This week
in deals.
Eight hand-vetted offers on solar panels, batteries, and balance-of-system gear. Prices verified against MSRP and three months of historical lows. No affiliate-only listings, no rebrands, no fluff.
EG4 18kPV hits its lowest price since launch — $3,899 shipped.
“The closest thing to a Sol-Ark 15K at two thirds the cost. Our 90-day field test logged zero faults and 98.1% round-trip efficiency on a 30kWh EG4 bank.” — Maren K., field editor
Pairs neatly with the EG4-LL-S 48 V battery (also on sale below). At $216/kWh installed, this is the most cost-effective hybrid stack we’ve reviewed this year — and it’s listed UL 9540 for permitted installations.
· 14.3 kWh server rack
· 410 W mono · pallet 28
· 48 / 5000 · 230V
· 5 kW + 10 kWh
· 48 V · 15.5 kWh
· 440 W bifacial · pallet 31
· MPPT 250/100
· van / trailer kit
What we’d actually buy.
Our recommendations, ranked by specs we measured ourselves, twelve weeks of user reports, and dollars-per-useful-watt — not by the affiliate payout. Tested in cabins, vans, and an off-grid shop in rural Oregon.
Sol-Ark 15K-2P is still the one to beat — but the EG4 18kPV is finally close.
After twelve weeks of side-by-side logging on a 22 kW array, the Sol-Ark held a 1.4 % efficiency lead and far better grid-passthrough behavior. The EG4 wins on price, parts availability, and a friendlier installer dashboard. We’d buy the EG4 for a fresh off-grid build today.
EG4 LifePower4 14.3 kWh.
Holds 98.2 % round-trip efficiency after 400 cycles. Best $/kWh we’ve measured.
Battle Born GC3.
270 Ah of LFP in a golf-cart footprint, with low-temp cutoffs that actually engage.
Hyundai HiE-S440VG.
$0.33/W with a 25-year linear power warranty. Bifacial gain measured at 6.4 %.
Victron Easy-Solar 24/3000.
All-in-one 3 kW inverter + MPPT for off-grid cabins under 12 kWh/day. Bulletproof.
Size it before you spend.
Tell us your loads, your latitude, and your worst week of sun. We’ll size the array, the bank, and the inverter to match — and tell you what it costs at today’s deal prices, not last year’s MSRP.
Four steps, fifteen minutes, no email gate.
The planner uses NREL PVWatts irradiance, a peak-load methodology from the Sandia handbook, and a battery sizing model tuned for 2-day autonomy at 50 % DoD on LFP. Outputs are line-item BOMs you can hand to an installer — or build yourself.
- 01LoadsPick appliances or paste a utility bill. We auto-build a 24-hour load curve.
- 02SiteDrop a pin. We pull tilt, shading, and worst-week irradiance from NREL.
- 03System shapeSolar + battery, battery only, or generator-hybrid. We size the gear.
- 04BudgetSee the BOM at today’s deal prices, with DIY vs. installed costs.
Daily loads
Site & reserve
Read the quote like we would.
Drop an installer PDF and we’ll line-item it: equipment at MSRP, installer markup, labor at regional rate, and every gotcha in the financing or PPA. Then we’ll show you the DIY number, side by side.
SunPath Energy · Residential Solar Proposal
Customer: Eldridge residence, 12.4 kW DC system with 26 kWh battery backup, 25-year power purchase agreement.
Found
What it’d cost done right.
We re-priced this same system using current deal prices, a regional labor benchmark, and a fair installer margin. Then we modeled the DIY cost for a homeowner with permit help.
News from the field.
Tariff moves, FERC orders, new gear hitting the market, and dispatches from readers building in the back-of-beyond. Updated daily.
Section 201 tariffs renew through 2030 — what it means for panel prices.
EG4’s new 24kPV hybrid leaks ahead of Solar Power International.
Two years off-grid in the Sawtooth: what we’d do differently.
How we audit installer quotes — the four numbers we always check.
The Dispatch.
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