DEMO — fictional range. Local brief only, NOT SENT. No personal data is collected or transmitted.
GUIDE
The order the questions are worth asking in.
This is the sequence a balance-of-system project follows when it goes well, and the point at which each step becomes expensive to revisit.
- 1 · The site
- Location, height, exposure and atmosphere
- 2 · The ambient
- The summer peak, because the thermal case is built from it
- 3 · The heat path
- Where it goes, and who maintains whatever removes it
- 4 · The cable
- Type, fill and separation, because these decide the tray
- 5 · The load case
- Cable, wind and thermal, not the weight of the parts
- 6 · The parts
- Chosen for the two cases above rather than by dimension
- 7 · The calculation
- Against the code, signed by someone qualified
- 8 · The as-built
- Because the installation and the drawing differ
Why the order matters.
Each step constrains the next. Choosing an enclosure before the ambient is choosing a vent area for a temperature nobody has established, and choosing a tray before the cable fill is sizing a part for its appearance.
Where projects usually go wrong.
Step two, assumed, and step eight, not recorded. Both are cheap to do properly and expensive to discover after a system is on a roof.