Lumina

Great workmanship but not happy with a few things.

I was really excited with the idea of getting a rooftop PV system, and Lumina had really good reviews. Their price was nearly identical to another very highly rated company in my area and I liked the look of the REC panels so we went with Lumina. During the initial sizing I proposed a symmetric configuration that was pleasing to the eye and was told 'we can discuss the exact configuration during the engineering phase'. Well, I was never contacted until all of the approvals were complete and at that point it was too late to get the configuration that I wanted. The Lumina configuration was unsymmetric and had 1 fewer panel on the highly productive south facing roof. It was not the end of the world, but I take pride in the aesthetics of my house. In the end I was able to get them to make it symmetric, but with the one less panel in the good orientation. The biggest problem, however is that the panels on the front of the house are in a nearly ideal orientation, facing almost south, and with a roof pitch that is good for this latitude. The 400+ watt panels are oriented well enough that they should be able to generate close to 400 watts during the middle of the day (cloud cover permitting). Lumina specified and installed 300 watt inverters so those panels never produce more than 300 watts. Instead of a sine wave for production I get a curve that is clipped flat on top. 300 watt inverters are ok for the back of the house where the sun angles are not as ideal and the panels cannot produce as much power, but not for the front. So why am I giving them 4 stars? Well, their Operations department that scheduled and performed the installation did a really good job and were a delight to work with. The workmanship is really good and everything has been functioning for the first 16 months of operation. There were no surprises in the pricing.

Satisfied

Technically everything went well. Administration administratively the experience was just ok