[RE-wrenches] Remote Sunny boy Monitoring

Kevin Pegg kpegg at energyalternatives.ca
Fri Feb 22 14:56:20 PST 2013


Hi William, 

I have successfully used this product below on a few installs without line of sight, trees, hills, etc in the way approx 1 km span doing exactly what you are asking for - wireless RS485. It costs more than WiFi bridges, but it also works! 

http://www.bb-elec.com/Products/Wireless-Cellular/Radio-Modems/Industrial-Grade-Radio-Modems.aspx
Specifically, the LR-KIT, at 900MHz is better for marginal sites, coupled with external antennas and quality cable. Don't skimp! I used a Yagi antenna on the webbox side to transmit, with an omni antenna on the receiving end. Line them up as best you can and spend a bit of time adjusting until there's a signal. 

Once we got the units talking it's been 100% uptime for at least 2 years now. This company has all sorts of neat network products that I have been using for over a decade. Amazingly solid industrial quality gear. I believe they have a wireless AC relay solution as well I saw people asking in another thread. I never ended up deploying, but they had an easy off-the-shelf solution for a wireless gen start signal retrofit where pulling cable wasn't going to happen. 

Kevin

-----Original Message-----
From: re-wrenches-bounces at lists.re-wrenches.org
[mailto:re-wrenches-bounces at lists.re-wrenches.org]On Behalf Of William
Miller
Sent: February 22, 2013 10:20 AM
To: RE-wrenches
Subject: [RE-wrenches] Remote Sunny boy Monitoring


Friends:

Thanks for the responses to my question.  Here is what I have learned:

The main problem is that the Sunny Boy is remote from the house and there 
is no signal conduit.  There are any number of monitors that can hard wire 
to the Sunny Boy, usually with an RS485 connection.

Without a hardwire path that solution is not so easy.  Apparently I need to 
asses the viability of a wireless RS485 system.

I am wondering:

1. Do I understand the above scenario correctly?
2. Do any of you have any experience with wireless 485 systems?

Thanks again for all of the help.

William Miller


Miller Solar
Voice :805-438-5600
email: william at millersolar.com
http://millersolar.com
License No. C-10-773985

_______________________________________________
List sponsored by Home Power magazine

List Address: RE-wrenches at lists.re-wrenches.org

Change email address & settings:
http://lists.re-wrenches.org/options.cgi/re-wrenches-re-wrenches.org

List-Archive: http://lists.re-wrenches.org/pipermail/re-wrenches-re-wrenches.org

List rules & etiquette:
www.re-wrenches.org/etiquette.htm

Check out participant bios:
www.members.re-wrenches.org




More information about the RE-wrenches mailing list