Its been a couple of years of research and dabbling in the solar industry.
After many requests to provide the service and a few badly designed installations on sites where we work, We final got around to taking on our first complete system.
The first one took a while (3 days) to lay out, install and connect and now we down to a day per installation. It takes longer to prep the equipment in the workshop than it does to install and connect.
At the rate this industry is growing, I am glad we took the time to invest in it.
The first challenge is stock availability, unless you have a few million to outlay to order, purchase and wait for it to arrive, you going to be a stranded with teams eating up your profit margin. You need to plan order and make sure the stock is ready for the installation. This affects the profit margin because I find the wholesaler tells you no stock, but they can get at an inflated price. Then there is the people who are buying up as much stock as possible to create the shortage then sell it at an inflated price. You will hear some BS about small margins. You need to note that the margins might be small, but considering the price nobody is missing a lunch date. 2 more of these solar installations and I have might have to register with vat again. Look at it this way, a double socket outlet you buy for R39.00 marked up R25 (R48.75) % is chump change compared to 5 % markup on R140k for small solar installation. You need to sell a lot of socket outlets to make a few bob, compared to a 1 solar installation.
Shop around, the prices are dropping as the competition increases, every man and his cousin is becoming a solar expert and supplier, all the large wholesalers have caught onto the trend. There is even money in offering training, get 20 people in on a Saturday @R1000 a pop, that's a quick R20k for beers
The next challenge is quoting and load profiles, people talk about load profiles and audits and all that stuff, but in reality, only one thing counts, the budget. Dont waste your time and money buying expensive test equipment to do load profiles. 99% of the installation I have dealt with, were done on budget, not load requirements.
Then we move onto splitting DB's. You split the DB into essential and non essential parts, but nobody thinks to change the socket outlets to blue socket (UPS/ essential). The home executive arrives, switches on the TV to watch their favourite soapie, runs an extension cord for the iron and finds the tumble drier, washing machine and dishwasher will not work, so another extension from one TV plug. Load shedding kicks in 10 minutes later and your entire system goes into overload-fault or drains the battery in 6 minutes.
Then you have the house which would fail a test report already at the main DB, not forgetting all the lights with no earth wires or fans or geyser not connected to the ELU. After a quick split and shuffle for the essential and non essential in the main DB. You could do what most would do, just dont fit an ELU and exclude the electrical installation from your test report/COC. Everyone else is doing it why cant you, considering there is no policing the gamble would be in your favour, and even if you do get caught, you just nod and send a team to site and destroy as much of the customers personal belongings and you will be thrown off site before lunch and they will get someone else to fix your mess at their own cost
. Trust me it happens often, there are a few dodgey contractors using certain branding as a false pretence that their workmanship is safe and up to spec. I deal with it literally on a weekly basis.
Reply With Quote
Originally Posted by Justloadit
Did you like this article? Share it with your favourite social network.