Solar iBoost+ Diverter Review Installation - Is it worth it
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- Опубліковано 22 лип 2024
- It finaly made sense for me to buy a Solar IBoost+ due to increasing Gas and Electricity costs. I was annoyed by the exagerated and misleading claims in many adverts and so-called independent reviews; the truth is the iBoost diverter (or similar) is simply not right for everyone! In this video I look at the device and share how I thought about the cost and benefits. I hope it helps others make a sensible objective choice about how to reduce their bills.
22nd Aug 2022 I have updated spreadsheet on github to correct the conversion factor for m3 gas to kWh.
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🔸Github spreadsheet github.com/pshersby/Diverter
00:00 - Intro and discussion
02:12 - Objectives
03:12 - Unboxing
08:14 - A quick look inside
12:30 - how it works in the system and concerns
19:19 - Installed
20:41 - Various tests
30:00 - Is it worth it
34:12 - Easy rugh and ready cost benefits calculation
38:26 - Cost benefits spreadsheets and my figures
50:34 - The final Conclusion
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Quite a bit to cover here, so please use content list if you want to look at specific aspects
I have owned a Solar iboost for years and from day one my investment of £90 at the time saved me money. From the outset of your video, there is a tone of Negative thinking toward this product,The one I own has paid itself many times over and if it failed,I would not hesitate to buy another at today's price.( I am not a company that sells these products,Just a personal opinion).
I don't think negatively about the product, it does what it claims, just the miss-selling to people for whom it is not appropriate and exaggerated advertising. The video is all about helping people weigh the pros and cons.
Totally agree I've had mine eight years absolutely brilliant.
Great video. I've had an iBoost since 2014 works well. Decided to buy the iBoost+ mainly because of the Buddy and the 2 outputs but realised the output is chopped DC and doesn't zero volt switch. ( I have a upper and lower Immersion in the tank.) This has caused an issue with sticking contacts on the Immersion thermostats which never happened with the iBoost (AC out). I now use a temperature control unit which zero switches relays, problem solved. I have tied into the Temp con unit a sensor which inhibits heating if the Solar batteries are charging and prioritises the batteries because I too did not believe the "Solar" control by the iBoost + was genuine. Asked Marlec about these issues and was told the iBoost must be connected diectly to the heater or the warranty was void, no help with zero switching or Solar issue in fact te young lady dodged answering. Ade
Thanks, lots of interesting detail in that, and interesting point re the contacts. It seems to be a rare thing to find a company where the people have a clue what they are talking about. And of course in respect of the statutory rights she was talking rubbish.
Hi. I just wanted to say “thank you” for posting this review. It has made me stop and think whether it is worth putting an iboost in. I was just planning on doing it , having recently had PV panels and batteries installed. Your excellent video has made me stop and do some calculations . Much appreciate, thanks again.
Thanks for letting me know
Thank you for the detailed video, I'm sure that was a lot of work! I'm self installing a small 2400W solar in the next two weeks and given the current 28p unit cost of electricity and likely increase in the coming months, I presume these devices now have a much quicker RoI.
With price increases the time for roi drops a lot assuming you have sufficient export available. Are you also looking at batteries though because if you are there might not be much export left over. Fir me I git the basics working, then looked at the data to see what adding batteries might give me then looked at the diverter.
@@MakeOrRepair i would love to add a battery, my self install total cost for a ground based 2400W array is around £1700 inc, or approx £2000 with diverter.
A battery seems to add an additional 5-10k from what I've read so far. Its hard to justify those upfront costs right now.
The metric im most interested in is how much energy we generate and use in the winter months. I'm in Colchester so im getting max daily sunshine, and my wife and work from home all day so i think we can maximise the power generated.
I can easily add a second 2400W string of solar for approx £800 which might make sense.
Sorry for the long post 😀
@@substandard649 I started at 2.8kwh and that met a good part of my daytime usage in spring to autumn and a bit to bexport, but still ended up buying a fair amount to cover peak usage over, washing machine etc. It is fairly easy to adapt to use appliances when sunny.
You raise a good point about the battery considerations. I just wished there were standardised house systems which were intelligent enough to route the electricity where it need to go.
From personal experience, where this unit comes into its own and offers a MASSIVE benefit is when the house runs an air source heat pump. During the summer, 100% of our hot water has been produced through this iBoost and the air source heat pump has not kicked in AT ALL. Our air source heat pump runs at around 7-9kw for water heating so this introduces a massive saving. Not only is the hot water much hotter than what the air source heat pump can produce but it also means we can completely avoid the legionella cycle.
We don't have batteries yet but they are on their way. I'll have to look at things closely.
I'm sure things will be very different in winter. This is only our first year with solar.
I know what you mean about lack of standadised systems, the systems available are just not smart enough, you really need a central system that reads all the sensors, looks at cloud cover for the day ahead and optimises everything. Smart things are available but the don't integrate. You can use rule-based systems, but not all the controllers and data sources are available for example I boost my batteries overnight at low cost, but i should vary the amount based in next day weather, despite the inverter having rs484 control intrrface, to do that i would have to make my own controller.
The heat pump is interesting, I didn't feel able to comment on diverter with heat pump and hadn't given much thought about how you would achieve hot water with one.
Batteries made a massive difference to how effectively we use solar, also with cheaper overnight electricity we can store enough to reduce our bill by 70% in December when we generate virtually nothing. Hope they work well for you
Good, comprehensive video.
Regarding it "stealing" from the in-house battery, you can change a setting in the iBoost to raise the threshold where the iBoost switches on the immersion. I have set mine at 200W, which means that there has to be 200W of export before it kicks in. This has stopped virtually all parasitic battery usage.
Yes, I think I showed this in the video, I was relieved it performed adequately with batteries. I think some competitors with more sensors and wired sensors are more responsive but it is fine. It of course works fine in the morning when the batteries are low and need charging because the inverter simply charges them and there is no export to trigger the diverter (I have to go a bit higher with the threshold because my inverter won't commence charging at 200W excess, it needs about 230W). When the batteries are full however and it is making use of the excess that would be exported, and the sun reduces or appliance is turned on (that the bateries or solar could power) It does respond better with the higher threshold but the response is still a little slow because of the rate the remote sensor sends updates and the algorithm it uses to detect that although there is no export it can't keep taking the amount it is using. I was only losing less than 1% of battery to it. (Actually I'm not using it at the moment because my gas price is currently less than my electricity export price so I would make a loss! but that is going to change next year)
@@Dr4co2023 I have 2 X 8.2 batteries on a Gen 1 5 Hybrid inverter. I've set my iBoost at 250 Watts and it seems fine. Where is your CT Clamp positioned?
@@Dr4co2023 Pylontech US2000B, US2000C and US3000C. I think it might be more about when the inverter decides it is going to start charging the batteries. My inverter won't start charging the batteries in the morning until it is exporting over 190W, after which it allows upto 60W to be exported later in the day if the batteries reach 100% it will not charge them again until they fall below 95% and the top-end charging is at a lower rate. So I think I got mine to work at about 250W threshold if I recall correctly but set it higher to be certain.
@@Dr4co2023 They should both be on a bit of cable that will measure inport or export from the house as a whole, but space them as far as possible. Both mine are on the cable between the big fuses where the cables some into the house and the meter and I have kept them as far apart as possible using a cable tie. I suppose you could also put them on the output cable fron the meter if there is space, but before any junctions divide them. As long as they are on those cables the order does not matter.
This is what I was thinking ;)
Superb video. Just fitted one of these booster+ units after our ImmerSUN unit went bang, apparently a ( Common issue) and even after repairing it 3 weeks later it failed again. I situed the Iboost where the ImmerSUN was place in the garage some 10 meters away from the immersion, but realised the manufacturer of the Iboost required it to be fitted near the immersion, ie in the airing cupboard even though the Iboost seemed to be working perfectly okay within the garage. My only concern was the heat within the cupboard for placing it where I did, but reading the unit would require double shielded cable if the cable was over 3 meters ...So after a some thought I reconfigured the wiring in the garage so I could move the iboost where recommended.
At this time we don't have storage batteries, as this is something we may look into in the near future.
Once again great video !
Thanks, I suppose the shielded cable is to reduce switching noise from causing interference - that would have got costly - I think I would have done as you did and reconfigure to get the device closer to immersion.
Power diverters use DC to heat the elements, rather than AC. it’s the best way to do it using mosfets. DC doesn’t like going long distances as you can rapidly get voltage drop. My Solar iBoost+ lasted 18 months before it went bang. I’m now using a MyEnergi Eddi, which works well and has a lot my features and works perfectly with the Hub and Harvi.
@@sandyfordd1843 I should probably have connected up my scope (with a differential high voltage probe of course). I suspected a mosfet because I saw the big rectifier on the heatsink and those big inductors. The voltage loss in cable really depends how they manage the balance of voltage vs. current, there will always be some, I used 2.5mm heat resistant cables to keep losses small. The fact that they specifiy screened cable for >3m seems to indicate that there is some high frequency switching noise present.
@@sandyfordd1843 Hope mine lasts a lot longer. At that age I would contact trading standards and the company - that service life is not fit for purpose! Anyway perhaps I'll be doing a repair video on it in a couple of years!!!
@@MakeOrRepair , it was replaced under warranty, no issues there at all, they were great, but it took a few months for my replacement unit as the UK is no longer in the EU which caused delays with customs coming in and out of the UK. I bought the MyEddi instead.
Brilliant forensic analysis most of which I understood! Already got one installed but probably would not have bothered if I had watched this first. Installation costs could take another tenner a year off any possible gains over a 10 year product life.
Yes, I wanted to encourage people to look at all sides of the subject, not just the savings in the adverts. Since i made the video, it has only been worth me using it for a few months while my export tariff was pathetic and gas trebled in price. I'm a little out of touch with the cost of installation but it could easily negate any savings.
Ten years? we've had two in less than 5 years I'm not buying another there now £300 each
@@250190baileyI find it disturbing how many reports of them failing I've received. I would choode a different product if I bought again. Then again for me it has never been cost effective.
Great video! I have a question though, what happens when you produce, let's say 3kw, and use nothing in your house and have a 2kw immersion heater does iboost "force" 3kw through the 2kw immersion heater or only 2kw as it is rated for? And then allow to export 1kw
Each device including the immersion heater "draws" the amount of power. The diverter either limits the amount it can have or lets it take the amount it normally uses. So if you generate 3kw, you house uses 0.3kw, there is 2.7kw for export, if you immersion is 2kw, then the diverter may switch it on full, so the immersion gets 2kw, house 0.3 and 0.7 is still exported.
Thanks for the information provided. I have just bought one of these units and thought it was quite good as my water heating was with gas which I am no longer buying and using the excess solar electric which I was just exporting for next to nothing. I don't have battery storage as yet to worry about but when I do I think I will have to switch the immersion off at night to stop the battery discharging. My gas water heating used about 1m3 per day (1 burn in the morning and 1 burn in the evening) about 35 pence per day. The diverter says between 3.5 and 4.5 kwh of solar diverted into the immersion per day so I feel that it will take about 3 years to pay for it's self at my tariff prices but they will go up dramatically shortly when my fixed price deal ends.
Yes I'm only getting 4 or 5 kWh diverted each day too, but that is about 7kWh of gas saved, but the savings get better as the gas prices rise. I have not changed the gas program, but since the gas has cylinder thermostat the gas tops up the heat each day, just using less gas (my imported gas still costs less than buying full price electricity) I don't seem to have any problem with it taking too much from batteries, it might take a bit during the day as clouds go over but then the batteries win when the sun comes back. It does not use the batteries at night unless you program a on period.
@@MakeOrRepair Thanks for the reply. Glad to know that it does not use the batteries at night to heat the water unless you program an on period. Have you adjusted the storage offset again or are you set at 500w?
@@5kram set at about 300W just so I get a nice clear window for may batteries to start charging in the morning and this also makes sure that any little leakage to the grid overnight does not trigger the diverter. I might drop it to 200W and see how that goes.
Great deep dive in to the subject. I’m currently getting 15p/kWh for exported energy from octopus so this vid settles it for me. No diverter.
Glad it helped
Can I just ask I have a hot water tank heated by the boiler. How do I stop the boiler heating the water and using this iboost instead. Do I have to turn off the hot water at the boiler? Thank you.
My tank is also heated by the gas boiler but rads and water separately controlled on the progammer/timer. I also have a thermostat on the tank that means the gas only heats it to 60 degrees c. So we have the gas set to heat the water first thing in morning and 7pm when there is little solar for the iboost, but if the iboost already heated it then the gas only tops it up to 60c. Since we use a lot of hot water in the morning, the iboost works all day and the gas just makes sure the water gets properly hot if the iboost does not divert enough. Of course you do need a well insulated tank.
Really interesting. Have just fitted one. Oddly it shows it’s heating by solar even when my meter light is flashing! How can I be taking from the grid at the same time as diverting what would be available to export? Am I missing something?
Not sure what my meter lights mean, 2 yhinhs spring to mind. First that the current clamp is backwards, second that the light flashes during export, third year there is a tiny bit of import, say 10w fourth that the inverter current clamp and isolation clamp are really close and interfering. So 2 turned into 4. Does yor inverter have a display that let's you check what electricity is going where?
Thank you for the comprehensive video. I have a combination boiler (i.e. no water tank) so this system does not work for me. However is there any reason this unit could not be used to 'charge' a storage radiator?
Interesting question. Technically it can be done I think but some storage heaters have quite complicated controls that try and adjust the charge and discharge times and rates based on ambient temperatures etc, these might not be easy to use - however a simple heater is just a heating element, bricks and insulation, they could be proably be "topped up. with solar, then the timing mode turn it on fully at night during lower cost electricity periods. Of course the rating of the storage device must be within the capacity of the diverter. Also need to look to see how the vents in the top are operated - if it is an electric motor then it could be tricky since it would need constant power, you might need to do a little surgery to separate the input charge circuit from the output venting circuit. I was thinking about this method for heating my lab and studio but I think the amount of exported elctricty I have available in winter is just too low.
@@MakeOrRepair Looking more deeply into this there are companies that do it, here's one www.elnur-global.com/self-consumption-heating-solar-storage-heaters-for-photovoltaic-installations/ The cost for both controller and heater is around £1k. Looking at my historic reading (installed in 2011 - max FIT!) I am getting in approx. 1000 kw/h in the period Sept to March. That is 5.6 kw/h per day and at 34p/kw/h a potential saving of £400 for the 6 months. Clearly the capital would be covered in three years. I now need to consider than we do like to look at out gas coal effect fire in the evenings! 😁
Hi - we have a solar array and a iBoost ie no batteries. Does the immersion have to be switched permanently ON for the system to work or should the immersion be on a timer?
many thanks - BTW great video!
Greg
Strange, I remember replying to this already
Great video and good work providing the assets for people to dig deeper and make their mind up themselves.
From my experience, I had a Solar iBoost but swapped it for a myenergi Eddi. Nothing wrong with the iBoost, it just didn’t come with the same level of control vs. the Eddi (App, API, Home Assistant integration)
Personally, I get great satisfaction knowing I’m heating the water from my solar panels, therefore how much is that worth to people? Historically, people who installed solar panels for their home aren’t doing it *just* for financial reasons. For me, if I break even after 10 years I’ll be fine with that, which was the rough estimate before energy prices doubled.
Note: I believe you took the energy to heat your water from August. Keep in mind the water temperature delta is probably at its lowest here, to heat water in Jan/Feb to ~65c will consume more kWh’s.
Thanks i agree there are other factors than the money, I was really the misleading adverts and sales pressure that made me want to encourage people to think more about it. Re the water temp delta, you are right, the online calculator let's you see the impact. also didn't fully take account of heat losses overnight a problem for us us that we use 90%of our hot water in the morning so it has had all night to lose heat but our insulation seems adequate. I thought about making the model more accurate but there are so many variables it would be unusable for most people, so in the end I decided to do a reasonable approximation and focus on how much power people can reasonably divert for example In my case I simply don't have any export in nov/dec/Jan it is all stored in battery so the diverter has no impact then. also since mine is an indirect cylinder I can only heat about the top 70% of the tank using immersion. It takes quite a lot of energy to heat 250 litres per day so I suspect that with rising fuel prices the biggest factor will simply be how much export have they got available to divert, that will be the main limit on savings.
Agree with you about the delay in the system responding - understand that its due to the time delay between sender transmission (to extend battery life). I vaguely recall reading somewhere that you can overcome this delay by using the mains power supply for the transmitter that can be ordered, but since my meter tails are outside of the house that's a non starter for me.
As a check, I temporarily powered it through a plug in meter and found that the IBoost pretty consistently reads 12% higher (in kW). The exam question is which one is correct? Any comments would be welcomed.
One question? - according to my smart meter, my house routinely exports 200 to 300 watts to the grid (far higher than the claimed 100). Is there any way of adjusting this threshold (I understand that the later model does)?
I would be surprised if a plug in meter was that bad, they seem to use a dedicated ic. The iboost on the other hand is using a resistor to measure current in a rapidly switching supply to the immersion and then doing the maths in a microcontroller. Re the threshold for export, definitely programmable using buttons on the + model but I would need to download a manual to recall how. I'm not sure on the earlier version.
UK immersion heaters are 240 volts. Will this work with them?
Yes, mine is a UK heater. I suppose they might make 110V version for the US etc but Europe is pretty much all 220-240V. It is the wattage you should look out for if you have a a very large heater but normal domestic immersion is no problem.
Very helpful thanks... I might just revisit that whole section on making adjustments so that the unit shutdowns quicker 🤔 Will be taking a look at mine tomorrow and assess it. Overall very helpful and informative... Liked the granular nature of those figures.. much food for thought, especially with prices as they are now Oct 2022.. Feels like a no brainer now, but will crunch the numbers to see
Also be helpful to know what you think about the value of that 'Buddy' unit cant seem to find much about them
I'm not all that excited by the buddy units and such-like. I just want to get it tuned to give me good results then completely ignore it.
do you have any opinion on this vs the EDDI? we dont get the feed-in from the excess so i am looking at purchasing one for when my fixed energy price expires! Thanks
Someone else commented that eddi is more configurable etc. Other than that no practical experience. If you are getting nothing for feed in then most companies are required to provide at least Seg payments. My octopus go does not pay for export, but I ca sign up for separate export account. Of course you need relevant paperwork.
@@MakeOrRepair We went with a roof rental scheme (ashadegreener) and they collect the feed-in and we benefit from the free electricity if we use it efficiently, this might be a stupid question but can you wire the iBoost direct into a plug socket and have it trickle feed a portable battery with the excess when its available?
@@andylfc7812 well with no payment for feed-in then you certainly want tovtet everything you can from the generated. Using an iboost with a battery sounds dodgy, pretty sure I discussed operating principles with someone on an earlier posting and it would not be suitable in most cases and how do you get the voltages right? Maybe there is a smart battery solution, but it would involve an inverter etc and likely expensive.
I have an iboost plus that has stopped heating my hot water, I have tested the heat element and measuring around 20ohms, the thermostat is working ok and switching continuity when the temperature dial is turned yet I’m still not getting hot water.. what voltage should be coming out of the unit on output1, I’m measuring around 211v DC.. and the element doesn’t heat up. Applying 240vac to the element and everything is working fine with no issues, water is heating up. As soon as it’s wired back to the iBoost then it’s not heating. Is the output voltage correct? What else can I check? I am boosting the unit for 15mins to test.
It delivers a switched dc signal so the multimeter can be fooled. but it is not so much the voltage as the ability to deliver current during the pulses. You would skso need to test it connected to heater not just the output. I will be putting up a repair video soon, might not be your exact problem but might help explain things.
@@MakeOrRepair I have tested at the element and getting between 170v and 211v Dc, is this showing correct operation? The heat element must be both AC and DC as it heats up and works fine connected directly to the immersion isolator AC supply, I didn’t realise the heat element would heat up with a DC supply
@casssid on the face of it, it sounds like it would heat somewhat . But i think it is a bit low for boost. the element just needs power, dc or ac is irrelevant to it. 240 vac rms is just a way of expressing the ac in a way equivalent to dc. What we want us the power delivered, now in theory if we say 200vdc with 20 ohms load that gives 10A and 2kW power. So that seems a little low for boost, what I'm wondering is if your measurement is getting skewed by limitations of the meter. The iboost uses full bridge rectification so 240vac in becomes roughly 340vdc, the iboost then uses pulsebwidth modulation to control the current going to the element, I.e switching that dc on and off thousands of times per second. A multimeter is going to have difficulty sampling that signal and displaying a meaningful voltage. I have one under repair at the moment, if the component ever gets delivered I'll connect up my scope and perhaps power analyser to show how it works and what to expect. Warning - Do not connect a scope without a high voltage differential probe
Could we get the detail spread sheet to input £250 or £500 install costs and the current government caped price, also octopus is offering 15p / Kw just be interested. The 2 cost are DYI install vs Professional install
You can put any installation cost you like in the spreadsheet and any other capital expenditure involved. In terms of government capped price not really sure what could do about that, the cap applies to all heating fuel gas and electricity whatever the use so it could not really apply just to this purpose. Not sure it applies to heating oil at all! The spreadsheet is not protected, you can adapt it as you want. You can even "fork" it on github and upload your suggested alterations, if they are good then I would accept them and they would be available to everyone.
Hi - we have a solar array and iBoost, but NO batteries.
Does our immersion have to be permanently ON for the system to work, or should we have a timer for the immersion?
thanks - very useful video.
Greg
The iboost will only heat water when the sun is out and you are exporting. So you also need some other way to heat in days when the iboost is not enough or to top up the heat when needed. Mine is both gas heated and has an immersion, so the iboost is connected to immersion without timer, it heats during the day if there is enough sun, then the gas heating runs at 6am to ensure we have a full tank fir morning showers etc.
@@MakeOrRepair many thanks for the very useful answer!
@@MakeOrRepair many thanks, thats very useful Greg
I don't have a battery and use this instead. It's just been installed on 3.65kw system but I'm not getting the water as hot as expected. The sun has been out and generating nearly 3Kw elec. The device is up in the attic near my HWT and I'm too old and partially disabled to get up and see but it was installed by a professional electrician .
I'm pretty used to PV as this is the 3rd house I've had it on . But this system is a freeby from the council although I chose to have an solariboost added instead of a battery which would have cost me an extra £3k . is there a way of connecting it to an app on my phone? As I've not got any operating instructions.
Would I be advised to get a buddy to see what's going on from the kitchen and could I control from that ?
Previously I had oil central heating but the solar diverter heated my water during the summer with little extra boost. Now I'm on gas which I can boost when necessary. I know to only use one device at a time etc..
thanks for any suggestions DB
I think you need the add-on buddy if you want remote monitoring and remote control, not aware of an app. But before spending you need to check it is functioning correctly. If you have monitoring for your inverter then that will help -
The iBoost is just another consumer as far as the inverter is concerned, so with coldish water and say 3Kw of generation, and nothing big like an oven running, you should see pretty much all of that 3kw being consumed in the house; once water is up to heat it should be a lot less. You should perhaps also check your gas hot water schedule to make sure it is not heating the water first e.g. first thing in the morning or the previous night because the imersion will have a 60C cut-off. If your water is cold and it is not diverting then there is definately some problem, which might go from it having messed up in a power cut and just needs restarting and program checking to an actual fault - unfortunately you might need a willing volunteer for that check.
If it is faulty then you might be better replacing with something like the EDDI diverter, it seems to have better functionality and I THINK comes with wireless remote as standard but you would need to check. Hope that helps
You did not mention the second output channel on this unit which comes into action when the emersion switches off when HOT, as there is still solar available I use it to feed a 3kw storage heater(with bricks inside) that is fitted in the lounge to give evening heating when you open the flap, This also has a time clock to topup during a off peek rate electric during the early hours of the morning, Do not have a battery on my solar at present
Yes, that is a good point, i should have looked more at that
Great video! also just to point out, I highly doubt the device will last 35 years.. I've been though 2 of these in 6 years.. I am no longer going to replace it as the device isn't reliable enough.
From the earlier comments reliability does seem to be quite a problem. Mine is still working, but it would be interesting to get hold of a few failed units and find out if there is a common cause.
Excellent video, thank you. I've just fitted one of these for the same reason as yourself - seeing that gas has gone up to 7.4p and is predicted to go to 12p or higher.
One question about your efficiency test between electric and gas - I suspect this wasn't a fair comparison. Unless you have a de-stratification pump or dual immersion (top-bottom) elements you will likely be heating only a 1/3 to 1/2 of the tank during the test and not the full tank as the indirect coil would do.
Solving the stratification problem in a low cost (DIY and without a new cylinder) is a problem I'm currently investigating...
Yes, I had forgotten about it when I shot the video. On a good day with cold tank, it heats about 1/3 of the tank, then the gas has to finish the job. Having said that I don't have masses of export to use so, except on really good days it uses most of my export. It works out similar to the adjustment I did towards the end of the calculations, but just goes to show that for gas users it is harder to get the benefits than you might think.
My system has a deep immersion heater, so heats the full volume of the tank. Probably not exactly the same quantity of water as the gas powered water coils, but pretty close. The electric thermostat is also set much higher (at 65 C). Given similar starting conditions, the IBoost reports about 2.5 kWh needed to heat the tank, and my smart meter reports about 5 kWh of gas - so my best guess is that the real world efficiency of gas is 50% (using a modern condensing boiler with claimed 93% efficiency, so the loss is probably due to heating all of the water in the pipework connecting the two, and letting it leak away afterwards).
Mine appears to have died. Its blowing local fuse and main fuse board.
Thanks. I have noticed a few negative comments regarding reliability. There are other makes that might have better track record.
your maths are based on the feed in rate being the goal to cover your gas usage, but the fact is if you import to heat any energy via electric usage will be 20p per kwh as what is the norm now, most new owners also don't really get a feed in tariff like first gen users so the export unit rate may only add £8-10 a month, so the best practice it to use all the electricity to can before it goes to the grid, these units aren't designed to replace you heating method they will burn out in about 5 years or so if like that but more like supplement it,
like many who are away from home most of the time due to work., your energy levels used at home drop like a stone when no one is there unless you have a high powered unit such as washing machine or heat pump based dryer set to run in these times so would go to the diverter at the rate of a kettle most of the time, so if your not there all day it can run all throughout the solar day. and you come home to a hot water tank simple.
further to this if you only heated in the morning by natural heat loss the average hot water cylinder looses 6% if its a C rated and most unless your a big family not really draining the cylinder just a few litters to 20% at a time, thus the actual volume needed heating may actually be a lot lower and general top up heat. your still be warming up in the mornings unless you leave it on all night to heat 200 litres, but the fact that it doesn't have additional CT or smart tariff readability makes this unit hard to use off peak as it can't tell if what's coming in is at a cheaper rate or full beans. all it detects is am i exporting if yes then divert if importing turn off,
further to this if your at home all day that's a different story, where your goal will be to use everything you can off grid charge the battery etc minimising grid usage anyway, leaving little to the export unit to heat the water, if your solar array was just 4KWh then between full time house usage and charging a 10kwh pack most of the time its just not worth it your better off plugging in the EV on a granny and smart plug and just charging the car etc then use home assistance and your smart traffic to turn on/off when exporting,
if your array was a new type of panel between 6-8kwh or very fortunate and have more then its a different story where you will be often exporting or one of the very few to have a pool, again this is where having the diverter is till great to have. your never going to get a real time shut down with any of the devices there will always be a delay causing some usage from the grid for a period of time before it shuts down, some brands are better than others at doing this,
Everyone is different - That's why my calculations are based on actual usage, and actual exported electricity as far as possible so as to avoid many of the confusing aspects. At the end of the day what you use (or a bit more since you lose heat overnight) is the amount of kWh you need, and what you export is what you have available to meet that demand AT BEST., after that you save on the fuel you no longer import and lose on the electricity you no longer export.
My examples were about gas, because I was showing my calculations, and we use gas, but also to handle the fact that different fuels have different efficiencies, I did also explain how electricity and oil differ - but at the end of they day they are just another fuel source with differing efficiency and cost. The key point was to introduce the main factors for people to think about which I suppose can be summed up as working out how to use the lowest cost fuels and how to organise them to get the best, instead of just the adverts and sales pressure. I hope I did make it clear that you want to use your generated electricity, then if you have them store it in batteies - then what is left is the candidate for divierting to hot water - unless you have a lot of excess electricity you may not get payback - it takes a lot of electricity to heat enough water for two people 4kW panels is likely marginal unless you ar on the old FIT scheme or already using expensive fuels.
Re the off-peak comment - my electricity is a set very low price between 00:30 and 04:30 so I use that for all sorts of things when the weather is bad and in Winter just based on time - for some people of course they might have more vaiablity (e.g. an agile tariff) and then that is a lot harder to manage - you need smart devices
@@tobys593The question is how much more is your normal fuel cost vs. the feed-in tariff, the bigger the difference the more you save by maximising your solar usage vs. exporting it. If you are already sourcing most of the heating power from solar then you are already making most of the saving possible. What a diverter will do is prevent you accidentally importing electricity during the couldy/overcast times, so on the face of it it meets your need, but do you spend enough on imported electricity to make it worthwhile? Also the diverter in place on a cloudy/overcast day might mean you don't heat your tank as much as you want!
Since my water heating was intended to be primarily gas I only have an immersion at the top of the tank so can't fully heat the whole tank using the immersion and I found that my diverter is only diverting about 5 or 6 kWh per day so while it will pay for itself eventually it is not sufficient on its own to heat all the water for the day.
Hope that helps
@@tobys593 it also depends where your export meter is, it sounds like you’re on a decent (older) Feed-in-tariff, the meter for this is just after the solar inverter and crucially before you’re fuse board/consumer unit and main electricity meter. Therefore, if you get one of these units it will *NOT* reduce your ~£2k rebate as the payment is based on your solar meter, not the main house meter. In my opinion, get one. I have a myenergi Eddi and no longer use gas to heat water, I use off-peak electric to heat when solar is not enough and the price for gas vs electric at this time is the same, however, the efficiency of electric is obviously significantly higher.
Hi, which key you used to open it up? tired allen key did fit... Thanks
Looking back at the pre-edited footage there are 4 torx screws in the back, not sure of the exact size but pretty small perhaps a T10 or a T8
@Make Or Repair thanks already opened it. Not much to see there. Yea gonna need to buy new one as my died. As I heard mine not the first one. Now need to decide to buy new or no
Thanks for you video
@@mariscirulis338 Sorry to hear that, perhaps it is just that I hear about them but quite a lot seem to die... There are a few mentions of other makes etc in the comments that might interest you. If you are willing to send it to me I would quite like to disect and attempt a repair on a failed one for a video, I suspect there is some sort of design issue with them - not certain I can fix it safely (sort of depends how and why it failed) but perhaps worth a try? If so please email make.or.repair@gmail.com and we can exchange address details
@@MakeOrRepair sent you an email ... could be in spam as well. thanks send your address then gonna try to find some box and hope royal mail gonna they it
thanks
@Make Or Repair sent you Iboost last week. Thanks
I am off grid, would this diverter still work?
So your aim is to Hest water when you have excess going to waste? Not sure how this would work. It depends on monitoring the amount flowing from the house to the grid.
Very comprehensive overview, I only use the Iboost in the spring summer and autumn as I have biomass during the winter, my solar is producing maximum 40kw per day and with the 12kw battery storage it is charged before mid day, i just wish there was a more intelligent monitoring for the house that combines all my systems, iboost, solar, biomass and Schneider Electric Wiser.
Can you give me the link to your spreadsheet please.
lastly we need the standing charge removed for anyone exporting to the grid or standing charge removed with unit cost adjustment, this would encourage users to invest in generation as well as encourage users to use less instead of being penalised with a £300+ upfront cost before use were the poorest are impacted most.
Yes, I think there are several comments regarding integration of the different systems. With my solar being lower, but with reduced cost overnight, i could really do with a more intelligent system too. A few people have done some things themselves and there are some rule based things that Dan run on phones or tablets, but they rely on being able to talk to devices, and most devices are proprietary, trying to lock everything to their brand.
Also agree in the UK there is no incentive to export. The actual amount paid is silly and there must be dozens of comments on my channel from people on old fits scheme who are desperate not to export because the get paid regardless. I would certainly like to see both situations change, for example open standards for device monitoring and control and proper payment schemes to encourage export, that reduces costs to suppliers, and increasing local generation also reduces infrastructure overheads. Anyway I need to look for appropriate pressure groups
Very detailed thank you. Good point re the fan noise. I had a hum from a house alrm main control box situated in the airing cupboard stud wall which backs onto the bedroom. It could just be heard so I had to make up a sandwich mount with polystyrene in the middle to dampen the noise.
Anyway it appears my immersion heater does not have a separate feed from the consumer unit so its switch must be part of the upstairs ring. Would you foresee any issues by continuing with this as the feed to the iBoost box and then a further isolation switch on the immersion heater side of the iBoost?
I don't see a problem, a typical 32A ring upstairs can easily handle approx 3kW heater. I suppose there could be some switching noise going back onto the ring but my quick look in the device indicated it has some good suppression and if I recall correctly it has relevant certifications regarding causing interference.
@@MakeOrRepair thank you for your reply. It would be possible to add a direct feed but it would require some work routing the cable. Come to think of it the upstairs ring has no real demands on it other than the odd phone charger and. bedside lights. Occasionally the vacuum.
Why would it ever take fro, the battery when it is triggered by exported energy? When the sun goes down there is no solar so you are running off battery and there is no export therefore the iBoost should be triggered to engage your immersion. No complicated sensing or algorithms required. Or have I misunderstood something?
If it is using all the exported energy which is the excess solar, then the exported energy now reads zero, so when the sun goes in the inverter keeps the export at zero by using the batteries. The iboost does not have any means to know, as far as it is concerned it is just right, no idea that 3kw is from battery instead of panel. So it looks like the algorithm allows a little to always export, e.g. 100w so when the inverter switches to battery after a while the iboost realises it is taking too much and drops 100w, then the inverter reduces battery drain by 100w to match and this adjustment happens roughly every 20s, so if the iboost was allowing 3kW to the immersion then it takes almost 10 minutes before it shuts off, that is why I played with the threshold in the video, to make it work in bigger steps.
Solar is similar pay for energy before you use. On the whole excellent review.
Indeed, Pay lots of capital up front and hope you save it in running costs before it goes wrong!
At the moment I get 15p per kWh exported. gas costs me about 7p per KWH. Given I use roughly twice as much gas as electricity to achieve the same heating effect for hot water, for every KWH of electricity not exported I lose 15p of income but save 14p of gas. In other words - it would cost me to divert exported electricity to heat how water.
Exactly. For me there were just a few months in summer when it was worth it - my export tariff was ridiculously low and gas crazily high, but since my export tariff improved the iboost is pointless.
I don’t understand why you feel the battery would be an issue? My understanding is the eye boost is only sensing if electricity is being exported therefore weather solar energy or battery energy is coming to the house is irrelevant only becomes relevant once it starts leaving the house. Am I not correct in that?
If the battery is charged and we have say 1kw to spare then the diverter takes it instead of exporting it so far so good. But of course the inverter/charger sees that the immersion is on just as another household load so will try and prop it up with battery if the sun shades or another device starts. the inverter is trying to prevent import. In fact it does happen for a few minutes. Also there is a minimum current to charge the batteries, so the batteries and diverter are looking to use the same power, that is why adjusted the divertef threshold, to ensure the battery charge gets to use it first. It works adequately though.
@@MakeOrRepair I think that is easily solved by setting the diverter start point to 200 watts or so. The battery is going to shoot for a zero export and that should shut the diverter down. I mean the battery export control electronics accuracy is high so will never let the export go off to figures of a few hundred watts more than seconds
@gopikrishnayogarajah well the remote sensor is pretty slow. Setting the threshold a bit higher does do a good enough job as I showed in the video but it was certainly worth checking. Anyway, now I have more battery storage. I don't export enough to heat the water using this method, but everyone has different circumstances so I thing comments in video still help people think about it which was the point really.
@@MakeOrRepair Sure thanks for sharing . I was commenting because I have this setup and it works fine. Yes it is slow to react but that slowness I feel is also part of design intent to allow the battery system catch up and Zero the export/import (that prevents the run off you suspected) . For me it all works fine but yes it does let go of some small amount end of the day to the grid as compared to more sophisticated systems - on the other hand does a fantastic job of dumping majority of the excess into the tank. I have solar inverter and separate AC coupled battery just FYI.
My iboost enables 90% of my hot water during sunny months of the year. It is brilliant. Nonsense about the fan.
Well glad it is useful for you. Fan is too noisy for my liking fitted in a bedroom, but my tolerance of avoidable noise is very low!
Like the way you have set targets for on charge/load.
kWh is 60 minutes so your 3.6kw hot water is 60w in the minute. So therefore if you sample to over produce 60w in one minute the. You power up the hot water.
If you don't have any other loads, could you not just run a CT to turn on a load when there is export, set say at half an amp.
It flicks on and as the current over production drops it turns back off. It would be off and on a lot. But it would not draw from the grid. Unles the production is higher than the load.
Well 3.6kWh is 3.6kw instantaneous maintained for an entire hour, or another way of thinking of it is an average of 3.6kW for an entire hour. The heater load is 3.6kW, the energy used is that multiplied by time. So the proportional nature of this device is important because to be cost effective you want to use every bit of excess power upto the limit of the heater, but never more. 1/2 amp is (in the uk) 120W rms approximately so if we suppose we use that for say 10 hours of bright daylight then that would total up to 1.2kWh energy used in total and that is not going to get anywhere close to heating a whole tank, you would need about 5A on that approach.
@@MakeOrRepair I used half amp as an example. But that being said. If your load is 3.6kw but you have 500w of excess, then I assume that this would deliver that power..
In the UK the weather varies the sun's current a lot :)
I m thinking if the CT relay is used to turn off and on as the current flows out, then the excess power would be cut as it were where the load is greater than the excess.
Is see the MK2router uses a triac to catch the Hz and adds current to each side of the wave. Bit more complicated that a on off switch.
But it how to manage power with variable power..?
@@guywhoknows if you turn on a 3.6kw load with a relay then it would take your excess and just get the rest from the grid. This is the key point that the device limits the current based on the reading from the remote sensor so that you don't use more than the excess available, software then has to work out if the sun goes in or other loads are suddenly using more power and in my case what the batteriesare doing. It is one of those cases where it seems simple until you try and do it.
@@MakeOrRepair this is the bit I didn't kinda get.
If you switch on and off say with a 50% duty Cycle do you deliver 50% of the loads draw?
Same as with a DC to DC?
I'm not much into the AC side of power and how it all works
@@guywhoknows if we take ac and truncate each cycle of the sine wave we get what amounts to an old style light dimmer and that would sort of work, but since the heater is largely resistive it is inefficient because you don't actually control the current, it just ramps up with the ac sine wave and then gets abruptly turned off each time it gets too high. and unless you have about 3.6 kw excess solar output it would have to have a cycle below 50% otherwise it would draw current from the grid as the voltage rises towards the peak. The element is largely resistive so current and voltage are in phase. But somewhere in the comments we discussed that the easiest way is to rectify the mains then use pulse width modulation to deliver a variable regulated current to the heater element with a lot of inductance or capacitance acting to store energy, that way you actually draw the smoothed out reduced current from you inverter using the full ac cycle and avoid nasty 50hz high current switching back onto you domestic mains. so yes in that case the duty cycle does affect the power. This is just.like a big switch -mode power supply, or dc motor speed controler, except instead of regulating output voltage you regulate the output current to be a little under the excess being sensed as exported. Not the easiest to explain in text, and there are other considerations but Hope that helps
3 years and it died. Replaced for wholesale price. Two years just out of warranty and it died .Replaced for free this time. .Hoping for a lot longer service now. I don't think that I will get my money back on this investment for a long time.
Thanks. Disturbing how many people reporting failures!
Well… I pay €2.02 for 1m3 gas in Holland… How come the gas in England is just about €0,80? Or do i misunderstand your calculation?
No, we pay in in kWH and ther are roughly 10.55 kWH per 1m3. Not Mt formula, it is the one used, you can find the full m3 to kwh easily. British gas price today is about 7.4 pence per kwh so x10.55 and convert to euros come out just under 0.90. Thst is domestic rate, Commercial will be far higher. I suppose part of the answer is that the UK has a domestic price cap, beyond that current gas prices are beyond comprehension.
@@MakeOrRepair Clear! Thanks! I think I'm going for a pv direct water heater. I can easily implement that on my existing setup.
Exporting back to the grid is estimated based on what your solar photovoltaic generates so whoever is paying your export tariff would not know if you have a booster fitted or not!
That is only the case for people on the fits scheme which closed for new members several years ago. Since then the export is metered and you get paid per kW exported. I think the scheme was ended because people were not exporting what was expected so as a result companies are paying for electricity not received, and that forces bills up.
I don't know if this nugget is of use to anyone, but ... my iBoost was fine & not charging from the battery (apart from the switching delay discussed here), but after a visit from Nat Grid to seal my old meter, it started drawing about 150w. I moved the collars further apart & it started switching as before. I'm assuming the collars had accidentally slipped closer together. Something to watch for?
I had to use a cable tie under one of yhe current transformers/sensors toyshop it slipping down. Attached tightly to cable then trimmed the cable tie so about 20mm sticking out.
It can save money IF you have immersion hearing only for the water, the water takes 3KW to run a heater..
yes, if you only use electricity for hot water the net saving is the difference between purchase and export price
were did you get 10p KwR Electric & 3p Gas KwR, try as of today's tariff August 2022 try x3 30p electric 8p gas.
Fun Fact 300L water takes 10.5KwR to heat up from 40 to 70 degress this is Avg for a house hold.
so that's a cost of £3 per day £22 week £90 month.
so if you manage to export 10KwR a day this is what you would expect on 300 litre system.
That's what it was, I did say it was increasing and how that changed the payback. I currently pay 7.5p electricity overnight and 27 during the day. My gas is 3.2p for the next year, after that it goes up a lot. The cost benefit continues to depend on the difference between the price you get for export and yhe cost of fuel you replace with diverted power. Note however that people with indirect tanks where immersion is a backup are unlikely to be able to heat hhd whole tank, just the top half.
@@MakeOrRepair how the hell are you getting these prices, could you tell me so i can change to it.
@@ecoterrorist1402 I use Octopus Go, you need a SMET2 smart meter, it is a fixed 1 year deal. Don't know the exact prices they are offering at the moment, I renewed for a year at the MAY rates. But easy to get a quote and if you do find a better deal later you can leave without exit penalty. I think I have a link at bottom of video description where if you are a new octopus customer you would get 50 credit.
My Gas is just the normal price, I just happend to be lucky and change to a 2-year fixed deal before the prices got silly, not looking forward to next year.
Octopus go only makes sense if you have batteries or an EV so you can make full use of overnight lower cost power. And if you can use solar for most of the day. The downside is that it does not include a high-value export payment (because you buy cheaper) but you can just ring the helpdesk and they will give you a basic SEG export rate (mine is 4.2p per kWh exported) or you can do the export with a different company.
Hope that helps.
Pete
There is a different way to look at the savings beyond the return on investment and that: if I have disposable cash now and won't have it later, it's worth spending it to keep running costs down.
My payback period for my solar/battery has gone from 15 yrs to 10 in twelve months due to energy price increases. And that's great, don't get me wrong.
But the important point is and was smart tariffs and reduction in grid usage. And in that 12 months this year even with the new higher costs my running costs each paypacket will be half what it would have been. If they get cheaper my pay back will lengthen again. But energy costs will *still* be half what it would have been each month.
Immediate saving means you can save for the next saving... Or keep your head above water if times turn tough.
Well, yes that is a decision to make and is my main reason for solar and batteries, i have capital but income is tight. But you still need positive roi, or you may as well put it in a saving account. One way to not have funds in the future is to spend them on the wrong things. Also had I known where inflation was heading I would have said about capital investment now in saving technology having greater value because fuel is going to cost more, and each pound will buy less in the future. Roi should take account of inflation, and anyone investing in solar or diverters over the last few years is going to see far better return than expected.
@@MakeOrRepair you never know we might rebalance our energy market to reflect the actual cost of most of our electricity , which will lengthen ROI again lol.
I'd been putting money in a savings account so that I could afford to put this stuff in without loans. Interest rates the whole time were shocking - that might be about to change of course, but I definitely don't regret my purchases so far and for a couple of hundred quid extra I'm hoping the iboost my installer wants to put in rather than springing for the Eddi I said I thought I wanted is going to still be worth it and not cause probs with my battery.
Your video has been really useful for me in spotting any early problems I might have to manually configure around response times though, thanks so much for that
One cubic metre of gas is roughly 11 kWh not 33 kWh as in your spreadsheet.
Err, yes about 10 to 11 depending on temperature and calorific value, I was generally approximating most things but I must have missed a step in my conversion. Need to fix that
I have now updated spreadsheet thanks
If it uses just solar. If it dont get up to 60deg C younget legionalla
It is a combination of how fast your water is used and temperature. At 50c it takes a few hours to kill legionella. At 60C it is only a minute. You really want to avoid storing water at say 25-45 for a long period. Risk is reduced however if the water is not stored for long. We use the diverter for some heat, then gas to bring it to 60c. Useful to remember that the water at the top, which is used first is hottest. So I would recommend setting a timed on period to top up the heat if it needs it, thermostatic control is a must!,
whats wrong with "battery compability claims".
this is connected to your consumer unit. makes no difference if you have batteries or not.
The fact that has a 100W buffer (not zero as you mention), it will never have issues with inverters.
If sun goes in, you wont have any export, therefore this will turn off.
Example. battery is full:
2000W Solar: youre using 200W, exporting 1800W, Isolar will use until export = 100W, so it will use 1700W.
inverter will still see: 2000W solar, 1900W load, 100W export.
The moment the Sun goes out (cloud) , the inverter will still see's "100W export" all the way as the isolar reduce load, as theres no sun at all, there wont be any export, so the isolar turns off.
Your inverter doesnt "Dectect loads". it just measures whats being imported/exported. so theres no reason this wont work with batteries, specially with the 100W buffer.
The few seconds (10-20-30) it takes to react, 2kW for 30 seconds its a grand total of 16Wh, or 0.3% of a 5kWh battery. which would quickly top up to 100% in a minute or so.
Is it worth it?
all depends on how much you pay to heat water at night, how much you get paid for exports, and so on. for me, its worth it, but only if the unit is used/cheap/etc
If you were going to heat it at night at 7P and how you're diverting export of 5P , is not worth it. but if you need to heat it during the day, (after a morning shower) , and your battery isnt big, that can keep your water hot all day in the summer and save you from importing peak pricing to have a late evening bath. (and avoid 30+pence import ).
in that way , it can be worth it.
I think your issue is that your inverter is only switching at 100-200W, if was keeping it at 0, this would respond instantly.
It is nothing to do with the inverter, this device itself just sees the export every 20 seconds or so (much slower than the inverter) so if the diverter is using 1kw for the heater and the sun goes in the diverter has no idea it happened because the inverter uses the batteries and the export is still zero - so how does the diverter know how to stop. As demonstrated it can take a long time to work it out!
Well on them figure's I'm not going to be fitting a Solar i-Boost 🤦♂
well you have to weigh it up. the price of fuel has increased a lot since filming, so it is beneficial for more people than before. but at least in the uk gas remains lower cost if already in use, unless you have a lot of excess solar generation to play with. For me battery storage was a far more effective solution particularly buying cheep at night andstoring for daytime use in winter
Make Or Repair I live alone and have a 5kw system 14pv panels and 2, 5kw Batteries, so it's more important to me keeping them Batteries charged than generating hot water, I've only just had my DNO approval and I'm on Octopus Agile Tariff which isn't good for charging my battery @ a cheaper rate like Octopus Go, it's early days for me and Solar all the advice on Utube is dated with out of date prices, so my Tariff choice is confusing, I'm hoping Octopus brings out a Tariff for PV & Battery Storage user's 🙏
@@ianandrew7010 don't forget that even on agile you can get seg payments for export. Either from a different company or octopus It was burried in one of the octopus q&as. I had to ring the help desk and after going away to ask they sent me the seg forms. In summer once the batteries are full I get paid something for my export. Adds up to about £200 so it was worth the hassle. Seg is a derisory 4.2p per kwh but the alternative is to give away the excess...
@MakeOrRepair I've just been accepted on Octopus Outgoing Agile was only connected this weekend I've chosen Agile instead of the 15p Fixed payment's