What can cause an invertor to trip the MCB?

[Wilko]

One idea is to charge a local battery using power that can't be exported and use that to run the invertor when the sun has backed off. This could work, but be careful of claimed return on investment

Edit - oops SpecialistEnergy beat me

 

[Gary K]

On another note. I have been getting phone calls about a bit of kit that can be added to my own solar pv array that can increase the energy by 25%. Pretty dubious, and I always tell them to go get a proper job. I assume there isn't anything out there that can improve the output of the panels?[/QUOTE]

Was it PV+?
There is a thread about it on the main forum page.

 

[SpecialistEnergy]

They might be talking about optimisers - but they won't increase the performance by 25%. Unless there are several panels in shade. Its a pretty expensive thing to do as it involves putting a unit on each panel with shading issues, plus usually some kind of internet gateway. So scaffolding plus optimisers (£40-50 each) plus gateway plus labour plus markup.... £2000 - 2500 for a domestic system? Might be worth it, but you are left with optimisers on the roof which may fail in the future so you'd have to think carefully about the pros and cons

 

[littlespark]

PV+? I dunno.. I never get far enough into the conversation to find out who they are, or what they're selling... but ill have a read, cheers

 

[littlespark]

Mines is south facing roof, zero shade. I think I can get as best as I can get in way of returns. Mine been installed 6 years now, so decent FIT too.

 

[The Solar King]

There is alot of dodgy mis-selling of SolarEdge going on. It is currently unclear how the protagonists got hold of the names and addresses of people with PV installed. there is a suggrstion that the MCS database may have been hacked. The selling practices are dreadful. Most of the companies involved are not members of RECC and some are not MCS approved installers.

Other companies have been tempted to jump on this band wagon, some of whom should know better.

Only time to ever concider this is when your inverter fails. Even then, unless there are serious issues over shading etc, you would be unlikely to ever make your money back.

SolarEdge is absolutely brilliant kit when used in the right way and installed at the right time. If you want to know how good, just loook at the number of installers and industry professionals have it on their own properties.

The shysters will soon move on to battery storage where the opportunities to mis-sell will be legion.

 

[Gavin A]

I'm pretty sure that the databases used were simply built up by the previous cold calling companies who were selling solar who simply recorded every time the person answering the phone told them they weren't interested because they already had a solar system installed.

 

[Electrical]

Such cases result from power surges. I can't guess anything other than that.