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My name is mike from Florida, grew up poor and have chased affordable solar since 2006 , started off with a crapy 45 harborfreight kit that put out more than 2 amps at full sun and a harborfreight inverter that 2 amps at idle no load , i quickly learned this was a joke and but it gave me the solar bug which i have been chasing ever since, one of my proudest moments is
During Irma I Ran my whole house off of a 120v 1800 watt xantrex hard wired to the both poles of the breaker panel , Every single device in my house functioned flawlessly except for 220 devices , I used 2 to Golf cart batteries and then charged them with some heavy duty 4awg jumper cables from my car along with that 45 watt kit to supplement when car was off [this only put out like 2 amps, and it was really the alternator doing all the charging ] used it this way for almost a whole week, all my neighbors were in Awe and i was charging every ones cell phones[had a big power strip outside] one person down the street, even asked to borrow my generator, at which i replied, what generator. . .lol they looked at me confused and said but how do you have power? I chuckled I dont know everything about solar but I know quite a darn lot and will love to both learn and help others learn on this forum, my expertise is in off grid "illegal/ non code" systems, and i have learned how to build such systems DIRT CHEAP BUT, they do not meet code, So This is my new endeavor is how to build "code legal systems" for dirt cheap as i have always done but legally integrated if this is at all possible
I guess I can start with 2 questions:
CODE UL1741
If a unit is completely off grid, does it need to comply with this code? If the answer is no it doesn't need to comply, what actually constitutes off grid, are there exceptions in grid connected house where you can do this, in a off grid situation?
if you have a portable "solar generator" aka every thing crammed into a box can you legally connect this to a "generator port on a house" in the same manner that a generator would be [presume it is a split phase inverter with a L14-30 PORT ] im looking for a loop hole of the law on how use a non ul1741 inverter on a house in an emergency situation IN A LEGAL MANNER
I know these are complicated questions for a first post, but i am really trying to find a way to make these crazy cheap systems work in a legal manner as all the UL models ARE SO EXPENSIVE
https://www.bge.com/MyAccount/MyService/Documents/BGEInverterList.pdf