Solar System Upgrades & Add-Ons

Usually yes, and it is one of the most common upgrades we do. The limits are roof space, the headroom left in your inverter, and your grid connection agreement. Where the existing inverter is already near capacity, the answer is often a second inverter or a swap rather than simply clipping more panels onto the end of the rails.

Yes. A retrofit battery is one of the biggest changes you can make to an older system, because it lets you use the generation you are currently exporting for very little. Depending on your existing inverter it is either an AC-coupled battery alongside it, or a hybrid inverter that replaces it. We size it against your actual consumption rather than your roof.

They can, but they should not simply be put on the same string. Mixing modules of different age, wattage or electrical characteristics on one string drags the whole string toward the weakest panel. The usual answer is to run new panels on their own string or their own MPPT input so both sets perform properly.

Age, efficiency and compatibility. Inverters typically have a shorter working life than panels, so on a system over about ten years old the inverter is the component most likely to be the bottleneck. Frequent fault codes, no useful monitoring, or a unit with no headroom for the panels you want to add are all reasons to change it.

In most cases yes, because the mounting, cabling and much of the array are already there and still serviceable. Upgrading targets the specific component that is limiting you. Where a system is very old, undersized and out of warranty, replacement can work out better, and we will say so rather than sell you an upgrade that does not pay.

It can, and this is worth checking before any work starts. Changing the declared capacity of a system that sits under a legacy feed-in tariff agreement can affect your payments. Adding a battery or replacing an inverter is usually handled differently from adding generation capacity, so tell us if you are on a FiT and we will work around it.

Often yes. Some older inverters accept a communication module or data logger; where they do not, a separate consumption monitor clamped at the meter gives you generation and usage in an app without touching the inverter. Monitoring is usually the cheapest upgrade and the one that shows you whether anything else is wrong.

Adding a small number of panels or swapping an inverter is typically a day. A battery retrofit is usually a day, sometimes two where the electrical work is more involved. We confirm the timescale after the system analysis, because access and the state of the existing wiring move it more than the new hardware does.