I just thought I would drop a quick note to say "Hi" and thanks to Henry for everything that he has done to help make the Suntie a superb inverter.

Even though today was partly cloudy, I was getting some very good numbers from my solar electric system. Today was the first day that the system was tested...(2) STXR2500's and 4.2kW worth of PV. I was amazed at how much power was being produced during the late afternoon with overcast skies. How very cool!!!

Tomorrow the electrical inspector will be inspecting the system and if all goes well, the next call will be to the local utility for their inspection, installation of a digital meter and signing of the contract.

Once the contract is signed, I will be receiving $8,000 back from the state of MN. (Rebate=2k per kW, up to 4kW max.)

The installation went very smooth and the only complaint that I had with the STXR2500's was that one of the two inverts didn't have any electrical knock-outs larger than 3/4". (Both units were new, upgraded inverters.)

I also ran (2) cat 5 cables 80' and had no problems connecting to my PC with Henry's software and (2) B & B Opto Isolators. I first tried the Opto Isolators out at the inverters--worked fine, and then tried them at the computer. Either way, they worked with no known noise problems.

I'm curious as to thoughts about keeping the opto isolators at the computer end. I'm concerned that if there was a close lightning strike, high voltage might still carry into the house via the cat 5 cable and potentially damage the RS-232 port and/or the computer in general. By isolating the wire by the computer, I would think the opto isolator would prevent any high voltage threat coming in from outdoors and attacking my PC.

Speaking of lightning threats...Both sets of panels and inverters are well grounded and bonded to the utility entrance ground.

An electrician friend just came back this weekend from an off-grid site in which the owner never grounded a single component!!! It fried everything, including the distribution panel and wiring in the walls. Even the drywall has spark marks where the romex is/used to be located in the walls. How this house never caught on fire is beyond me.

Enought blabbing...

Alan

Thanks for the kind words !

What panels did you end up getting ? , and if you could share with us where and cost ?

The PV's are Kyocera 158's @ $490 each. The Sunties were purchased from the same dealer @ $1,000 each. Not only did he match my best price on the Kyocera's, but he had two new Sunties that he didn't want anymore.

As a follow-up to myself, I did discover that at peak power production, the amount of noise on the line seems to also peak. I was experiencing intermittant data around mid-day, so I moved the opto-isolators back out at the inverters and the problem went away.

Cheers,

Alan