Vacation: What do you do?

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stmar
stmar Solar Expert Posts: 370 ✭✭✭
in Grid Tie and Grid Interactive Systems #1
When you are going to be gone for a period of time, say a week or more, what do you do to your system? If you have the ability would it be advisable to shut down the inverter and let it rest while you are away? I can put my house on the grid directly and only have my frig, 24 vdc Sunfrost, on the battery bank and the solar will keep that running with no problem. Our grid is fairly reliable so that is not a problem, just wondering what others do. I am a bit paranoid leaving it running because my Trace caught fire a few years ago, ac transformer fried, but I have had no issues since getting it rebuilt.
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  • stmar
    stmar Solar Expert Posts: 370 ✭✭✭
    #2
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    Does anybody do anything different when they are not going to be around?
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  • Mountain Don
    Mountain Don Solar Expert Posts: 494 ✭✭✭
    #3
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    We have 2 installations.

    One is 100% off grid; we disconnect that one's inverter from the batteries and leave the CC on and working.

    The second is a grid tie system with a battery backup that only supplies the 120 VAC refrigerator and the gas furnace. We leave that system alone, don't change a thing when leaving for any period of time. The only things we do adjust is to turn the A/C completely off or set the furnace to only come on at 55 F. As well we turn off the fresh water supply just in case something springs a leak.
    Northern NM, 624 watts PV, The Kid CC, GC-2 batteries @ 24 VDC, Outback VFX3524M
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  • stmar
    stmar Solar Expert Posts: 370 ✭✭✭
    #4
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    I am leaning toward taking the inverter off line since we are not in a hard freeze probability and the grid is reliable. I usually turn off the water if there are no animals to care for and even then I turn off the valve to the house. That is good advice about the water.
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  • Photowhit
    Photowhit Solar Expert Posts: 6,003 ✭✭✭✭✭
    #5
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    In the 30 or so week to month long trips I've taken, I leave everything up and running and haven't had a problem yet. The one time I was going for an extended trip, I had a temp system setup and I moved every thing up by the cabin to prevent theft, left the charge controller on and a single panel (this was a tiny system 4-50 watt panels) I accidentally left the inverter on and being left in the shade and collecting leaves I returned to dead batteries 3-4 months later...

    I was gone for 3 weeks over Christmas and all was well when I returned home. Fridge still working, broke out a frozen pizza and had dinner!
    Home system 4000 watt (Evergreen) array standing, with 2 Midnite Classic Lites,  Midnite E-panel, Magnum MS4024, Prosine 1800(now backup) and Exeltech 1100(former backup...lol), 660 ah 24v Forklift battery(now 10 years old). Off grid for 20 years (if I include 8 months on a bicycle).
    - Assorted other systems, pieces and to many panels in the closet to not do more projects.
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  • gbaig
    gbaig Registered Users Posts: 32 ✭✭
    #6
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    I live outside my home country and come back every two months. I leave system running, no issues. All goes well. Home Internet Routers, Security System and two main Gate lights are running on the solar system.

    6KV system
    Schneider XW6048, 2 charge controller
    24 Sharp Panels, 12 Batteries
    ComBox for remote monitoring, system control panel
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  • stmar
    stmar Solar Expert Posts: 370 ✭✭✭
    #7
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    I let the inverter rest for a week, battery bank stayed in the 28 volt range during the day and 26 to 25.6 at night. Restarted the inverter and now it is bulk charging but only a few amps, I have it set for a max of 12 amps charge because my bank is only 400ah. I guess that means the battery bank is in good shape since it is fairly quickly decreasing the charge amps as it bulk charges.
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