Solar panel fitting and review

[scotia]

Hi divshwar, Nice! I know exactly what you mean with regards to the Switzerland plate..i saw the price of that and wondered what?! I live in switzerland too... What dimesnions did you use? it looks spot on?

 

[Ethel's dad]

Hi divshwar, Nice! I know exactly what you mean with regards to the Switzerland plate..i saw the price of that and wondered what?! I live in switzerland too... What dimesnions did you use? it looks spot on?

Hi Scotia, I'm sorry to say I handed the measurements over to the fabricator and can't remember what they are. However, the most important measurement is the vertical of the "z" profile at the edges which can be no more than 20mm to avoid contacting the roof. I will try and get the original paperwork from them but it is probably recycling material by now. Good luck.

 

[DrJuanKerr]

Hi - I've not got round to looking at the VIP area yet! Will take a look this weekend

If you want the kit fitted with the cable run through the grommet, and the charger installed, and the remote LCD fitted, I charge £80 and it takes around 1.5 - 2 hours.

Hi Roger, the price quoted above was April 2016. What is the latest price to install please?
Cheers

 

[Roger Donoghue]

Hi - no change - I'm inflation-proof. £80 (£100 if for the WRM dual battery charger)

 

[DrJuanKerr]

Awesome

 

[DrJuanKerr]

Hi Roger,
I'm going to want the 200W Dual Panel Kit and WRM15 kit as fitted by @Properjob in this post
https://vwcaliforniaclub.com/thread...i-and-t5-6-solar-panels-for-2017.16907/page-4

The cost is showing as £938 on your website but that doesn't take in to consideration any "VIP Discount"

Two questions if I may
1. Do you offer any VIP discount and if so what will the cost of the aforementioned kit be please
2. Is a weekend install a possibility and if so, do you have availability on Sat 12th Jan

Cheers

EDIT: I've just read from the VIP section
"VIP members a 5% discount on all solar kits, and we will also take £20 off any fitting charges over £60."

That's Q1 answered
How about Q2?
Thx

 

[Roger Donoghue]

Ji Juan, best to PM me or even better, email, as I don't always get notifications when posts are made on threads here, nor PMs. Its a little erratic. My website address is at the foot of my messages here.

When you are ready to make an order, email me and I'll issue you with a coupon to remove 5% from your cart., and yes, your fitting would come down to £80 for a VIP member with dual panels and the WRM15.

 

[Roger Donoghue]

p.s. I'd be grateful if any more questions are redirected to this thread:

https://vwcaliforniaclub.com/threads/new-solar-panels-in-all-of-our-kits-for-2019.28038/

As this one has partially turned into a "how to make your own kit", which is fine, but has wandered off topic somewhat.

 

[Bjohnson]

I ordered one of Rogers solar kits in early April' to fit ready for the main camping season. Kit arrived within a few days and was straightforward to fit with comprehensive instructions.

I opted for the 120W panel and the Western Co leisure charger. Has been working without any trouble and means our batteries are always topped up.

We don't use much power, fridge, lights, radio - usual Cali power demands, plus charging phones and powering a laptop when we watch movies some evenings. Our only big power demand is an electric fan heater on cold evenings (yes I know we have a heater inbuilt in the Cali!), but no amount of solar or batteries would make it viable to use that so I didn't see much point going for a larger solar array.

Fitting was straightforward, probably took me half a day, but I was doing plenty of faffing - perfect excuse to empty all the cupboards to run the wires, which then entailed some additional cleaning And my OCD meant I spent ages routing and securing wires! It was also a ball ache to get good acces under the passenger seat for the starter battery connection, so I removed the seat entirely which added time rather than trying to struggle with the connections.

i also ordered some additional adhesive plastic cable clips - eBay - for running the wiring in the cupboards at the back of the Cali.

When you run the single wire to the front passenger seat, the plastic trim strip on the floor - the trim running full width of the van behind the two front seats, that overlaps the plastic floor and the carpet between the seats - can be removed and this aids with running the wire where it exits under the cupboard/B pillar and enters
under the passenger seat, it also makes it easier to completely conceal the wire. The trim is removed by carefully prising up and pulling out of its retaining track. As long as you prise and lift carefully there are no clips to damage or break and refitting is a simple push fit back in place.

All in, a worthwhile investment for our Cali.





I

Bit tricky to see the wiring in the bottom pick, but all the wiring goes up from the charger/controller. There's a Bluetooth widget that I mounted in the top of the wardrobe, all the other wiring (3 wires) runs down the back corner and drops behind the plastic trim in the rear cupboard, once it's at low level inside the compartment for the water tank it's easy access to the first leisure battery and the single wire can then be routed behind the main cupboards to the front of the van. I tie wrapped the single cable along the length of the water pipe which is accessible at the back of the cupboards.

 

[altvic]

I have the same Western Co charger (but two x 120 w panels) for leisure and motor battery charge and all seems to be going well; I even get a charge in the rain. But I was wondering if you have a good understanding of the smiley faces on the app? There are different colours and different facial expressions from open mouth to grimace, which is not very intuitive to my mind.
Would appreciate your (or others') thoughts on this.
Cheers

 

[Bjohnson]

I have the same Western Co charger (but two x 120 w panels) for leisure and motor battery charge and all seems to be going well; I even get a charge in the rain. But I was wondering if you have a good understanding of the smiley faces on the app? There are different colours and different facial expressions from open mouth to grimace, which is not very intuitive to my mind.
Would appreciate your (or others') thoughts on this.
Cheers

I agree they dont seem to make much sense! I don't really look at them, I only really take note of the output and which batteries are being charged - leisure or engine

 

[Siren]

Fitted my panels from Roger this morning - T6 Ocean. I opted for two panels and the Western Co charger. I had previously checked out other members posts on fitting, but Rogers instructions are excellent - thank you Roger. Quality of the kit first class. Took me the morning working steadily and very carefully. I was slightly daunted by having to remove the front passenger seat and to connect a cable to the starter battery, so decided to disconnect the battery under the bonnet...just in case. Actually running and connecting this cable really not difficult, thanks to those instructions and the included photos and as far as I can tell all working fine. Just one point which might help others and that relates to disconnecting the starter battery. I noticed this afternoon that my wing mirrors no longer folded when locking from the remote. One touch windows didnt work either. Odd, but a quick search on the forum threw up the answer thanks to a post by Loz I think. Hope its OK to repost the solution here. It worked for me - thanks Loz.

Okay, door controllers often do this when they lose power or get reprogrammed.
Try and recalibrate both windows by doing this.
Press and hold the window button to drive the window down, when it stops let go and press it down again and hold it for 5 seconds.
Now pull it up (sometimes it jumps up and stops but just pull up again) when you get to the top let go and pull the button up again and hold for 5 seconds like you did on the way down.
Check the one-touch down and up works.
Repeat this on the other door.
Now the one-touch is recalibrated test the folding mirrors.

Looking forward to some wild camping... Cheers Roger.

Kevin M.

 

[coopersd]

Thanks, it's a DIY build using Bosch aluminium profile for the frame. Room for two panels up there if I need it.

View attachment 12845

Your Bosch framing is really neat, would you have a link for it - is it Rexroth?