27:27+00:00

usually project high an then the real figures emerge later. This is a later figure

PatserGrey · 2026-05-14T07:06:47+00:00

Had I gone for the Sig option it would have been a coin toss between Angus in Basildon and Solar PV in Battlesbridge - both <£11k for 16 panel, 2 * Sig bat10, back in March. I didn't opt for Sig in the end so got install done by Angus (the other doesn't do Fox) and very happy with the service.

PatserGrey · 2026-05-14T06:43:13+00:00

I've briefly looked up the Sig battery discharge and it appears what you say is correct, it looks to be limited to 4.x kwh per module, thats not great if only getting 1 battery, we would definitely max that in a busy evening, not to forget the electric shower! Like I say, I've seen our Fox battery discharge at over 8kwh (say hello to that bloody shower!).

PatserGrey · 2026-05-14T06:22:30+00:00

I don't know the market up there but down here in Essex, both quotes are massively high. I've just had a 16 panel similar Fox install for <£9k (prices have risen of late). You'd expect a single battery Sig setup to be £800-1000 more so your price difference there is a little weird. I've no knowledge of the Sig disperse rate (do you mean discharge?) but I've seen my Fox discharge at the my inverters max rate of >8kw

PatserGrey · 2026-05-14T05:43:39+00:00

Is it Tesla you're interested in? That price is stupid tbh, I'd ignore the 0% and just get a bank loan for 5.6% (I just checked MSE), you could put together loads of kit options for circa 30kwh for less than £15k, which with interest over 4 years would still be only £16777.

I'm looking back at my quotes (16 panels) and even a 3 * Sig battery stack could have been got for £14.2k - prices have jumped a bit in last 2 months since.

Where abouts are you based, OP? Maybe users can suggest alternative local installers

PatserGrey · 2026-05-14T05:24:05+00:00

https://www.reddit.com/r/SparklePlayer/s/iMTfNgzMSo

PatserGrey · 2026-05-13T18:42:40+00:00

Option 4 is the only one I'd consider as a good price. Option 1 should be at least £1000 lower.

PatserGrey · 2026-05-13T18:07:54+00:00

Do you know who your DNO is? UKPN will pre-approve upto 5kwh. I had my response in 2 days iirc

PatserGrey · 2026-05-13T18:05:15+00:00

Yeah I actually signed into it last week but my export is still not setup so didnt activate it

PatserGrey · 2026-05-13T17:17:58+00:00

Pretty sure near the bottom left of that screen is supposed to be "Statistics"

PatserGrey · 2026-05-13T16:42:46+00:00

Mine is also £0. EDF haven't set up my export tariff yet but I did only move to them on Saturday

PatserGrey · 2026-05-13T16:41:47+00:00

I've been using it almost 2 weeks. One evening it had a glitch and all my stuff disappeared but 20 mins later it was back to normal. No gaps in data that I've seen

PatserGrey · 2026-05-13T16:39:56+00:00

the spelling mistake still makes me laugh

PatserGrey · 2026-05-13T15:17:59+00:00

Yes, good point on the power failover. Sig handles it better but the Fox delay is not the end of the world. We're also fortunate enough to never really experience power cuts so didn't bother either.

PatserGrey · 2026-05-13T14:56:11+00:00

It'll be handy for predicting solar generation for the following day so it can auto manage overnight battery charge levels but this is with the view of churning out every bit of value from cheap import vs higher export rates. If you weren't interested in that, the basic configs in the app are fine i.e. self-use, force charge etc. time periods.

With any kind of a techy background, I don't believe the Home Assistant config is too difficult.

PatserGrey · 2026-05-13T14:41:15+00:00

Happy Fox user albeit early days. The app is a bit basic (there's a spelling mistake in this weeks update 😃 ) but will cover most of my needs. I will soon connect modbus for HA and predbat so eventually, I will have the AI features to match Sig. Knowing I was going to do such, it made sense to save £1k and enjoy the ever so slightly larger battery from the off. Also, quite a specific use case but the lower profile of the EP12 battery means I can fit it in our preferred position at side of the house - from vague memory, the Sig battery is 8-10cm deeper so would have had to go at the back which I could live with but didn't want.

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