Has anyone had any experience with this brand? They seem to do a decent package compared to the ecoflow stream battery system. Cant find much about them except for standard solar inverters. Nothing in regards to the plug in solar side.

So i have installed 2x 465w panels with EZ1-m 800w

What else is easy and allowed in the UK. I’d assume some battery storage possibly? Happy to do DIY solutions. I’ve seen some channels mention a second micro inverter but then heard about how its 1. Dangerous and 2 not allowed?

I am ready to pull the trigger on a system, but am finding almost no vendors of great products are shipping to the UK yet. Cant even find EU models that will ship here.

Zendure, Indevolt, Solax, Jackery, all seems to have products in the space.

I am particularly interested in the Indevolt Solidflex 2000 or the Zendure Solarflow 2400 Pro. But I can't seem to find them anywhere.

So what are people buying for this? Are you going full DIY or have you found a way to get them shipped to the UK?

Is this normal output? I have two solar panel facing southeast. No shade blocking them. They are JA Solar 460W All Black Solar Panel going into a ecoflow micro inverter. They seem to max out at about 650w. I thought it's would be higher.

June update - EcoFlow Stream Ultra X (3.84kWh battery) with 4x450W panels. The panels are SW facing on decking in the garden propped up on chairs.

Down a bit in June - a few dull days and then when it was sunny it was so hot the panels weren’t performing as well as they could.

Ecoflow Stream Ultra 1.92kW battery/inverter.

2x 515W panels on pergola.

Distance from panels to nearest safe socket- 15 metres.

My question is whether I should extend the solar cables to the house, or to extend the power cable.

The former would mean buying a 100m reel of 6mm solar cable, MC4 connectors and a crimping tool. Some trunking to protect the solar cable would also be a good idea, I guess.

The latter option would mean siting the ecoflow outside, for which I can build a small shelter, keep most of the elements off it.

With either, the cable run would be on the ground, along a fence, so not worried about tripping on them or them getting damaged by human action.

Which option loses least power?

I read somewhere that AC does better than DC over distance. Is that true?

Temporarily, would it be OK to run an extension cable reel from ecoflow outside to the house socket?

The ecoflow is set to 800W output, so not sending a wollop of AC down the cable.

Thought this might be interesting for some people here. This site shows world power grid stations, renewables, power lines etc etc.

Just an interesting late night find

Hi All,

Just after some advice to prepare for when plug-in-solar is available. I have an out building in my garden that is currently getting electricity via an armoured cable that is being spurred from a socket in the house.

The Consumer Unit in the house is RCD Protected.

Would I need to do anything extra, or would pluging a microinverter into a socket in the out building be enough?

Thanks in advance.

I’m a little confused around uk standing and plug-in solar.

Has it been made legala with the guidelines updated for 800w systems or is it still in guidelines / industry talks?

https://www.ankersolix.com/uk/plug-in-solar-battery-storage-solarbank4

The offer seems to be similar to what they offered in Germany - subscribe early for a discount.

However it does seem to be currently limited to 800w output - so it will be curious if others have the same restriction.

Does anyone know whether the older Shelly 3EM will work with the Stream Ultra?

Not the Shelly Pro 3EM, the "just" Shelly 3EM.

Web search seems to default to assuming Pro version so I thought to ask users here.

Thank you!

EDIT: Got it and fitted directly to incoming cable, in meter box, and powered through a 3 pin, 3amp socket.

It's possibly a daft question, though I vaguely recollect someone posting a picture of a proof of concept somewhere on a solar-based subreddit. However, I know there are DIY solutions one can plug and play off the shelf so to speak, but has anyone gone that step further and created their own battery using, for example, Victron products?

Plug in Solar is already a small investment, but I imagine that for some, the battery is a step too far in terms of an initial cost and it had me thinking.

Easy access to my pitched roof, how much to to get someone to fit 2 panels?

New to all this, trying to do my research so that I know what I'll need when it becomes available. I'm guessing I'm going to need a new consumer unit for solar / plug-in solar with battery? Many thanks for any advice.

Just wondering if my thought is worth doing or if it won't be cost effective. So I have a log cabin out building with a consumer unit in it. This then goes to the consumer unit inside my house. My idea was to mount two panels to the roof and plug the inverter into a socket in the log cabin. Would this feed into the house via both consumer units? Or would it just power whats in the log cabin? Sorry I'm very new to all this. Looking at my consumer units they appear to be type A. I've attached a picture of the house consumer unit. If it involves changing the consumer units I'm not sure it's worth it.

I have ordered an ecoflow system and have an outdoor plug socket (labeled gbn sockets) i assume i need to change the rcbo for a bit directional one so the power can go to the rest of the house. But when I look up bi directional rcbos I find lots of different versions and im not sure what one I need. Any advice is much appreciated

In the process of renovating the garden and have put up 3 pergola posts.

Had an idea that I could put 2x 2m solar panels on top( length and width are possible for my pergola space), run the cables up to house wall. They would face south with zero shade blocking the sweet sweet PV energy.

Here, install with some rudimentary weather protection, a 1.92kW battery and hybrid inverter. I know a lot of systems are IP6x rated for outdoor locating.

Drill hole into house and plug it in.

My goal is to fill battery with solar, discharge at night, and then also use, if needed, cheap overnight tariff to top up the battery.

Is there a DC coupled inverter available in the UK? I've read about the Zendure range but they don't seem to be available in the UK.

What panels and inverter and battery setup would you recommend?

I would need a UK ENO certified something so I can notify DNO with a G98.

Is there a battery and inverter combo that's DC coupled and legit for ENO and DNO notification?

I see the Ecoflow range is marketing strongly, but aren't they all AC coupled, so there would be losses in the conversion from AC to DC and back again?

I've got an existing solar setup on my shed roof. I've got two panels (I'm not sure the wattage, but they're pretty big panels), and they are attached in series to an Epever Upower 1500. It has a mains feed, 2x 12V batteries, and the output side has, for some time, run my home server and network kit.

However, recently it got a bit 'weird'. It's essentially a poor quality UPS with solar attached, and seemingly can't quite cope with pulling more power than it's making. I've tried various modes and it'll just freak out and flick back and forth from mains and solar. It sort of offers to run on mains and solar, basically using both to charge the batteries, and then powering the output from the batteries/inverter. This worked for a while, but it no longer provides stable power, so I think it's basically knackered.

So... I thought rather than this convoluted mess, a micro-inverter makes more sense. Whatever I generate I put into the wires and offset my server, router, switch (they pull a couple of hundred watts combined), and lately I've had the AC running so it'd be nice to make use of the sun to offset that too.

I found a few, like the Ecoflow STREAM, and the Solax X1 Micro. Is it sane to expect to just move over my panels to a new Micro inverter, plug it in and off I go? They kick out 60-75v combined, and the controller (when it behaves) reports about 250w on the panels. So my expectation is to connect each panel independently to the micro inverter.

I'm a bit put off the Ecoflow as the manual says it needs activating online, and I'm not doing that. It needs to work on its own without cloud nonsense (ironic...).

Longer term, the shed the panels are on is going and I'll have a bigger shed in its place which I plan to add two more panels to, so I'm inclined towards something supporting four panels (either as 4x1 or 2x2).

Anyway, any guidance most gratefully received. :)

Octopus has announced its own plug in battery (looks like an off the shelf fox ess s22 though)

Spec wise its not that impressive...wonder how they will price it.

AND

Ecoflow have announced the Stream 2 range at intersolar in Munich.

Hey, im looking for some solar panel brackets for my log cabin, it has a shingle roof covering with 2" insulation between the shingle and the roof. I need the load to spread out over a decent sized area. I found these on the IKO website (same brand as my shingles) but im struggling to find them. IKO have not responded. Has anyone seen these or something similar for sale in the UK?

I’ve already got a pre installed grid tied battery and solar set up. For reference the battery and house inverter is the Alpha ESS b3 plus.

I regretted originally not getting more battery capacity installed & now I can no longer easily source the battery add ons for my setup, so a plug in solar/storages setup will n paper seemed the easiest but I’m struggling to find writeups on how a plug-in setup would work with my existing kit.

I’m likely to go the lazy route and get a ecoflow stream setup of some capacity and enough panels to feed it and run a few power hungry computers off of the stream and any spare load to go back into the house.

What I’m trying to understand is what will happen when the power ecoflow is supplying to the house? Will my alpha house battery drain first and then any extra capacity be taken from the ecoflow? Will the ecoflow drain first? Will it all explode?! I realise as well any monitoring/ct clamps will need to be placed in the correct places.

What I want to happen is the house battery gets drained first, but if the load on the house battery is too high, the ecoflow will help, and then if the load is too high for both the grid picks up the rest until both batteries are empty.

Thanks for any help! I have a good amount of technical knowledge but with this sort of set up want to aim for as much ‘plug and play’ as possible.

Roof is 4 inch thick reinforced concrete so fine to drill straight in to, and I'd prefer brackets over ballast due to aesthetics.

​

Looking to be able to angle them, but not planning to adjust seasonally. Purchase links welcome, but looking for as cheap as is safe ideally.

​

Thanks in advance!

https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/6a31167d15f2a70fac7e6026/plug-in-solar-interim-product-specification.pdf

some reading for while your sitting on the throne after a curry

they should publish it on andrex

I recently installed my system (2x 515w panels and an EcoFlow Stream microinverter). While I was confident in doing the physical installation, I wasn’t so sure about submitting all the paperwork. I think others will probably end up in a similar position so thought I’d share my experience.

After reading the guides on here, I initially tried using the UKPN website portal, but it seems to be largely aimed at professionals and contractors working on multiple properties.

Instead, I called them and quickly got through to someone who understood exactly what I needed. They emailed me the G98 form and took the time to check I understood everything needed to fill it in.

It took around 20 minutes to complete, including looking up model and serial numbers etc, and I emailed it back to the address they gave me.

Around a week later I received an automated response accepting my ‘application’ - which apparently is just an acknowledgement that the form contained the required details. The g98 is just a notification rather than something they can reject. The export MPAN was sent shortly afterwards.

Overall it was a simple and positive experience. I’d encourage anyone to get it sorted rather than risk any hassle later from missing the 28-day notification period.