Now you didn't provide me your voltage drop....I noticed...I will guess to make your 2% you are roughly at 300mv or so after spending nearly 600.00 in cable costs, I spent 265 have a 820mv drop .That link I sent is for a company from Saskatchewan, as you can see the advertised price on the net,That brand is good. there are others as well, go to home depot on line sales.....149.00. that's a US price don't know that brand, with exchange it would be roughly 180, add shipping up here and you would only be a little over 200
Ok, see this is why someone needed to call it....the goal post are now being moved on me, saying well they are no good for any decent size system......we arnt talking large system just your example designed to make mppt look better than it is. Saying ,"The more solar you add, the problem of current and voltage drop will just get worse". moving the goal posts on me again...I would love to address that as well, but one thing at a time please.
820 -300mv drop in cables for a diference of 520mv`are you or is anyone going to tell me 500mv is going to make any charging difference in the example given...none, not one bit.....consider this....17.9 is the power point for these panel. 50 ft run x 2 is 100ft of 10 gauge. Using 10 gauge would give me a drop of 820mv, not so much as a volt...... I would still be at 17.1 volts. That's a little over 4 percent drop and its nothing...so why are they/you using 2 percent...its just to make mppt look more affordable by specing unneeded requirements that drive costs north.
Now here is where how absolutely bat shit nutty that is.....take your voltmeter put it on your batts lets just say its morning your batts are down to 12.5 the suns coming up so you will be bulk charging, Take a second voltmeter put it on your panel leads, anyone of a set. What voltage will you read on this second meter 50 feet away at your panels? Mosfet drop through your controler at .3 volts...through your cables 820mv.....

13.62 is what you will be measuring at your panels 😯 where did your 17.9 go??? You have just lost 4.28 volts!!! Gone!! you have lost 24%...and guess what.. measure the batt voltage on your 3600 dollar system and tell me what it will be...THE EXACT SAME
You have lost all those volts because a lead acid battery is more powerfull than a solar panel or a bunch of them and when they go head to head the batts win and load down the voltage....every time....... Panel voltage will = battery voltage + series voltage losses every time.. (with the controller active in bulk) your 2 or my 4% losses never even come into play, absolutely irrelevant the only time cable losses will factor in as a voltage loss, is if they were greater than a couple or 3 volts and taking charging voltage below 15 or 15.5 volts or so. Don't respond just consider the point.. chew it over and maybe reluctantly after a while you will say...ok that sob is right... 😉
I don't need no stinking mppt to charge 12 volt batts with 12 volt panels from 50 feet away!!!
Now you forget I had a 141 dollars extra so I can just throw that at things you have ojected to..not happy with blade fuse no problem. dc rated fuses and holders avalible at any electrical supply house try Ecole how about the KLKD-XX littlefuse rated to 600 volts DC paired with a Wohner brand midget fuseholder, or the dc square d you mentioned right from home depot, and come on you cant say you wont use it do to weather concerns! some how I think you can find a way to mount it out of the rain...or inside a pv enclosure.......you can do it I know you can 🙂

But to be honest In the real world I wouldn't do any of that the way I described 😯 I mean I could but...why.
lets buy 5 250watt 24 volt panels for 1100.00 (brick mortar store in Canada) 220.00 a panel
your price for a combiner box 167.00
your breakers and price110.00
my previous listed controller 136.53
500 ft of 8 gauge hook up wire doing the same as before as it comes in 500ft roll so what the hell I will use it up,.61 cents foot so 305.00 I am now at 1.7 (in imaginary cable voltage losses, I say imaginary cause while in theory they exist in these examples never do, never effect anything) I have your 2% in losses beat at 1.7 % Crunch the numbers yourself...max power voltage 30.1 at 8.3 amps 8awg!! an a 100 ft run 😀 Are you happy now 😀 The charge controler does not care if its using 24 volt or 12 volt panels (its non denominational 😀 ) to charge batts.
But this now brings up another question for you. Have you really been buying 500 dollar 12 volt panels, when you could have just used a 24 volt panel (for 220.00) that puts out a equal or greater amperage?? Think outside the box and view a panel as a current source, and use it as such....if I had a system put in at your costs and found out later that I could have saved half the price in panels I would be very angry with you.. 😯
I havnt even gotten to the charging characteristics of lead acid batts, that again negates the need for mppt, nor have I come to the true cost of the mppt controlers regarding how many you will go through in the life of your system ( I say 3), do to electrolytic cap failure in the dc to dc converter section,...way to much typing, if I wasnt stuborn I would just say you win...But I am stuborn, and right
Also, come on now, a guy buys another panel doubling his wattage and happens to buy a mppt controller as well and is happy with his system.
I propose to you that doubling his wattage.. a 100 pecent increase in power, would make anyone happy, regardless of controller, he could charge with wet spaghetti and be happy cause he has twice the wattage!
Now, do you yield? is this the hill you wish to die on? (figuratively)..defending mppt for batt charging...Do I have to go on!....that's right I got more where this came from!!

mppt for grid tie, selling back or net mettering...best way to go...controller failures don't really mater as mppt will have earned its replacement costs, because the grid is unlimited with respect to the amount of power you can dump back on it mppt pays for itself in that application...lead acid bank cant be used like that, infact the opposite as the bulk fill is completed the controller must phase back the power its putting into the bank or we will get excesive off gasing of the batts..that's right your expensive mppt controller has to reduce its output..like every other controller and that's what it will be doing...you bought a jag that can hit 300kmhr but there is a 2x4 under the petal not letting you go more than 80kmhr. You can drive 300km hr down your driveway but only 80kmhr when you hit the road, that might be a better way to express it. Go 12 volt panels (or 24volt) for 12 volt banks, with a C60, 24 volt panels with a 24 volt bank and a C60, then take the money you saved on controlers and buy 2 more panels outside of your normal array, stick them on a pole back to back facing east,west (so your getting power first thing at sunrise, all the way to sunset) and that will produce for you more real power day in and out than any mppt system...and trouble free

by the way I had given that vid a thumbs down...looks like his utube vid doesn't register thumbs down votes!

I must add that mppt with batt charging if your using a wind turbine,do to the nature of how you can plot a I/V curve for your situation is more practical in that application though by no means exclusively so.

Just back to add (cause everything doesn't come to mind at once) whether standard charge controlers or mppt often do to the large arrays both system likely will require two charge controlers so if you have gone mppt then you take a costly hit twice. If you are uncomfortable with working around electricity mppt isn't really something you should tackle as a first electrical project, its just that the high DC voltage you can be working with ,and likely higher batt voltages 48 can hurt like hell during a moment of inattention, where as the 12, and 24volt systems are simple and more forgiving for the do it yourselfer.

Talk about moving goal posts!
Your argument has gone from MPPT is overrated, to I can do it just as good, see my way!
I have always maintained exactly the same position (a,b & c from above).
So, I will go over this again:

First off, with regard to voltage drop, you may choose to use conductors that allow for large voltage drops, but the CEC would disagree with you. The maximum allowed from panels to controller would be 3%, with 2% being very common.

Second, you can use DC fuses such as the ones you describe (KLKD, etc...) for over-current protection only. You would need to add another load break switch (again, DC rated).

Third, your argument about battery voltage dragging down PV voltage is a big reason why you should use MPPT. A traditional PWM controller will drag the PV voltage down to battery voltage a number of times per second. As it does, the real output power to the battery bank drops as well.
MPPT controllers will allow the array to operate at its optimal voltage and increase the current being charged at battery voltage.

Fourth, you can certainly use a 60 cell solar panel to charge a 12V battery bank, as long as the charge controller maximum voltage input is high enough to accept it, but it is not advisable. However, if your charge controller is PWM, then it will function as I described in #3 above. So, your cheap 60 cell panel with a Vmp of 30V and a "rated" output of somewhere around 250W is now only delivering somewhere around 140W of power. Not such a good deal anymore. Moreover, if you try to use 60 cell solar panels to charge 24V battery banks (all solar in parallel), then the batteries will never get fully charged in the summer. The voltage isn't high enough.

Maybe you should read the white paper written by MorningStar. They make top of the line PWM and MPPT controllers. They can explain the differences (without prejudice) to you.
http://www.morningstarcorp.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/Morningstar-Corporation-Traditional-PWM-vs-TrakStar-MPPT-Whitepaper-March-2015.pdf

Wow...
I managed to reply without using any emoticons.

Still

ILL BE BACK............... 😆 😮 😯 😕 🙁 🙂 😀 😎 :geek: 🙂 😉 😮

Well, I'm not Anne Sullivan. I'm done trying...