Solar Saga

So, after a number of years debating the question, and what feels like years trying to get quotes out of people, the installers finally arrived this week to fit solar panels to the back roof. 


They turned up about 9am - an electrician and a panel fitter - and were soon busy with the fixings on the roof and wiring stuff up to the junction box in the kitchen / fitting an inverter in the boiler 'cupboard', etc.



It was much later in the afternoon though by the time the panels were actually going up, and gone 7pm when they finally finished - by which time it was getting too dark to initialise the system.

It did all look quite smart when they'd done - but this is where the saga started . . .

• When we came to 'initialise' it all the next morning (having been left instructions) we couldn't get it to work.  Something hadn't been wired up quite right, and we had to wait for the installers to return from North Wales (a couple of days later) to sort it out.
  
  
• We then had one day of nice sunshine, and actual solar generation, before the company were back in touch to say that we'd had the wrong inverter fitted.
  
  
• A day later the electrician was back with us to remove our inverter, and head back to North Wales to swap it for the correct one.  (Somehow, out of four jobs they had the kit in the van for, they'd manage to get all the inverters mixed up!).  By 7pm he was back with the right inverter, and within the hour the saga was finally over.

I'm pleased to report that it is all now working - and we're particularly enjoying the free hot water provided by the iBoost system (which feeds the excess solar power to the immersion heater).

Got there in the end!