I did some work yesterday experimenting with solar.
I have 2 Helios 260w panels and got three salvaged Enphase M215 inverters. Those were from a friend who found them at an electronics salvage yard. (Too bad they have a weird mounting flange on them!)
I was able to "commission" the inverters using Enphase's "Envoy" internet gateway. The device communicates to the inverters over the power lines. So, that's used to set up the inverters in the first place, and then output production data of the inverters to the web after that.
The Envoy was pretty easy to set up with the "Installer Toolkit" App on my smartphone.
I was able to get actual power out of the solar panels. Pretty cool stuff!
Of course, this is all just experimenting. I was using a temporary power connection, the solar panels were just leaned up against my garage, and I was making sure to use plenty of electricity at my house at the time so I couldn't spin the meter backwards.
Actually DOING some of this makes me feel much more confident about my system.
Solar Experimenting
Part 1 of 2
Part 2 of 2