Shiny new Soladin 600's

Exactly three weeks ago after I’d disconnected the inverters two new Soladin 600′s arrived today. I received two e-mails yesterday night that they were on their way back. Now, we both work during the day time so I could easily see a scenario where I could pick up the inverters on Monday, after the shipper had tried to deliver them in vain. Fortunately the delivery guy gave the parcels to our neighbours were I picked them up at the beginning of the evening.

After opening the boxes I found two what appear to be brand new Soladin 600′s, complete with user manual and mounting strip. I half expected to receive repaired or refurbished inverters, so receiving two new ones is nice. It’s quite a good deal for me: one of the two inverters was a refurbished model (it was exchanged directly after purchase because of a noisy fan) and now it seems I’ve got two brand new inverters. Because the inverter is the weakest link in a solar installation I’m happy with that.

It’s a good feeling to have the entire installation operational again. According to the weather forecast we’ve got a few sunny days coming up and it just feels bad when several solar panels are on the roof, in the sun, doing nothing. I estimate that the production loss during the three-week absence is about 12 kWh, which represents about 1% of the yearly production of our entire installation. It has a monetary value of about € 2,75.

Recall timeline (in Dutch, I'm afraid)

Although I’m really happy to have both inverters operational again I do have to say that that there are some aspects of the recall operation which could use some improvement. In my opinion the communication could have been better. I would like to know exactly what is wrong with the inverters, hoe big the risk of overheating/fire was and if there have been actual cases of fire. Mastervolt won’t say a thing about this.

The boxes that were sent to me were flimsy and the inverter barely fit. They were nearly unprotected from shocks and the vulnerable DC-connectors were squashed against a side of the box. It also was the first time I had to do with the Kiala shipping network and I was unimpressed. The parcels didn’t move for four days after I left them at the drop-off point.

Anyway, they’re back where they belong, sunny weather is expected for the coming few days, so the world is back in order again

De Plugwise Switch met één schakelaar

I ordered a Plugwise () Switch () yesterday. The image shows the version with one button but the device comes with both the large single button and two half buttons. The switch can be programmed to switch individual devices which are attached to a measuring plug on and off,  but also groups of plugs.

This makes it possible to have a ‘everything off’ switch next to the front door of the house. When leaving the house, pressing the off button can switch off all devices that are on standby, making it easy to save a lot of power which would otherwise be wasted.

I’m not exactly sure yet how we’ll use the Switch, but I think I’ll just place it on the table near our laptops. With the double buttons installed we can then easily switch both our laptops and the DSL-modem/NAS on and off. It might even turn out to be handy to take the switch with us to bed when we want to watch a movie which is stored on the NAS on a laptop, then we don’t have to go downstairs to switch it off. I think the real possibilities will only become clear when we start using the switch in practice. The programming options seem extensive and flexible to me. Of course I’ll publish a review after we’ve used the device for a while. One of the things I’m curious about is how long the two AA-batteries the device works on will last, because that has a sustainability aspect.

It’s not cheap (nearly € 50,-), so we’re certainly not going to save any money with it but it might just make our lives a little easier.

Solar Days 2011

Just like in 2009 () en 2010 () we’ll participate with the Solar Days. This is a PR-event to promote solar energy under the general public. One of the type of events is the open door days by people and companies to show interested people how solar energy works in practice.

The Dutch website () with information about the Solar Days has opened recently. People who are interested in solar energy can take a look at the map () if there’s an event near them (the map is still empty because the website just opened), and people who are interested in hosting their own open door day () can register on the site.

We will will open our doors for interested people, we’ll show our solar system and the live monitoring with Plugwise (). Of course I’ll publish our address in the week before the Solar Days. I hope to see you in May!

Packaged but very cramped

Last Thursday, exactly seven days after I’d registered both our Soladin 600′s at Mastervolts website for replacement, two large envelopes fell into the  mail slot, containing folded cardboard shipment boxes.

I have to say I’m not very impressed with the quality of the boxes. I ship stuff regularly and from experience I know the importance of good packaging, especially by making sure there is a layer of soft, shock-absorbing material around the item being shipped. Styrofoam, soft foam, bubble wrap, even crumpled newspapers work well. It’s a sad fact that couriers are not always very careful with the things we entrust to them. Mastervolt (or rather, the company () they’ve hired to handle the recall) has really cut costs here. The inverters barely fit in the box, and they’re in no way protected against shocks during transport. And if that’s not bad enough, both DC connectors rest directly against the side of the box, I can easily imaging those connectors being damaged if the box is handled roughly. I took several pictures of this situation before I closed the box, because I don’t want any trouble having to argue about broken connectors if the inverter is damaged upon arrival. Three flimsy and not very stickers were included to seal the box, but I had no confidence in their ability to do so. I sealed both boxes with proper packing tape.

Everything I saw from this recall thus far says ‘cheap’. That might be logical – this recall is something Mastervolt does because they have to, not because they want to – but I don’t think they should be surprised if a number of inverters show up damaged.

Tool to release the DC cables

When disconnecting the inverters one of them gave me quite some trouble when I tried to disconnect the DC cables. To prevent the cables from disconnecting accidentally, the plugs have some kind of ‘barbs’. An effective solution but in my case they weren’t easy to remove after nearly five years. Pliers came to the rescue but I couldn’t help leaving some marks on the plastic.

Apparently Mastervolt expects these troubles because they shipped me a small plastic tool which should make it easy (or at least easier) to release the plugs. As I had already disconnected my inverters (and I didn’t know this tool would be shipped to me) I didn’t use it. It’s odd that several other people who are having their inverter(s) replaced did not receive this tool, but it’s because I registered our inverters a few days later. I can image a situation where Mastervolt got many phone calls from people having trouble disconnecting their DC cables, and then decided to ship this tools with the boxen.

On Saturday, January 15th, 2011 I delivered both packages to a so-called ‘Kiala-punt‘ (), part of a system for picking up and shipping parcels. And now…. we wait, until the replacement inverters show up.

Our installations presented schematically

Just like many households with solar panels in the Netherlands we have the Mastervolt () Soladin 600 () grid tied solar inverter. In most respects a fine device, although with quite a low efficiency. The oldest of the pair we have has been doing its job without any problems for nearly five years now. The youngest of the two is nearly three years old and has likewise never given any problems.

Today I read that Mastervolt recalls a number of inverters of the types Soladin 600 and Windmaster 500/Soladin Wind 500, produced between May 2006 and September 2008. The web page (//) which Mastervolt has put online especially for this says “These inverters include a component that does not meet the applicable requirements. Under certain circumstances, this component can fail and its temperature may rise to an unacceptable level. It can not be excluded that this ultimately leads to a safety issue (risk of fire). Mastervolt considers the safety of its customers as top priority. Therefore Mastervolt decided to replace the inverters with this malfunction as soon as possible, free of charge.”

That sounds quite serious, to be hounest. I’m going to check the serial numbers of our two inverters tonight. Unfortunately the website seems to have technical problems, many people indicate they can’t visit the site. Here is a screenshot (in Dutch, but the site seems solid now, so that’s not important anymore) of the with the serial numbers of the affected inverters:

Mastervolt Soladin 600 recall action

I’m very curious to see how Mastervolt will tackle the recall. The oldest Soladin 600 was replaced directly after I bought it because it had a very noisy cooling fan. Mastervolt did that extremely customer-friendly; I only had to send back the bad one after I received the new one. I secretly hoped they would do it the same way because despite is being the middle of the winter, with low production, each missed kWh because the inverteres are switched off feels bad.

I’ll update this article as soon as I’ve checked the serial numbers of our inverters.

-update-

We’re lucky: both our Soladin 600 inverters do not have to be replaced. I heard from other people whose inverter has to be replaced that Mastervolt has set as condition for a free replacement that the inverter is switched off immediately. I have no idea how long it will take before a replacement inverter arrives, but I expect it to take a week or two. I did hear from other people whose inverter has to be replaced that Mastervolt stipulated that the inverter has to be disconnected immediately in order to get a free replacement. Even in a winter month like January it’s a shame that there’ll be some loss of production – and I don’t expect Mastervolt to reimburse me for that loss.

-update 2-

Everyone makes mistakes and I’m no exception. I made the mistake of comparing the serial numbers of our inverters with a non-original table which some one had copied to his website from the Mastervolt website. Unfortunately, this table proved to be incorrect. Both our inverters’ serial numbers start with U6 and that means that they do have to be replaced. I’ll phone Mastervolt tomorrow to ask how long they expect the replacement to take because when I disconnect our two Soladins it means that 50% of our solar installation is out of commission. With regard to production it’s even worse: the solar panels that are attached to the Soladins are the batter placed ones, so the production loss will be much more than 50%.

I do feel quite bad about this. Not only because of the loss of production, because that won’t be too bad at this time of the year. But all this does mean that there have been two devices in our attic which were at risk of burning the house down. It’s very good that Mastervolt takes decisive action, but I don’t want to contemplate what would have happened of one or both of the inverters would have caught fire.

-update 3- (January 10th, 2011)

Two empty spots on our inverter board

I took down both inverters while waiting for the replacement. Unfortunately yesterday was a crisp day with lots of sun. I estimate that the missing Soladins would have produced more than a kWh, more than half the day production. If January gets more sunny days the loss in production might become substantial. I’m keeping records and I might give Mastervolt a call about compensation.

I’ve been told that Philips had to recall a certain type of inverter some time ago, and they compensated the owners for the loss in production. Mastervolt has said nothing about it, so I don’t think they will, but who knows?