After what seems like hundreds of sleepless nights, my 4.7kW PV system is online and working!!!

And I wanted to give many thanks to Solar Guppy, both for his patience and his help. I had wanted to do as much of the PV install as practical, however through circumstances and an electrician friend who suddenly didn't seem interested in finishing the job after I bought the equipment, I ended up doing a substantial bit of things myself.

I got the permit approved, I calculated the wire sizes, I put up the conduit, I figured out the layout of the system. OK, there were about 100 questions answered by Solar Guppy and also some of the guys over at the Arizona Sun forum. So their help is GREATLY appreciated. Contrast that with the Mike Holt forum, where they wouldn't answer any questions because they said I was a DIYer, when in fact I wanted to make sure a licensed electrician, which is required for the rebate here in Florida, did things correctly.

I found a roofer to install the mounting feet and rails. However, even though he said he had done many installations, it turned out to be less than perfect. I wondered when he didn't snap a chalk line across the roof, but he assured me that was the way he did things and it would be fine. When he didn't show up twice while I waited all day for him, I got up on the roof to see what I could do. OK, the feet weren't straight at all. So I had to go back and adjust them as best I could.

I found a great group of electricians, Cauley Electric, here in Bartow. They had to go back and install another set of conduit though, because I had used the NEC or my calcuations but the local inspectors and the electricians insisted a ground wire had to be run, the conduit could not be used as the ground even though the NEC said it was OK.


In the end it turned out to be a great experience, now I'm just hoping to get it running to the best performance it can do.

Once again, many many thanks to Solar Guppy!

Hi Kevin,

I happy to hear it has all worked out for you and thank you for the complements. Teaching is a gift and one that we all can share, I hope you find the time to help others as you expressed I was of some help to you.

SG

Good job. Are you in Florida? Bartow sounds close to me. I really enjoy my new teaching job, I had the opportunity this month to work alongside Dr Roger Messenger and Jim Dunlop as quest speakers in my classroom. If you are in Basrtow, FL I would like to come over for a site visit.

Jim Parish
SolarSourceInstitute