David Baillie wrote:
Mart Hale wrote:
John F Dean wrote:Can you provide more detail?
I started experimenting with using solar direct to a hot water heater element Connection is simply solar panel then connect to heating element, with a 55 gal barrel of water.
I started with 2 panels then worked up to like 9 panels each 260 watts ratted but give me 220 watts in practice.
After I was comfortable with this, I then want to my present solar system which has over 2000 watts of solar going to an inverter to batteries.
To this system I added a Y connector to both Positive and Neg to the power coming in from my solar panels directly before the charge controller.
Now from here I added an electric car relay so I could control the connection, and ran both positive and neg directly to my hot water heater.
Once my solar charged battery is full around 2 PM each day, I then trigger the relay set on a 2 hour timer to direct power from the panels to the hot water heater element, the 2 hour limit prevents a boil over of the tank, it is manually triggered, I test the temp of the water coming out of the tap before I trigger it so I know it will not over heat.
Heating element is rated at 3800 watts, so I am well within spec.
All this time I could of been using that extra power, I just got brave enough now to try it.
Congrats on the dump load. A few questions and some possible next steps. Any idea if the relay is rated for the string voltage? It would be a likely fail point. Does your charge controller have a dry relay for triggering a fan? Many of them do. Using that voltage trigger is a great way to automatically trigger the switchover. Finally if you do not have ac going to your water heater you can use it's thermostat to cut power to the trigger of the relay to avoid boil over..things to think about
Cheers and congrats!
David Baillie wrote:
Mart Hale wrote:
John F Dean wrote:Can you provide more detail?
I started experimenting with using solar direct to a hot water heater element Connection is simply solar panel then connect to heating element, with a 55 gal barrel of water.
I started with 2 panels then worked up to like 9 panels each 260 watts ratted but give me 220 watts in practice.
After I was comfortable with this, I then want to my present solar system which has over 2000 watts of solar going to an inverter to batteries.
To this system I added a Y connector to both Positive and Neg to the power coming in from my solar panels directly before the charge controller.
Now from here I added an electric car relay so I could control the connection, and ran both positive and neg directly to my hot water heater.
Once my solar charged battery is full around 2 PM each day, I then trigger the relay set on a 2 hour timer to direct power from the panels to the hot water heater element, the 2 hour limit prevents a boil over of the tank, it is manually triggered, I test the temp of the water coming out of the tap before I trigger it so I know it will not over heat.
Heating element is rated at 3800 watts, so I am well within spec.
All this time I could of been using that extra power, I just got brave enough now to try it.
Congrats on the dump load. A few questions and some possible next steps. Any idea if the relay is rated for the string voltage? It would be a likely fail point. Does your charge controller have a dry relay for triggering a fan? Many of them do. Using that voltage trigger is a great way to automatically trigger the switchover. Finally if you do not have ac going to your water heater you can use it's thermostat to cut power to the trigger of the relay to avoid boil over..things to think about
Cheers and congrats!
John F Dean wrote:Can you provide more detail?