Re: [pvusers] Is this list active

[Michael Welch <michael.welch@homepower.com>]

TERI FARROW wrote at 01:28 PM 12/31/2001 -0600:
  
>The part about getting a proffesional installation was certainly good
>advice - but isn't always practicable.
>Experts are rarely willing to traipse two hundred miles from the nearest
>city to do a one or two module installation.
>So what should such prospective consumers do? Come back in fifty years?

Getting a pro does not necessarily mean getting a good job done, either. I just inspected a system for a friend that was negotiating the purchase of a home that already had stand-alone PV. The installation was horrendous. For example, I had to move the PV input cable to check battery electrolyte level, and the cable slipped out of its lug! The inverter cables were 2/0 for a system with a 4 kw inverter. All the battery interconnects were #4.

And the installer had the nerve to sell the owner some used 33 cell modules that nobody else wanted. A lot of nerve.

That said, I think that more often than not, most folks are better off with a pro doing the work. Their system is more likely to fit their needs, will be safer, and will work better than if done by someone that has little experience. Obviously, I am a great believer in do-it-yourself (Home Power magazine is largely for those kinds of folks, though our readership is moving gradually in the other direction), but without certain skills, that is fraught with danger.
  
Michael Welch
  
------------------------
"I'm hopeful. I know there is a lot of ambition in Washington, obviously. But I hope the ambitious realize that they are more likely to succeed with success as opposed to failure."
			Resident George "Dubya" Bush
        
Michael Welch, michael.welch@homepower.com www.homepower.com
     Managing Editor, Home Power magazine
     Office Coordinator, Redwood Alliance
     (Not HP mag numbers) 707-822-7884 fax: 707-822-3481


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