It's about time I have lights in my home.

Author	Message
Godoh Guru Joined: 26/09/2020 Location: Australia Posts: 712	Posted: 05:44am 01 Oct 2025       Hi Mr Ozzy, that system looks excessive for just a few lights. First normal circuit breakers used for 240 volt wiring  work fine for 24 volt circuits. Lightning is very difficult to protect against, I had an inverter blow up ( fortunately repairable) from a lightning strike on an off grid house. Just the induced voltage in the house wiring was enough to kill some components. Without any overhead cables to the house you most likely wont' have much problems with lightning strikes. As Phil suggested some spare lights in a box will do the job. I have lived off grid now for 50 years and never had a light damaged by lightning. Only one inverter damaged once. If you are running 24 volt lighting then there is no need for DC to Dc converters. If you plan to drop the Dc voltage from 24 to 12 volt there are plenty of really cheap converters around. For you solar panels you are allowed to wire stuff up to 120 volts Dc without needing a sparky. So connect your panels in series parallel, I would suggest 2 in series and parallel the groups, that way you can send the panel voltage to the house at 60 to 70 volts and use an MPPT controller at the house to charge the batteries. There will be a lot less voltage drop problems. 6mm solar cable is pretty cheap if you can find it on Gumtree or ebay. You can parallel some up for your underground run from the panels if required. Multi led panel lights give a much better light than the old MR16 downlights, Anyway have fun and good luck. Pete