Solar install turning out really bad - looking for some help/advice please.

[pure3d2]

He survived, and the soap opera has been renewed for another season.

There's more?

[inetdog]

What a rollercoaster! I was telling my wife about the OP's story and she was getting stressed out.

"Did he get approved? Did he eventually get it up and running? I need to know or I can't sleep!"

He survived, and the soap opera has been renewed for another season.

[pure3d2]

What a rollercoaster! I was telling my wife about the OP's story and she was getting stressed out.

"Did he get approved? Did he eventually get it up and running? I need to know or I can't sleep!"

[vegasbrad]

Wow

Epic thread, just epic, stayed up way too late reading it tonight , thanks for all the hours you took to post all this! I'm just starting looking for a good solar panel company in Las Vegas. This is my biggest fear...Hacks! I worked in a Car audio shop for 9 years then Custom Home Theater for many years after that. I saw lots of hacks unfortunately. Now I built Electric Vehicle charging stations and sell them online for my home business. Having someone out from "edited" tomorrow to the house, we'll see what they offer me.

Thanks again for sharing all this good info

Mod note, howdy, please dont put in links to installers, thanks

[tatumjonj]

Well, I finally read through this entire thread and I must say that I'm very impressed with not only your can do attitude but also your installation skills. Not as impressed with your ability to pick a good contractor, but I think I realize why you did it as the amount of money you saved was quite substantial even though you ended up putting a lot of elbow grease into the project. Kudos.

[nomadh]

My neighbor says the only things level on his house are the rain gutters.

Wow you must know the Seinfeld of contractor humor. I like that one.

Just finished reading. Congrats. Looks like you know what you are doing now.
i'll hire you to install solar edge on my house for < $2.00 /watt.

[bcroe]

Oh I'm into it a lot more than that...parts alone were like $22k.
But remember its a pretty large system at 12.4kW using SolarEdge.

It certainly is an informative thread, on about every aspect including:
How to save money with DIY;
How to check and recover quality in a project;
How to bargain;
Somewhat entertaining seeing all the bugs worked out;
How a PV install works.
Maybe a record length thread too?

Some of that happened to me too, more than I have described. Bruce Roe

[tatumjonj]

Very informative thread.

[HX_Guy]

Oh I'm into it a lot more than that...parts alone were like $22k. But remember its a pretty large system at 12.4kW using SolarEdge.

[oilerlord]

I see my thread is alive and well!

Oilerlord to answer your question...all I ended up paying the installer was barter dollars, to the tune of about $15k and while my hard cost on that barter is around $10k, I had it sitting in my barter account collecting dust...it's not like I could have cashed it out...so to me the monetary value I got from the tax credit on that $15k was worth just leaving it to the installer vs doing a chargeback on it, which I could have easily and successfully done.

I have to admit that I read all 77 pages but missed that part about you being into the project for only $10K. Reading your posts was kind of like watching a train wreck in progress - tough to watch but at riveting at the same time. Considering all the blood, sweat, and tears you had to endure, I'm not sure you got a bargain. Anyway, good luck in the future and thanks again for sharing your experience with everyone.

[HX_Guy]

I see my thread is alive and well!

Oilerlord to answer your question...all I ended up paying the installer was barter dollars, to the tune of about $15k and while my hard cost on that barter is around $10k, I had it sitting in my barter account collecting dust...it's not like I could have cashed it out...so to me the monetary value I got from the tax credit on that $15k was worth just leaving it to the installer vs doing a chargeback on it, which I could have easily and successfully done.

[oilerlord]

To give the OP some credit, how many solar owners bother to go up on the roof to check for workmanship of their contractors anyway? Even city inspectors don't bother go up the roof to check for workmanship. They just assume that everything was done properly on the roof and all they check for is proper installation that meet codes on the ground.

At least the OP takes the initiative to check for these things that most solar homeowners don't. Even the loose wiring was kind of an accidental discovery by him, not that he was looking for it on purpose. So this kind of thing could have happened to anybody. Just because you hire what you "think" is a "quality" contractor and your inspections pass on first tries doesn't mean that you're guaranteed quality workmanship. This kind of thing could have easily happen to others as it did happen to the OP. At least the OP went on the roof to poke around and found out about these things, while most other homeowners don't and they "think" they got a quality install, but they never know for sure. Maybe they do, maybe they don't. You just don't know until a leak or a fire or a malfunction happens.

Remember that the OP did ask 4? previous solar owners who hired this bad contractors and all 4? of them said they were happy with the install. Obviously they were all blissfully unaware of how bad this contractor is. At least the OP didn't just rest on these 4 feedbacks and went up on the roof to check things for himself.

I wonder what's worse? The OP "knowingly" hire a bad contractor and double checking on his work, or the 4 previous owners who unknowingly hired this bad contractors and blissfully thought that they had a quality installation and gave the OP good referral on the contractor.

I absolutely give the OP credit...To everyone's benefit, he pretty much gave us a play-by-play of everything that went wrong with his project, and the steps he took to fix it. IMHO, he was WAY to patient with that idiot installer. I can't speak for homeowners that are "blissfully" unaware of the quality of their solar installations, but if I was spending upwards of $30K - I'd be very much involved every step of the process. I still don't understand how or why he paid that bastard anything when it appears he basically installed (and re-installed) everything on his own.

[Volusiano]

To give the OP some credit, how many solar owners bother to go up on the roof to check for workmanship of their contractors anyway? Even city inspectors don't bother go up the roof to check for workmanship. They just assume that everything was done properly on the roof and all they check for is proper installation that meet codes on the ground.

At least the OP takes the initiative to check for these things that most solar homeowners don't. Even the loose wiring was kind of an accidental discovery by him, not that he was looking for it on purpose. So this kind of thing could have happened to anybody. Just because you hire what you "think" is a "quality" contractor and your inspections pass on first tries doesn't mean that you're guaranteed quality workmanship. This kind of thing could have easily happen to others as it did happen to the OP. At least the OP went on the roof to poke around and found out about these things, while most other homeowners don't and they "think" they got a quality install, but they never know for sure. Maybe they do, maybe they don't. You just don't know until a leak or a fire or a malfunction happens.

Remember that the OP did ask 4? previous solar owners who hired this bad contractors and all 4? of them said they were happy with the install. Obviously they were all blissfully unaware of how bad this contractor is. At least the OP didn't just rest on these 4 feedbacks and went up on the roof to check things for himself.

I wonder what's worse? The OP "knowingly" hire a bad contractor and double checking on his work, or the 4 previous owners who unknowingly hired this bad contractors and blissfully thought that they had a quality installation and gave the OP good referral on the contractor.

[Alisobob]

... very well what might have happened if he didn't take matters into his own hands and rewire his setup.

Yup.

Could have got real nasty, real quick.

[Volusiano]

Where did I misses the catching fire? I think many of us learned a lot from this thread.

Nothing caught on fire, but the OP found some loose wiring that he was able to easily yank out of the connectors because they weren't crimped in properly -> potential for catching fire.