Fronius, Sungrow and SolarEdge Failure Rates
Вставка
- Опубліковано 6 вер 2024
- 10 years later, how are our Fronius, Sungrow and SolarEdge fauilure rates? The figures blew my mind 🤯
☀️ Looking to go solar in South-East Queensland? We're happy to help! Contact us today.
🌏 It's great for the planet, and even better for your wallet.
🌐 www.mcelectrical.com.au
📱 07 3268 3836
🇦🇺 Brisbane, Australia
Please LIKE and SUBSCRIBE to our channel to stay updated with the latest news and helpful tips to get the most out of YOUR solar system.
My Solarsystem was installed in Germany back in 2005 using two Fronius inverters (IG30 and IG40). My IG40 ran for 16years straight without any repair or even maintainance. Only then I had to have it repaired which cost me approximately 400 EUR at the time. My IG30 survived until just after its 18th birthday. Rather than repairing it, I have replaced both inverters by one new Fronius Symo Gen24. Lets hope this one is just as durable, but looking at the massive heatsink of the Gen24, I dont have the slightest doubt!
It would be more informative if the Stats were Given Seperately for Sungrow and SolarEdge...Also Mentioning the Numbers of Each issues Categorised like 1-Replacement....2-Software Glitch...3-Low Performance Due to MMPT Algorithm Etc....Would Give an Overall Clearer Picture....As an Installer ofcourse it makes more Sense for you to Go the Fronius Way but some customers might find More Value for money in others....Thanks for the Content.
Yeh, I was going to do that, but it gets down into the weeds with a lot of explanation of optimiser failures etc. SolarEdge definitely fails more than Sungrow. But we had a pretty bad run with Sungrow also.
Sigenergy is making noise lately. It will be great to hear your thoughts on Sigenergy...
I appreciate your enthusiasm but this vid tends to be more infomercial than a practical industry comparison.
Ha, maybe. I just thought the comparison of failures told an interesting story.
@@mcelectrical No you are simply biased towards the product that gives you the highest margins.
Had our Solaredge system since Sep 2017 and its been issue free post install. Also wouldn't Enphase or Solaredge still be better for Shaded conditions? Also doesn't Enphase also allowing multiple locations instead of a single string inverter? Lastly yes Fronius is a fantastic brand. But I thought you had stopped selling SolarEdge after your issues with them at the end of 2018? So they may have improved in reliability from a seller point of view over the past 6 years and your opinion on them may not be current?
You'd think so, but other installers who were opposed to our findings have since come to experience the same issues we had with SolarEdge. Microinverters are touted to outperform string inverters in shade, but Fronius actually handles shade better. Mark mentions his findings in this video: ua-cam.com/video/EtJMErVw7Kk/v-deo.html
Yes, simple string inverters are the go, the slight reduction in output isn't worth all the extra electronics up on the roof, my SMA equipment has been flawless (am totally off grid) for the last 6 years. 🤠😎
Took me many years of trying SolarEdge, Tigo and Enphase to work out that putting power electronics on the roof is a dumb idea
@@mcelectricalwow, even Enphase you no longer like?
What are the issues you’ve had with Solaredge ? I appreciate it may mean a video is longer than you wished, however as a customer how can I make a decision that’s best for me.
Best advice is just to avoid. Or read this. mcelectrical.com.au/blog/solaredge-inverter-optimiser-review/
Enphase won’t work if the shading is higher as it doesn’t get enough voltage so Fronius with string will work better
Agreed. It really depends on the shade and really impossible to tell which would work better. My tests say they work on average about the same in shade. ua-cam.com/video/TqOw43-hbjc/v-deo.htmlsi=1HkQoH2bO4e9nhic
GMPPT rescanning is important when you have shade, by default Sungrow inverters have this disabled...
Great information Mark, I have seriously been considering a Fronius system to upgrade the current system on my house. From these anecdotal figures and the 15 times more reliability of the Fronius system, do you have a hard percentage of failure rates of the solar edge / Sungrow VS the Fronius?
Mark boys installed a Fronius system to my place 6 yrs ago and have never had one issue with it, and was emailed straight away asking why my system was down. Great inverter and great service.
Yeh we did the figure and decided not to share them because it takes a lot of context to understand. But from memory it was around 200 “truck rolls” for a fronius failure where there was “down time” over 9!years. SolarEdge failures were much worse than Sungrow, but Sungrow certainly has issues too. In total about 200 failures between the both of them. The time period for both Sungrow and SolarEdge since first install was also less, so that makes it worse.
@@mcelectrical Sorry to ask , but you wrote 200 failues for both which does mean 200 failures from 300 + 300 inverters which would mean every 33% or 200 from 300 in total which would mean 66%
Fronius figures are quite astonishing but wasn't solaredge a system with individual mppt and monitoring of each panel too like the enphase does ?
I had seen their panel tracking of I know a guy who has a solaredge system with single panel monitoring and those solar edge guys are like Tesla boys in love with their products over the moon.
We have simply 10 growatt inverts, 2 hybrids and the usual stuff, but we use DC optimizers from BRS Solar germany for only those panels next to chimnes and dormers which work really well and trade voltage in for current to keep the string at the currentlevel it has without the panel. We had to get just 5 of these and it works if you look at the other comparabel strings of the same length and pitch. It delay the shadow impact of about 1,5 hours this way in the noon.
Could you make a video about these unique performance based on your experience of the fronius inverters cause it is hard to understand how that can work. The optimizer are here 45€ or 73 $ Aus, easy to install and understand how they work, but this string inverter mppt gppt thing is hard to understand without a deep explanation.
We have no issues with those 10 growatt inverters (about 5 years old and with a 10 year warranty with a quite good price back then) but I am always keen to learn about such significant difference as you had pointed out quite impressively.
thanks for sharing this indeep reliability figures cause as you do not like to repair installed systems so do we not like to have issues.
@@mcelectrical I'm in the process of applying for an approval to install a Sungrow SH25T hybrid. This is a 25kw 3-phase pv and battery inverter in a single unit. It is very new on the market and is unique in its rating and feature set. It looks like Sungrow have put a lot of R&D into this series which also includes a 15kw and 20kw model.
It would be interesting to understand the models, their generation and types of failure of the Sungrow units. It is quite likely that the new generation which is what I am looking at are the best residential units designed and made by Sungrow.
The SH25T has a
@gxtoast2221 in looking at getting the 15kw version of that for the reasons you listed but have you found anywhere selling the sbh battery yet? Seems like the perfect solution for whole home backup on 3 phase
Can you install a few enphase microinverter panels to boost your home generation ?????
Say a Fronius string system plus the Enphase panels.
Sure. But depending on where you live, you technically can’t just buy a micro and a panel. You need the “envoy” or the brains of the system which costs about the price of a cheap inverter. Approx $700 or so.
@markcavanagh thanks Mark.
Do you have experience with enphase systems.?
Out of curiosity, would you ever do an install for a customer wanting Enphase over Fronius? Not sure if you have an exclusivity contract with Fronius?
@markandrews1219 I do not have any panels on my roof.
It seems that one brand is the right way to go.
We have neighbours with many different size systems, and so it seemed that a smaller system you could add to if you needed more over time.
@Stephen the idea adding a few more panels over time is a bit like impractical. Economies of scale and the cost of labour make it much more cost effective to do it right the first time. But, even if you don’t, you can design a string system to add panels later also. We recently were asked to quote on adding to a 10 year old Enphase system we installed. It involved installing a new envoy and running new cables to be compliant. It was more feasible just to install a new string system.
Fronius symo (3 phased) does not have dynamic feed in for phases. It sends energy divided equally to all 3 phases. And there is nothing you cand do. Fronius has not even established a date for when thisbwill be solved, nor does fronius have an answer of how it will be implemented.
Interesting comment. Which inverter does have the ability out of balance production? Are you talking about running on or off grid?
@mcelectrical
On grid. I dont understand exactly what you are asking. Are you asking which inverter is able to send energy different on all phases, in dependence with consumption per phase?
So how does your experience compare to a much bigger dataset from SolarQuotes ?
Are you talking about customer reviews? Or do they have some type of review after 5 or 10 years reliability data of these inverters?
@@mcelectrical No other installer reviews you clown.
What is difference ? Fronius versus SunGrow hybrid? : transfer switch- 30sec versus 10ms ; only Hybrid 2000h versus hybrid & off-grid running ; no frequency sifting versus has frequency sifting in backup mode & off-grid ; no generator sported versus generator sported; only BYD and LG versus BYD ;LG; Pylontech ..etc..as to be clear understood, I want to be honesty only .I like fronius but I want to be realistic.
Agree Sungrow hybrid has some cool features, but it’s the reliability that concerns me more. Especially when talking about a hybrid inverter.
How were the tests done?
It’s real word. Just the number of failures we have had since about 2015. (Btw count failures as loss of production, not a wifi issue or similar.)
Hope to crack the 10k subs soon !
Getting close 🙏
Seriously, give it a rest on your sales pitch for Fronius.
To be honest, I get sick of listening to myself bang on about Fronius. I wish SMA or someone else would hurry up and bring out a better inverter.
The Gen24 power point during a blackout is ridiculous...it only works if the sun's out and if clouds come over when your sandwich maker is running then ohh well.
It’s better than having a stale untoasted ham and cheese sandwich with a flat phone.
Not by much, it's a lame option on a great inverter.
Thanks for your review.
no, it comes with it and if you buy a fronius compliant battery it should work instantly once configured properly.
Fronius is an austrian brand also established in germany quite well with production and developement site here like SMA the big player here.
We do not use black out what so ever even though I had gotten it too with the Growatt systems and all had made a huge hype around this feature but we have in germany here a 99,97% grid availability and 0,02% of the 0,03% are announced shutdown for 2 hours which mostly take about 10 or 15 minutes to expand the grid. Every 7th year we have a power outage caused by thunderstrike but that is a minute long break or so , no longer than 3 or 5 minutes. And I can live without power for these minutes.
We had only one big outage when we had a very long very cold period in winter with wind from the east and a huge amount on the cross country lines which then started freezing instantly. Not a big issue but history repeats itself from time to time and as most people know the Titanic was made out of very rigid or brittle steel when it becomes cold.
And the cross country steel mast burst under the heavy load of ice and snow while facing strong winds too one by another like in an avalanche. Those steel masts were simply made out of an brittle steel no one had been aware of it. Luckily that had happened a bit south and only in 1 county those masts were still in place and faced a longer off grid period back then 3 decades ago.
We have an emergency or utility generator for such cases to charge the EV with 3 kW in case and a usual 2,5 kW black out power but no automatic switch or so which makes no sense and is not allowed. You have to use a switch which goes from grid over off to blackout and vice versa manually.
Mate, that is spin … are you getting paid for this? Show us some real numbers of how many breakdowns …numbers…because a quarter of the Fronius I installed…. Have had to be sent back and as they don’t do a direct swap with a China inverter
it’s a pain in arse so that’s three callouts. One to deal with the customer and check the inverter. and then deal with them on the phone. Then to deliver the inverter to be posted off… then to pick up the inverter to replace it and install it… for a bullshit fee. I’ve moved to SMA. They treat their installers better.
Yeh I was going to give numbers but it makes the video more complex than necessary. It includes optimiser failures (because truck rolls are my concern) and any downtime that we invoiced the manufacturer. The biggest failure rate was SolarEdge by far, but Sungrow wasn’t great either. A few people have asked for the numbers so I might do a follow up video.
Interesting you say that about fronius. As Fronius solution partners, we can repair inverters on site. This speeds up the process and they pay us more to repair, so it’s a pretty decent deal.
This bloke is a walking talking fronius infomercial.
Why, thank you!
@@mcelectrical I actually want objective data and not smartarse responses you clowns. Your true colors are certainly coming out now.
Nice insight (: Vitrual Power Plant like Tesla is coming to Australia with Fronius soon (:
I already have VPP on my tesla pw2 paired with gen24
@@frankzhenyuanliu8614 would be nice to make a video about that (: but the VPP service is accounted with Tesla you get the money with Tesla, or energy contract?
I mean a stand alone Fronius solution
genuine question what are you referring to?
@mirsphoto www.solarquotes.com.au/battery-storage/virtual-power-plants/
@@mcelectricalthank you
you lost me at 'chinese junk'. like the byd batteries and canadian solar panels you sell. come on mate, that's a ridiculous statement in 2024.
I see how that comes across. But I wasn’t calling all Chinese junk. I was referring to SolarEdge specifically, and to a lesser degree Sungrow. Based on the failure rates we’ve seen and compared to Fronius.