Inverter Life Study - 15 years

[littleharbor2]

I got a spare S/E mppt60 -- problem is I have to climb on roof to re-wire panels. Strings now are at about 400 volts for Fronius. mppt60 max is 150 volts.
And what's with this forum site -- constantly logs me out

When you log in you need to click on the "Remember me" box.

[Keepsake]

Doing 'after the smoke' work on the IG5100. Found a charbroiled board in the bottom module. After removing I want to 'cleanse' the chassis and area of the carbon that is everywhere. What is best for a liquid cleaner and method to get the carbon deposits out ?

[DanS26]

One of these should do it.......

https://www.amazon.com/Falcon-Compressed-Disposable-Cleaning-DPSJB/dp/B0000AE67M/ref=sr_1_4?crid=T4J8YX8ZIKAO&keywords=liquid+air&qid=1679072816&sprefix=liquid+air%2Caps%2C148&sr=8-4

[Keepsake]

Did the break apart, lower power board had burnt sections of pcb, beyond repair.
So I cleaned up the carbon soot, put the good board back in and now get a State 431.
Manual I have doesn't show that as a code.

Found this ...

STATE 431

All power stacks are in boot mode

Internal fault

Do I let this go for some time in expectation that the board I have will run after some time ?

[Keepsake]

My last working Fronius IG5100 is bawking too now. I am getting a "State 425" code. It will self rectify but its cutting into production. It is going on 12 years old. Been changed out at least 3 times during warranty. It's not worth repairing unless their is a work around. I've seen online where a firmware upgrade is proposed. I have never had any data path into the unit so I cannot conceive how I can perform any upgrade. Has anyone here had this issue?

[brycenesbitt]

Survey shows 34.3% failure rate for residential inverters over 15 years – pv magazine International (pv-magazine.com)
Kind of confirms my guess over the years for string inverters. Most seem to make it to 10 years as long as the house has a good low clamp voltage surge protector but if someone wants 20 years they had better buy and extended warranty.

I have one data point, which is a dead SMA2500U Sunny Boy string inverter after 9 years in operation.
What it would really take is an EPA or utility requirement that all vendors share with researchers and regulators the service lifetime data they already collect on inverters.
This is important to understand the true environmental cost and benefits of solar as well.

[Calsun]

I paid extra for a 20 year warranty on my SunPower inverter. It failed in November 2022 after nearly 10 years of use. SunPower has not replaced the inverter as of this post, more than 6 months after it failed. I reported them to the local Better Business Bureau and all that SunPower did was to state that they had turned the claim over to one of their escalation specialists. SunPower is completely disreputable and I would strongly advise going with any other company's inverter.

To get my system back up I bought a new Solis inverter and had in installed. I will be taking SunPower to small claims court. The Solis inverter has a 10 year warranty and when it fails I will buy a new inverter. A warranty is worthless if the company chooses not to honor it.

[J.P.M.]

I paid extra for a 20 year warranty on my SunPower inverter. It failed in November 2022 after nearly 10 years of use. SunPower has not replaced the inverter as of this post, more than 6 months after it failed. I reported them to the local Better Business Bureau and all that SunPower did was to state that they had turned the claim over to one of their escalation specialists. SunPower is completely disreputable and I would strongly advise going with any other company's inverter.

To get my system back up I bought a new Solis inverter and had in installed. I will be taking SunPower to small claims court. The Solis inverter has a 10 year warranty and when it fails I will buy a new inverter. A warranty is worthless if the company chooses not to honor it.

Sunpower panels were once the Cadillac of the business - high quality - even though overpriced, overhyped and oversold.
However, their inverters were always rebadged stuff from others so I'm not sure a failed inverter is entirely their doing.

But, their failure to step up and handle your warranty problem sure ought to be on their nickel.

Since my system went on line 10 1/2 years ago I don't believe it's missed a kWh of production - probably due to a combination of good panels, care in system design and professionalism in the installation.
However, I believe I was one of the first on this forum to say unequivocally that their support sucked to the point I stopped asking them questions, and by the read of things lately, it sure doesn't seem to have improved any.
After all the horror stories, I'm glad I have a checked out duplicate to my inverter sitting in the garage next to the current one when it soils the bed.

Good luck in court.

[bcroe]

Life experience here is, paying extra for warranty and spending
a lot of effort trying to collect, is pretty much a waste. Mostly I
pay no attention to them. What breaks gets fixed, never mind
the paper work. Bruce Roe

[J.P.M.]

Life experience here is, paying extra for warranty and spending
a lot of effort trying to collect, is pretty much a waste. Mostly I
pay no attention to them. What breaks gets fixed, never mind
the paper work. Bruce Roe

Extended warranties for just about everything pretty much always were and remain a big rip off and nothing but a moneymaker for outfits offering them. If they weren't, tell me why outfits who sell them bend over backwards to peddle them. Well, it's because they are tremendous revenue and bottom-line enhancers enabled by low payouts and high premiums. Just ask anyone who's ever worked/sold in retail about the pressure to sell extended warranties as revenue enhancers. That revenue goes straight to the bottom line and is used to offset service dept. costs and much more.

[littleharbor2]

I recently got a full price refund on an Accuview weather station from Allstate. Yes, I was surprised.

[peakbagger]

I must admit for the first time ever I bought a Toyota Extended warranty on my Toyota Rav 4 Prime. Despite it coming with extended coverage for the drivetrain and batteries it is a very complex vehicle made in limited quantities with lots of Prime specific special systems. I didn't buy the plan from a dealer when new as that is typically a major rip off, I bought the same factory extension two years later from a dealer in the Midwest that sells the plans at a much lower markup ($1040 for 4 year extension compared to the dealer cost of close to 5K). The local dealer slaps a diagnostic fee on out of warrantee cars of $150 to check a code so for at least 7 years and 100k. I can avoid that fee. My guess is the likelihood of Toyota being around and responsive is far higher than an inverter manufacturer.

By the way I have heard that some sleazy installers were charging for inverter extended warranties but rather than buying if from the OEM they were buying a third party warranty. Good luck finding someone to call in 10 years.

[nerdralph]

I have one data point, which is a dead SMA2500U Sunny Boy string inverter after 9 years in operation.
What it would really take is an EPA or utility requirement that all vendors share with researchers and regulators the service lifetime data they already collect on inverters.
This is important to understand the true environmental cost and benefits of solar as well.

What good is knowing how long the inverters have lasted, when the manufacturers release a new generation of inverters about every 5 years?
I try to choose the highest efficiency of the lowest-cost inverters. Higher efficiency = lower temperatures, which should result in longer lifetime. That sweet spot has been the Solis 1P-4G-US series, but the new plus series is about 40% more expensive with around the same efficiency.

[J.P.M.]

What good is knowing how long the inverters have lasted, when the manufacturers release a new generation of inverters about every 5 years?
I try to choose the highest efficiency of the lowest-cost inverters. Higher efficiency = lower temperatures, which should result in longer lifetime. That sweet spot has been the Solis 1P-4G-US series, but the new plus series is about 40% more expensive with around the same efficiency.

I've got Rube Goldberg type forced air cooling system for my inverter in the garage and it lowers the inverter to ambient temp. difference by about 40% under full sun loading from ~ 30 C to ~ 18 C. Parisitic load is ~ 70 W per a kill-a-watt meter.
Cheaper and more reliable than any warranty. Next cheapest is the spare inverter next to the one that's operating.

[brycenesbitt]

What good is knowing how long the inverters have lasted, when the manufacturers release a new generation of inverters about every 5 years?

Agreed: the new inverter generation could be totally different.

On the consumer side:

• Oversize the inverter, though at a potential cost of efficiency
• Shade the inverter, or better yet place it in a basement or crawl space protected from hot (especially) or cold.
• Work with a reputable installer who has some chance of being at your side in a decade, when the issue arises.

On the vendor side:

• Don't use electrolytic capacitors. If you do, include a service manual and make those parts replaceable.
• Oversize other capacitors, as capacitor drift is a major cause of long term failure.
• Thermally isolate the case, so sunlight has minimal effect on the internal electronics temperature.
• Make provisions for active cooling, such as in combination with a heat pump water heater.
• Do accelerated life testing with a reputable lab: heat, vibration, temperature cycling, load cycling.
• Include extensive internal monitoring of voltage thresholds and the like, so raise a service alarm before a failure. Include temperature and humidity sensors in designs.
• Don't use the latest technology and smallest feature sizes. Bigger is more long lasting.
• Work with fire chiefs on a mechanical way to do rapid shutdown, so no electronics need be on roofs.
• Build modular equipment, on the model of the Framework laptop, so that inverter chassis can serve for the lifetime of the rest of the install, even as new standards and needs come into play.

On the regulatory side:

• Require vendors on a level playing field to issue warranties of a particular length (for example like smoke detectors which have warranties for their useful lives).
• Require vendors to share with regulators longevity data, in anonymous form.
• Grandfather so simple capacity increases do not trigger inverter replacement (see above comment on modular inverters / Framework ).
• Find no-electronics alternatives to the rapid shutdown situation on roofs, such as clearly marked mechanical shutdowns.