Testing modules (was tolerating 10% tolerance?) [RE-wrenches]

[Bill Brooks]

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Joel,

I think you made my point for me. My memory was that Solec was the low price
leader, not necessarily the honesty leader (might have been).

The way you made my point is that how can you honestly reward honesty. There
must be an unbiased evaluation to prove honesty. As you point out, almost
nobody can afford a $20k curve tracer so I think were back to needing
independent validation of products so that you are presented with facts
rather than marketing.

We both know that the manufacturers warranties are very carefully written.
Just for fun, I personally took a $20k curve tracer and tested every one of
my 40 modules and showed the manufacturer that they were over 15% low. I was
not even trying to get a claim and the manufacturer's response was, "your
curve tracer is inaccurate." Of course it had been recently calibrated, so
this poor neophyte engineer from the module manufacturer got tasked with
responding with this lame "your curve tracer is inaccurate" BS because they
had nothing else to turn to. Also, the warranty would have required that I
boxed up the entire array and mailed it to them. Then, with their 5%
inaccurate flash tester they would have said, "oh these are all within the
10% warranty window."

"I must be taking crazy pills" to quote Will Farrell from Zoolander. I think
we have a problem.

Bill.

-----Original Message-----
From: Joel Davidson [mailto:joeldavidson at earthlink.net] 
Sent: Wednesday, April 06, 2005 1:22 PM
To: RE-wrenches at topica.com
Subject: RE: Testing modules (was tolerating 10% tolerance?) [RE-wrenches]


Reward module manufacturers that give honest ratings with your money and
punish those who pump the numbers by taking your business elsewhere.

Honest ratings sell modules. Sales boomed after 1994 when Solec started
rating its modules more honestly.

Execellent modules command excellent prices. The last year that Hoxan made
48 watt modules, they were all 49.5 watts and above and sold at a premium.
Interestingly, H4048s were in such demand that one U.S. company private
labelled them as 50 watt modules.

Question - Hardly anyone can afford a $20k IV curve tracer. When your
customer says his or her 3 or 5 year old PV system isn't putting out like it
use to, how do you test for low output modules?

Joel Davidson

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