I find all this quite uplifting.
Or maybe just the 8000VA / 6.5kW model
4x US3000’s will serve him well with no warranty issues.
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Assuming you have good weather. I have learned not to size any system based on this calculation, with the ever changing seasons and weather the installer ends up taking endless calls as to why the system is not performing as designed.
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Doing some checking, the Pylontech US5000 (should that be UP5000?) has a continuous discharge of 80AMP. Would two of those then do the job?
Three would be better.
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Breaking my dark Scottish heart and cutting into my Windhoek Draught fund, but it is still much better than 6 x US3000s.
@Phil.g00 - my goal here is to be as independent of Eskom and eThekwini Electricity as I possibly can. Eskom is a known basket case, we know. eThekwini Electricity is a joke. They have maintained nothing in 30 years. Their substations are timebombs, the cabling to them is a mess with most of the secondary backup cables having failed long ago. In my area when the power comes back after load shedding it trips immediately 50% of the time and we wait anything up to 90 minutes or more for it to be restored. Our personal circumstances in the next 6 months allows no leeway for us. So I talk a bit of k#k about my Scottish wallet, but we’re going to do this properly, but also financially prudently.
You okes have been invaluable with advice, baie dankie, I’m reaching for my wallet with slightly longer arms than Robert the Bruce would approve of.
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You are right. The listed panel output and the pitch and direction of the panels basically render calculations useless.
I reconfigured my panels the last time I was in ZA. I think I now have in the order of 25 - 30kWp of panels now. I’ve actually lost count.
I measured, added panels, measured again, added more panels, and so on until I reached the MPPT or PV inverter’s max outputs.
Combining E and W strings, I could get to nearly 200% over panelling on an MPPT without clipping.
I ended up with a spare MPPT and a spare PV inverter that I had previously used in the system and matched the same overall power output.
The US5000 is 80A continuous, the UP5000 is 50A continuous.
Edit: it seems the US can perhaps do 100A continuous?
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I missed that, the US is not available in SA yet. it is indeed 50 amp on the UP5000… Nice work…
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As you may gather, I am a proponent of panels, panels and more panels.
Make enough power first. Manipulating it and storing it are secondary to this.
No moving parts and good for 25 years, panels beat out all other components in value.
The more panels you have, the less reliant you are on a battery, and the less you are at the mercy of the weather.
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You left BYD off the list here. Allegedly the second most installed battery on Victron after Pylon.
Our experience is that they’re extremely well built and the support has been excellent. They don’t ask too many questions before swapping out and they pay for courier there and back.
Their software support isn’t quite there and China team aren’t on top of their BMU remote access functionality yet. But it all works and is stable and we’ve got a couple of hundred in the field with about 20-30 going in a month.
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Interesting. We have a company policy of not working with Pylons. We’ve found that when they do have a problem, they sap hours of time and support is hard to find.
I’m really surprised that you’re getting good support. We need to find out where from and get on that bus as well because there is demand for the product that we shut the door to.
Indeed. For some reason I don’t see many people in SA using them. But they make a really good battery, I would even rate them slightly higher than Pylontech. With the latest firmware on the BYD Premium LV (and the Flex, which is the same BMS), they even have dynamic voltage control.
Recently did two separate installations with eTowers and almost immediately regretted it. Despite the spec sheet saying they support 90amp continuous discharge we’re seeing both units (at a BMS level) reporting ‘High Current Discharge’ and setting / communicating DCL zero back to the inverter. This condition being seen when discharge rates are around the 80amp mark (well within spec).
FreedomWon have investigated and confirmed this condition on the BMS logs on the units themselves. Their suggestion was to increase the high current discharge alert lag timer 
. This ofcourse did nothing to resolve the root cause - only lessen the frequency of the issue occurring.
Very disappointed and being that we have two affected units we suspect this issue isn’t limited to just our two units being shipped faulty, but rather all eTowers not supporting their stated continuous discharge amperage.
Phil I think I am not the only one that would like to see photos of your install 
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You had some of the units with the faulty firmware. I have the update for you to fix it.
Not a great pic, I am afraid, but it’s visible from space
I’d rather not disclose the absolute location.
The roof spine is very close to North. That roof is about 80% covered. (3 deep on either side (E&W) in some places, two deep in others - in portrait)
And there is a 10m high tower at the rear of the house with a 30 deg slope (8mx8m area) with 34 panels in portrait.
(3 rows of 8 (1m wide panels) & 1 row of 10 (.8m wide panels).)
Remarkably, I worked it out. I can still fit another pallet (24) panels in the remaining space.
I don’t know if you’ll be able to make out the labelling on the pic.
Medupi and Kusile are Quattro 8’s in parallel. Arnot is an offgrid Phoenix 5.
Duvha, Kriel, Komati and Kendal are PV inverters.
I think there is also a Drakensberg wired in, but that might be the spare PV inverter.
This was when it was still a work in progress, but I think it always will be.
On second thoughts there is too much going on that DB pic that I don’t want on the internet.
So I have removed it.
Go BIG or go home!!
Hi Warwick - as I said, the supplier did actually put BYD on their BOM, I’d just never heard of them, I should have included on the list. Can you confirm the continuous discharge of 70amps as per their spec sheet.
They add some other line items on the quote that are above my pay grade, I am assuming they are needed with the batteries?
BYD B-Box Premium LVS Battery Module battery module, 4kWh, lithium iron phosphate LiFePO4
BYD B-Box Premium LVS PDU+Base power distribution unit PDU+Base
BYD B-Box Premium LVL Battery Management Unit
BYD B-Box Premium LVS DC Connector Set 70mm² male DC connector set 70mm²,
Appreciate the advice.
Your roof real estate is bigger than my property. I’d have to use the roofs of both my immediate neighbours to get close 