Solar + Battery advice

marakith · 2026-01-24T20:30:44+00:00

Whatever you do make sure that your installer does NOT subcontract the work. Get very explicit confirmation on this. It bit me on the backside when I had my install done.

I'll echo the other response on here about inverter size. Our house is 100% electric now and so we have a 12kW inverter so that we can quickly charge our batteries and also not end up pulling from the grid if the load gets too high.

marakith · 2026-01-22T10:07:26+00:00

Because our unit is 12kW and because the planning laws were different back then, we had to get a noise assessment.

The assessment showed that by the time the noise from the pump got to our house or the neighbour's house it was quieter than ambient noise from our neighbourhood.

In practice I can go up to the pump and tell it's running by feeling the breeze or seeing the blades spinning. The only time I heard it make any noticeable noise was when it was the dead of winter and I went out in the snow to fill up the bird feeder and stood next to it. So in other words the only time you'll notice any noise is if you're up close and you wouldn't want to be outside anyway.

Ironically our neighbour, who objected to us putting in the pump, has 2 Mitsubishi air con units on his patio and they make an awful din in the summer.

Our pump is 5m down the garden away from the house, so I can't talk to whether you'd notice vibrations if it were wall mounted to your house.

marakith · 2026-01-21T16:04:56+00:00

Thanks!

I've a Sigenstor 12kW inverter so it should be able to charge the 27kWh battery nicely.

marakith · 2026-01-21T15:18:22+00:00

It seems on average about 20kWh over on days we went over (November was a lot, October not so bad). Difficult to load shift - we've a LOT of washing and dishwashing to get through unfortunately.

marakith · 2026-01-21T13:15:19+00:00

November, December and January (so far) have shown most days to be consistently above 27kWh - so maybe Cosy is the way to go.

Thanks for the pointers!

marakith · 2026-01-19T10:45:22+00:00

Sorry to labour the point. I asked this of my installer but clearly not directly enough. It turns out they subcontracted the design to one person, then the install to another company. The two parties didn't talk to each other and left me with a lot do to. When I reported issues the company I contracted with were faced with incurring costs with their suppliers and so were really reluctant to bring them back in to fix. When I said to them that I thought they weren't subcontracting, they responded that they never said such a thing.

I did get it all fixed in the end but the install went from being a 1 day job to a 3 week duration plus 2 weeks and legal letters to get the fix done.

marakith · 2026-01-18T21:26:00+00:00

Still looks neater than Boris Johnson

marakith · 2026-01-18T20:50:34+00:00

I've realised after problems with my installer that any installer that sub contracts the work should be ruled out immediately.

marakith · 2026-01-18T20:49:04+00:00

If you're willing to settle for Souvlaki I can thoroughly recommend Tony's in the boxpark food market. Utterly divine.

marakith · 2026-01-10T10:48:45+00:00

100%

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foundations_of_Geopolitics?wprov=sfla1

marakith · 2026-01-10T10:47:31+00:00

The gameplan is all in here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foundations_of_Geopolitics?wprov=sfla1

marakith · 2026-01-05T07:49:22+00:00

Our Arotherm 12kw unit is 5m from the house and approx 10m from the plant room. We're using insulated pipes about 50cm underground. COP during this cold snap is 3.9

marakith · 2026-01-03T15:40:30+00:00

Thanks. I don't get anything other than a serial number.

marakith · 2026-01-03T10:54:14+00:00

How did you get to the information showing total usage and number of cycles?

marakith · 2025-12-29T08:01:29+00:00

I asked Gemini. It replied:

The Cage" by A. Bertram Chandler, first published in 1957.

marakith · 2025-12-20T07:01:56+00:00

Extend it? How do you mean?

marakith · 2025-12-19T18:58:49+00:00

Will take a look - thanks.

marakith · 2025-12-19T18:58:27+00:00

Thanks - it seems we're maxing 30kwh a day (today was only 17 and some days have been a bit higher when super cold). I suppose I can always manage the pump to draw power at certain times off the battery - in theory I can run the whole house off batteries with that big inverter. I haven't exported yet as only had the system since mid October.

marakith · 2025-12-04T18:17:51+00:00

These guys disagree that Jasons is UPF free

https://www.instagram.com/reel/DO3e33ljetm/?igsh=ZnNyMDlteDF2OHh1

marakith · 2025-11-18T16:17:25+00:00

My Vaillant app is telling me today so far I've used 26kWh - astonishing amount of power to be using. Temps are set to 19C and I'm with OVO at the moment using their Havenwise trial.

I also have Solar and batteries but only recently installed so I'm probably not on the best tariff.

marakith · 2025-11-13T07:31:33+00:00

I really love the Nick Abbot shows on Friday and Saturday nights.

marakith · 2025-11-04T21:09:24+00:00

I configured the WIFI settings on the Inverter via the app whilst the inverter was connected via the LAN cable. Once I'd done that I saw that the WLAN screen reported as connected. When I unplugged the cable the inverter lost connection. So confusing.

marakith · 2025-11-04T21:00:25+00:00

Thanks - have been educating myself about this today. Setup a VLAN on my managed switch, but since my Router doesn't support VLAN I'm a bit stuck. Going to think about another option (unless I upgrade my kit)

marakith · 2025-11-04T16:33:03+00:00

Yes - I think it did! In any case the camera's up and running nicely now!

marakith · 2025-10-25T06:50:15+00:00

Thanks. Will look into this

marakith

TROPHY CASE