Solar Installation – Part 2

 

Solar Installation – Part 2

by rdpecken on Sep.16, 2013, under Electrical

Once the ground wire was routed from the panels to the ground, they were attached to the ground lug in the combiner box. This box is used to combine the outputs of the two strings of panels into a single pair of wires going to the charge controller. There are circuit breakers installed, mostly to use as switches to isolate any problems.

 
Combiner box installed

The combiner box had been mounted in my previous visit in June. The conduit from the roof had been run and the wires from the solar panels had been pulled through the conduit.

Combiner box

Once the wiring was complete in the combiner box, I drove a ground rod just below it, and connected a ground wire from the rod to the combiner box. The picture below shows the installation before the lightning protection was added.

Combiner Box – minus lightning protection

Next, I started working on the job-site boxes. The first step was to remove the welded on feet, to make the boxes sit flush with the deck, instead of raised 8 inches above it. This allows them to be used as a useful height bench, and allows for more secure connection to the deck.

Feet cut off bottom
 
 Feet removed

What did I ever do without a sawzall and dremel tool ???

Sawzall & Dremel

Continued in Part 3…

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