Dillsue

I think theres a national concession to allow export up to 16amps, but part of that concession is to let your DNO know that you are able to export, via a G98 notification.......quite a reasonable arrangement and its beyond me why some people seem so averse to doing so

Thats not a correct comparison . We all cook at different times and individual cooker rings in all households will fire at differeing times giving a low diversified import load. If all households on a section of grid installed 16amp of PV export then first sunny day they will all export at exactly the same time and the local voltage could rocket. If the DNOs know in advance that those households have PV they can manage the grid in a timely way. I dont know if current PV install levels are unprecedented but they are certainly high and keeping your DNO informed about what youre doing can only help them keep abreast of things

Yes. For all the reasons others have stated and so the DNO can keep tabs on how much generation is connected to each section of the grid. If everyone connects 16amp of PV generation, its gonna get interesting on a sunny summers day. By everyone telling the DNO what theyve installed to DNO can manage the potential summer peak of generation.

Dont forget to notify your DNO with a G98 notification form

PVGIS

But youll import from the grid if theres demand from the house whilst ALL output is going to the immersion??

Isnt that what your diverter does now? Diverts excess PV to the immersion and when the stat cuts out all PV goes to the house and then to the grid if the house doesnt use it??

Ours was at SP Manweb. I emailed their contact for our area and they phoned back the next day having already looked at our property. We had informal agreement a day or two later so I could plan things from that point. I cant speak highly enough of the service so far. The one fly in the ointment is that all this was way back Feb/March time and they were busy then. I spoke to their engineer last week and he said for every application they send out they get 4 new enquiries come in. Service may have changed now.

If youve gone off grid to avoid DNO approval then you may still need DNO approval for the changeover mechanism to ensure that the off grid PV and batteries dont become on grid when you reconnect to the grid that you dont want to connect to🤔

Same boat as us but you have a more lucrative FIT deal with another 14 years to run so not worth loosing . First off speak to your DNO to see what the chance of upping export is. We had an in principle agreement to double export in a couple of days with formal approval being processed now. Once you know if you can increase export you can plan your next move.

Anyone habitually starting and binning companies every so often is dodging/hiding something whether its paying tax, avoiding warranty calls, inability to run a business, scamming suppliers or customers etc etc. No matter how knowledgeable they are, would you want them doing that to you or part way through your job?? If they take credit cards, pay the deposit on a card so at least youve got section 75 cover

In the sketch you show the vertical adjustment slot for the rail being cut off. If you loose that adjustment your rail has to follow the contour of the roof which could be all over the place. Might be worth running a string line across the roof in a few places to check its flat otherwise you might want to keep the adjustment?? Recently fitted an array to my daughters house and with the outer hooks set lowest and those on the middle of the roof set highest, there was still a sag in the rail. Fortunately it wasnt obvious from the ground but you could still see the sag. Not sure who built the roof but they should have gone to Specsavers!

When you chop the roof hook dont have it resting on the tile but a few mm clear of the tile. The hook transfers the weight of the array plus wind/snow load through to the rafters. If the hook rests on the tile or can flex onto it, all the load goes through the tile with a fair chance the tile will break.

What I call our DHW tank is open vented with 3 separate coils. I suppose thats storing heat so could be called a thermal store but I guess youre talking about a space heating TS??

Even if its a pressuried coil in an open vented cylinder??

And a thin diamond disc. Renusol do a good installation video on utube for PV mounts but the roof hook detail is the same

Without checking just now, I understood that the EU only amounts to circa 40% of our trade, so non EU trade is a bigger market. There was a load of hot air over additional paperwork which caused delays a while back but Im not sure theres still significant problems, attributable to Brexit.

Are all the shortages due to collapse of supply chains, or just unprecedented increase in demand? AFAIK there was no issue last year with getting hold of solar kit and I had no problem getting kit earler this year. In terms of PV, seems to me that when people got their 30 day notice of eleccy price hikes and the sun came out, both at the beginning of March, the penny dropped that PV would be a good thing and lots jumped on the PV bandwagon. Likely all settle down in the autumn but not really a Brexit/covid/supply chain issue as it all seemed to be working last year??

I thought you were using a builder and buying a kit? I wouldnt use anyone to do anything if they werent interested in work I was offering- whats the aftersales and warranty going to be like if something goes wrong after youve paid??

Theres trade advertisers on ebay still advertising kits at the same price as they were at the beginning of the year. Theres a number of sellers advertising various Renusol mounting parts. Midsummer have restrictions on Renusol parts but no restrictions on Fastensol mounting, if youre happy buying chinese. Clearly things are busy but I dont think its non functioning. Based on the fact that people didnt start buying PV until the sun came out, probably best to forget your PV for now and buy insulation. Once everyone starts buying insulation in the autumn, buy your PV

Theres lots of ways of limiting export but if you want to do it in a clever way, youll probably need to get G100 compliant inverters

G98 is a notification so they cant reject your <16 amp installation. They may query paperwork but thats all they can do. I would put your G99 in straight away as certainly in our area things are getting processed very slowly. Put ours in months ago and other than a confirmation of receipt, not heard a peep

I think the form in previous posts may be the wrong one?? For <50kw generators its form A1.1 which is pretty straight forward but ask if your stuck

SA web site says their units are compatible with solar PV so should be doable as Nick says.

You can buy 4kw kits for around £2k so your aquaintance chose to spend £8k on install costs. I dont think thats something you can blame on installers as he could have just said no and waited til the industry calmed down.