Solar Water Heating Panel

Anyone got any experience of fitting/using a solar water panel? Quick shuftie on Google and looked at http://www.heatmyhome.co.uk/ . I've only a few more years to retirement and keeping costs down in the future appeals. Comments welcome.

If you make your own panels, do your own piping, and keep it simple, it might make financial sense. If you buy a system and have it fitted you will be dead long before you recover the cost in fuel savings. Look at the MotherEarth site for some ideas.

i feel oilman has pretty much summed it up.

i've kept thinking about solar off and on for a few yrs but feel it's not yet got to the worth putting money into bracket. the payback compared to the alternatives just doesn’t stack up.

just as an example i am even having trouble jumping from a conventional boiler to a condenser as my existing boiler persistently keeps going so doesn’t need fixing (which when the time comes would mean fixing with a condenser).

i am more aligned with the new building philosophy of keeping the heat loss down to in turn keep the energy costs down.

consequently my steps are:
1) keep an eye on your supplier’s prices and switch when appropriate to maintain best cost on the supply side.
2) analyse your existing CH system usage and modify to minimise the cost ie temp of thermostat, on/off timings, thermo valves, max use of gas fire
3) on elec side again analyse the usage ie use low energy lamps, pull plugs out to avoid stand bye usage
4) look at improving the insulation of what you've got in the order of draughts, loft insulation, cavity insulation, double glazing.

only if after all that would i then think of solar. however the principle does not sit well for me as in the uk we need energy when it's cold and this is usually when it's not sunny. accepting this is not the end and that solar is capable of offsetting the overall dependency then there is clearly a carrot to be gained (albeit on a long stick). if you still see benefit in the carrot then i would target electricity as opposed to water heating based on the large (current) cost differential.

what also disappoints is that grants are dependent upon having a system installed through a nominated supplier where as i feel they should be directly payable to the house owner and thereby totally separate to who and how the work is completed.

Its even worse!

The grants now are so small and only available to large installers. A small installer can easily undercut the large installers price by more than the grants so effectively there is no usable grant available except for HAs with many houses and great purchasing power.

I am solar qualified but cannot see any normal situation where a solar installation can be justified on financial grounds.

Only for someone prepared to pay a lot extra to reduce global warming can solar be justified.

Its a pity but thats the world today!

Tony