Transcription
Hey, this is Laurence from the Green Guys. You know, those smart guys behind the Solar Bouwmarkt. Anyone who watches more often knows that I finished the previous round before I went to the hospital to have my brain cut right down the middle, showing you the Fox Avocado at lightning speed. With the promise that if I came back from the hospital and was doing well again, I would explain more about it to you. Here I am, guys. I'm doing well. They literally cut my brain in half. But still, I'm just standing here again. It's been about three, four weeks now. Those kinds of little things. Okay, I've lost track of some things. But we're going to see right away if I have it all lined up correctly. If I can tell you more about the Fox. Because, well, those other green guys, while I was just lying in the hospital, really went all out with that thing. They've been playing with it and last week when I came back, they showed me all sorts of things, and we came to the conclusion that this is truly a great thing. This is a game changer. We're already calling it the Tesla Powerwall killer. Because, well, we at Solar Bouwmarkt consciously chose to ignore that Tesla Powerwall for all those years. Because, well, I'll just say it honestly. Tesla just makes it far too complicated with certifying installers specifically for that device, and you had to do all sorts of courses and things like that just to be allowed to flip the switch. And with that, they make it far too complicated for you who just want to do it yourself. So we said, let's leave that Tesla Powerwall alone. Because there are many more other better products, right? We've shown you that beautiful Smart Cube from Her over the past few years, among other things. We're doing roughly the same with Sig Energy. A fantastic product. Then, in addition, we introduced the smaller plugin batteries in the past few months. And then I think we've found a system here that stands in between. It's not a Mickey Mouse plugin battery. It's not a Smart Cube from Higher. Such a beautiful modular expandable system. But, guys, this thing can do almost everything that the Smart Cube from Higher, Sigore from Sig Energy, actually the two most professional products on the market right now, can do. Only it costs a lot less. It's less modular. Let me state that upfront. Because, well, with such an incredibly cool professional system, you can build it up modularly as crazy and as big as you want. But what we also see is that many consumers stay small. They stick with 2 or 3 batteries, which means, you know, between 10 and 20 kWh is enough for most consumers. And then I think you can manage perfectly with this. But let's take a look. Let me try to explain to you what it all entails exactly. We'll delve into the device together. But the first thing I can say about it is, it's not rocket science. On the one hand, it's a very simple thing, and on the other hand, it's enormously extensive. But what are we actually looking at? I'm looking at one unit here. So not a modular unit. It's one unit with a built-in 10 kWh battery and a 5 kW inverter. That can push 5 kW from the grid into the battery. From the battery back to the grid or to the fuse box. But it can also, and that's special compared to the smaller systems. It can also handle 5 kW of PV power. So I can connect a gigantic solar panel system of maybe 20, 30 panels to it, directly, we'll show you that in a moment. And it can handle that too. So it's actually in one unit what we see from many other inverters. That they have an inverter for the solar panels and below that a modular stackable row of batteries that most consumers don't build beyond 10 to 15 kWh. And then we have everything in one here. And honestly, guys, it looks beautiful too, right? With that white glass plate in front. They've done that neatly. But, well, being techies as we are, we naturally want to know what's behind it. What do we see on the inside? At the bottom, the battery compartment. Completely encased in metal. So, I don't want to talk about fire hazard at all. Then, above that, we have the inverter. Neatly, two cooling fans that can cool forcefully if necessary. We've already seen they don't run continuously. They only turn on when it has to handle a lot of power and gets a bit warm, then they turn on. I wouldn't put it in my bedroom, but still, it doesn't make much noise. And then, of course, the most interesting for us, the connection panel, right? What you might notice, what immediately stands out, is that we've run not one, but two power cables to it. What this device does is special. If we put this back between, let's say, the professional systems and those small plugin batteries, we often expand those professional systems with the off-grid capability. A completely separate cabinet so that when the grid fails, it takes over the grid and can keep part of your house running. The small batteries often have a backup port. Just one socket where you can plug something in. You've seen us baking with those small Marsdek batteries. Great fun. But this actually does it combined. What we can do with this device is a part of the fuse box. Because, well, step one. This device has a single-phase connection. So I can input single-phase. So I can connect to one phase of my house. And then I can also have it output a single-phase backup. And I can do two things with that. To compare it with the simple systems. I could make a plug on the input side and just plug it into the socket. On the output side, I could hang a power strip and plug in devices. Then we make it very simple. But I can also do what those large systems can do. That off-grid cabinet is built right in here. So in this case, I can feed the single-phase cable from my fuse box in and out again to the fuse box and hang a number of circuits behind it. The inverter can handle 5 kW in that way. So we could realistically, behind a single phase in a three-phase house connection, you know, three phases 25 amps, 5 kW, 23 point something amps. So we could actually have one entire phase of the house taken over by this unit. And we cover all three phases of the house. And perhaps also realistic, because 10 kWh of storage behind a three-phase house system gives you 30 kWh immediately. Or what I find even more interesting, you don't have to back up all three phases. You could also choose to keep all the circuits you want to back up on the same phases. And all the circuits where you say, "Well, if the power goes out, these circuits can also go out." You put them behind one phase. And the other two or one phase that you have such a device between, they are immediately backed up. This is truly a very nice system. And with it, it can do almost the same as all those professional systems from, you know, Higher, Sig Energy, Huawei, you name it, which can all do that, which are also, by the way, modularly expandable. Here we have it all compact in one unit for a price that is also more compact. Great. If we're going to loop it in, indeed, as a kind of backup unit between the fuse box, then it switches over as EPS or UPS. That's a choice with 20 milliseconds. In other words, the light doesn't flicker. And we can also, and I find that important for a device like this, because we can also plug it into the socket. We can very easily set the maximum import and export of energy in the settings. So we can simply limit it to the number we want, from 5000 to 2500 to 800 to whatever you want. But what I like most is, zero is also a number. So if I say I don't want to export anything at all, I just set my export limit to zero. That's also possible. To achieve all of that, we naturally need to know what's actually happening at the main connection of the fuse box. How much power is still flowing away or are we bringing in? Then we have to measure. Just like with all other battery systems, we have to put a meter in the cabinet. But they've solved that differently at Fox. It's not a meter that has to connect to the battery via Wi-Fi or whatever. No, it's a CT, and we place that CT coil in the fuse box and have to connect it with a wire. That means, honestly, there must be a wire from the fuse box to this device. That nice thin communication cable. On the other hand, if I were to place this at my home, I wouldn't plug it into the socket. I would indeed neatly loop it between the fuse box for a number of circuits for backup. Then you do have to run a cable to the fuse box. That means that second cable is naturally not that complicated. If I connect my solar panels directly, I have two MPP trackers. Per MPP tracker, a maximum input of 600 volts. That's nice. That means it's truly a full-fledged solar panel inverter. I can have 600V per tracker. The average panel nowadays is between 40 and 50V, depending on the brand and type. But that simply means that I can connect, let's say, between 10 and 15 panels per MPP tracker, or between 20 and 30 panels to the entire device. We'll help with system design, because it's often a bit more complicated. On the other hand, it's a simple calculation. You just need to know which numbers to use, but that's what the Green Guys are for. They're always in the Solar Café with these kinds of calculations for everyone. No problem at all. Then, of course, it can communicate with the big bad internet via a Wi-Fi antenna or via the LAN connection. And the result of that is a fantastic app where everything becomes so clearly visible. I'll show you that in a moment too. We've put the glass plates back on, because then it looks a lot nicer. But what immediately struck me, guys, is the small display on the side with a few buttons. Every setting I want to make, I can do here. Of course, I can do it in an app. Very handy, but I can also do it here. This means that if I don't have an iPhone, iPad, whatever, no internet connection, no Wi-Fi, I can set everything here. So I can use it without an internet connection. And if we're going to use the app? Well, guys, honestly, all those other battery brands make nice apps. There's nothing wrong with that at all. But Fox has surpassed it. You should come and see, man. How beautiful. I see, like with most apps, a schematic system of, yes, everything I have in my house. But it looks a bit nicer. I have my solar panel system with the inverter for the solar panels, which is, of course, built-in. I see the battery with what percentage it's full. I see the grid connection. I see all the power flows, which direction they're going, with the power they're flowing. Everything is visible. I think it's brilliant. And of course, besides that quick insight, we also have all sorts of statistics available, where we can view all the data per day, per week, per month, per year, for the entire lifespan. What we can do with the device in terms of usage, there are a number of different possibilities. We can set it to self-consumption if we have solar panels. In other words, I want to use as much of that solar energy myself as possible. If I don't use it immediately with my appliances, then via the battery, so that it discharges again at night. I can also set it via the small display or via the app to peak shaving, so that it uses most of it itself, but mainly removes the peaks, peaks in usage, so that it takes that from the battery, or prevents peaks in feed-in, so that it stores it in the battery. But I can also set it to feed-in priority. In other words, it will prioritize feeding back. To be completely honest, I don't see much added value in that in the Netherlands. But the most important thing is, and honestly not yet today, but in the next software update, we've already been promised by the manufacturer, we'll naturally get a connection with dynamic energy contracts, so that your own solar energy, which is always free, is used as well as possible, but in addition, the energy you lack is purchased at the moments when it's as cheap as possible, so that you can use it instead of buying expensive energy at that moment. And the most beautiful thing is also promised in the next software update. The AI integration, as almost all other brands have nowadays, so that it will do your solar energy and your dynamic contract much better via AI. Not yet at fixed times, but just how much sun will shine tomorrow? What are the energy prices tomorrow? What does this gentleman typically use on average per day? At what hour? And, you know, because it will learn how you use your electricity. And based on that, it will determine how much of that solar energy goes to the battery, when it buys the electricity you might lack, or when it feeds back to you if you have too much. That AI mode is quite a nice added value. Like most brands, it will handle it fantastically, guys. The Fox Avocado. Honestly, I'm in love. I think it's a fantastic device. If we compare it to everything we already had, I think a large group of you consumers has always fallen by the wayside. For people who don't want to spend too much, who just want a battery system with simple backup, we had those plugin batteries. For people who want a fantastic, self-working, fully automated system, we had the Higher Smart Cube, the Sig Energy, Sigore, possibly the Huawei systems, Solar Edge, Enphase, everything works fantastically. But, well, yes, let's be honest, they cost something, and this fits right in between. It can do almost everything those professional systems can do, but it really costs significantly less. It's just a bit more expensive than a plugin battery. Not even much more expensive. Feel free to check out the Solar Bouwmarkt shop. It will appear there with the current prices. And then you'll see that it's really not that bad for the possibilities that thing has. I think we have a winner here. The Tesla Powerwall Killer, the Fox Avocado. Available now at Solar Bouwmarkt. Guys, I'll be honest. After three weeks of them cutting my brain in half, three weeks later, to be able to do this for you again. I secretly feel quite good about it. Did you enjoy it too? Give me a thumbs up, and I'll make another fun video next week. Let's tackle a technical topic again. We'll see. If you don't want to miss it, subscribe to our channel. See you next time. This was Laurens. Greetings.