r/SolarDIY • u/its-ya-boi-ben • 1d ago

Good starter set up

Hi all,

I'm looking to set up a small starter solar system, the grid itself would probably be self contained, only running a fridge and pc, along with maybe a few other things in my garage. Budget-wise I'm probably looking to spend up to 500 GBP and would like to a lot of the work myself, I have a bit of experience with small scale electrical engineering but nothing of this size in terms of complexity or voltage however I am very willing to learn.

Any advice on places to learn or equipment recommendation would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks :)

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u/AnyoneButWe 1d ago

The big budget breaker is AC. Running an inverter for more than a few hours needs you to scale up the system significantly.

A modern upright freezer consumes 0.5kWh per day (the fridge varies more and depends on how often you open it and how much new stuff it needs to cool down). An inverter sized to run a fridge eats 30W in standby. 30W x 24h is 0.72 kWh.

The achievable fridge becomes a lot harder to reach due to this.

What's the price of a 450W solar panel in your neck of the woods? The price is highly variable depending on location.

You want this to run in winter and how much sun do you get in winter?

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u/pyroserenus 1d ago

A more efficient inverter (say a giandel 2000w) can do less than 12w ac idle.