Solar Panel Installation and Roofing Installation in Manalapan, NJ | 24 kW Across 60 Panels

Manalapan, NJ · Client since November 2022

Louis Fisher has been a Green Sun Energy Services client since November of 2022, when the roof and the solar array were bought on the same day. The roof was finished on 2 February 2023 and the array a week later.

Two layers off, 3,300 square feet on

This roof had been covered over once already, so two layers of old shingle came off down to the sheathing rather than one. Deck protection went over the exposed sheathing, then a GAF Timberline HDZ system in Barkwood carrying a 50-year warranty and a ridge vent along the peak. The survey called for measurements and photographs of every skylight before anything started, which is the only way to specify and flash them honestly — a skylight curb cannot be assessed from the ground.

60 panels, 24 kW and two inverters

Sixty Hanwha 400 watt panels came to 24 kW on Snap-N-Rack mounting, finished on 9 February 2023. That is beyond what a single residential inverter handles, so the array runs into two SolarEdge SE10000H Energy Hub units rather than one, each with optimizers on its own panels. JCP&L is the utility and the first year was designed for about 22,861 kWh.

Four groups, and not one of them faces south

The panels sit in four groups, all at the same shallow 22-degree pitch. Two are on the back of the house pointing west-southwest and two on the front pointing east-northeast. The design models them between about 67 and 80 percent of a due-south reference, which is why 24 kW of panels is designed for a little under 23,000 kWh rather than the figure an ideal roof would return. The array is large because the orientation is ordinary — on this house, area is the variable that could be changed and aspect was not.

The number that gives away a shading problem

Two of those groups are on the same roof face, at the same pitch, pointing the same way, and they model at 79.6 and 66.9 percent. Identical geometry cannot produce a thirteen-point gap on its own; something is shading part of that slope for part of the day. It is exactly the case that makes per-panel electronics worth having rather than optional. On a plain string, the shaded group would pull the unshaded one down with it every time the shadow crossed; here each panel reports and performs on its own, and the loss stays where the shade is.

A car charger wired to the inverter, not the panel

The job also included a SolarEdge EV charger, specified at the survey alongside the two inverters. It is its own unit on the wall, but it connects to the inverter rather than to the electrical service panel, and that is the whole point of it: during the day the car charges directly from what the roof is making, and at night it draws from the grid. A charger fed from the panel cannot tell the difference between a sunny afternoon and midnight — it is simply another load on the service. This one sits on the solar side of the house and knows exactly where its power is coming from.

Questions from Manalapan homeowners

SolarWhat is the difference between kW and kWh?

kW measures the size of the system; kWh measures the electricity it produces or the house consumes over time. An 11.5 kW array might be estimated at 13,100 kWh in its first year. Confusing the two makes proposals look larger or smaller than they are.

RoofingDoes a gutter guard have to go under the roof shingles?

Not all of them do. A system that installs to the top of the gutter without lifting or penetrating the shingles leaves the roof installation exactly as the roofer left it, which is an important distinction — anything slid under the shingle course or fastened through it is interfering with the roof to solve a gutter problem. The roofing manufacturer's written warranty always governs any specific warranty question.

RoofingHow long should an asphalt shingle roof last in Manalapan, NJ?

There is no single guaranteed service life. Longevity depends on the shingles, the installation, ventilation, weather exposure and maintenance. New Jersey roofs face summer heat, freezing temperatures, snow, ice, heavy rain, wind, humidity and, in some areas, coastal salt. A properly installed architectural roofing system should be judged against the manufacturer's warranty and installation requirements rather than a generic life-expectancy number.