wwhitney
Senior Member
- Location
- Berkeley, CA
- Occupation
- Retired
The Gateway rating is 200A, and yes, that is what that means. Of course, in your installation, the feeders and breakers running to/from the Gateway may not be that large.
Cheers, Wayne
PV Array and Battery size
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Cheers, Wayne
caribconsult
Senior Member
- Location
- Añasco, Puerto Rico
- Occupation
- Retired computer consultant
Thanks for the info, and you make a good point. I think the grid to gate entry breaker is only 80a, perhaps less, and I think they used #6 wire for most of the connections, and that's sort of marginal for a 200a load..
caribconsult
Senior Member
- Location
- Añasco, Puerto Rico
- Occupation
- Retired computer consultant
We tried an experiment a few days ago. I turned on the breaker that feeds the grid to the gateway and then we ran the electric dryer and I watched the app. The house was drawing a steady 5.8Kw, much from the solar panels and the rest from the grid. The battery was already at full charge. Is this right at the ceiling of continuous draw through the gateway, or can you draw up to your service limit through the gateway if the grid is on?
ggunn
PE (Electrical), NABCEP certified
- Location
- Austin, TX, USA
- Occupation
- Consulting Electrical Engineer - Photovoltaic Systems
What is the OCPD in your TEG feed from the utility? That's your limit.
caribconsult
Senior Member
- Location
- Añasco, Puerto Rico
- Occupation
- Retired computer consultant
Not sure what OCPD or TEG mean, but we have 200a service from the grid, at least that's what the main breaker at the meter says. So you say we can pull that entire 200a through the gateway? The 5Kw limit only applies to battery powered use? I don't foresee the day when we'd need that much juice but it's good to know the limitations of your system. Thanks for replying.
ggunn
PE (Electrical), NABCEP certified
- Location
- Austin, TX, USA
- Occupation
- Consulting Electrical Engineer - Photovoltaic Systems
Oh, sorry. TEG = Tesla Energy Gateway, and OCPD = OverCurrent Protection Device, which in this case is the main breaker in the TEG, and it is probably 200A. Your Gateway should be transparent to your service as long as the grid is up, but when you are operating off grid you are restricted to the maximum output of your PowerWall(s).
caribconsult
Senior Member
- Location
- Añasco, Puerto Rico
- Occupation
- Retired computer consultant
Well! A completely lucid explanation in plain English! Thank you so much. I suspected as much but it's always good to get the opinion of someone who knows. Thanks very much.
caribconsult
Senior Member
- Location
- Añasco, Puerto Rico
- Occupation
- Retired computer consultant
Just to clarify that I understand what you've said. our setup is: We have 200a service from the grid, but the grid feed into the gateway has a 40a breaker on it, which at 240V works out to around 9,600 watts. So we could pull about that much from the grid through the gateway before it blew the 40a breaker. If we upped the breaker to 80a, we could pull twice as much, perhaps 18,000w through the gateway? I didn't know it could handle that much current. Do I understand this correctly? By parallel logic, if we increased the grid feed breaker large enough, would all 200a of our service be available via the gateway? We do have a switch that allows us to connect directly to the grid, bypassing the Tesla system entirely, and that's what we use if we're doing some welding or running the electric clothes dryer.
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