Side of house (hardiplank) mounting

[chrissilich]

I have a very large, very boring (not many windows and out of public sight) side of my house facing almost straight south, so I thought, "why couldn't I mount the panels on the wall?" Has anyone seen this done?

I have hardiplank siding, so I suppose it would be a case of either drilling through it and the wall board and into studs (how to find them?), screwing in big bolts, and mounting rails to that, and then caulking around the holes, or better yet, removing the hardiplank boards and mounting some sort of bracket that would come out under the hardiplank when it's put back on. Either way, giant pain in the ass, but since the other options are ground mounting with slightly more shade than I'd like, and roof mounting on an east-west roof at the top of a hill that get's lots of wind, I'm considering everything.

[russ]

I have a very large, very boring (not many windows and out of public sight) side of my house facing almost straight south, so I thought, "why couldn't I mount the panels on the wall?" Has anyone seen this done?

I have hardiplank siding, so I suppose it would be a case of either drilling through it and the wall board and into studs (how to find them?), screwing in big bolts, and mounting rails to that, and then caulking around the holes, or better yet, removing the hardiplank boards and mounting some sort of bracket that would come out under the hardiplank when it's put back on. Either way, giant pain in the ass, but since the other options are ground mounting with slightly more shade than I'd like, and roof mounting on an east-west roof at the top of a hill that get's lots of wind, I'm considering everything.

Try using http://gisatnrel.nrel.gov/PVWatts_Viewer/index.html you can change the tilt of the panels (instructions are there) to what ever you want.

At 90° tilt you lose roughly 40% of your potential production.

[chrissilich]

Try using http://gisatnrel.nrel.gov/PVWatts_Viewer/index.html you can change the tilt of the panels (instructions are there) to what ever you want.

At 90° tilt you lose roughly 40% of your potential production.

Oh of course I'd tilt them to some degree. I hadn't thought about exactly how much though. I'm at 33º latitude, so that would mean a 66º tilt up from a vertical surface, that's a lot. According to some quick numbers thrown into PVWatts, flat vertical on the side of the house (90º) would lose me about 40%, slightly angled out (60º) would lose me about 12%, and angled half way out (45º) would lose about 3%. I think building some simple wood frames out of pressure treated 2x4s or 2x6s for a 45º tilt would be quite easy and strong.

Really I guess my question was does anyone have any experience to offer here, even if it's not solar related- just about mounting heavy stuff to the side of a hardiplank sided house?

[FunGas]

Go and see you local scaffolder, he will probably sell you some old steel tube (which they can't use now) for cheap. Build a free standing structure awy from the house.