Well, the scaffolding will get taken away this week, so I went up the ladder for these..
The panel is called 'Storlux' I won it on eBay over two years ago.
Due to the fact that at the time I bought it we were between houses and living in rented(!), it took me a year before I hired a van and collected from a most helpful chap in Somerset.
He had been reluctant to send it via carrier (he had bought a fair few of these direct from China, and had many losses due to broken tubes). I was the last person to collect mine, and he had no spare tubes left, but he did give me a spare heat tube and a couple of the plastic tube fixings.
Here's the whole thing.
Photographed at 08:00 on 10 May 2009
It was 8C overnight, this roof faces almost directly south, the tubes still have dew on them, and as you can see, the sun is at a very low angle.
33C collector temp.
Connector of water pipe into tube manifold. I have used a ready made flashing kit to go through the tiles.
The pipe is insulated with Amaflex, then covered with water proofing tape to keep the birds from pecking at it. Which is a pity, 'cause the Armaflex looked really smart and 'techie', whereas this looks like a stick mess.
The plastic ring with the jubilee clip is slotted into the lower frame crosspiece.
The tubes get passed from the top down into the plastic ring.
The bottom plastic part is then screwed into the ring to stop the tube falling out.
Finally, the jubilee clip is tightened to secure the whole fitting and stop the fitting unscrewing. I have put a spot of silicone on each thread to prevent unscrewing.
If you overtighten the clip, you break the tube. It was the last one! You then have to drive 2 hours each way to collect a new one.
I bought three spare tubes from Navitron - for the individual cost I regarded it as insurance, since the trip to Oakham took half a day. I'm pretty certain that my panel is the same as the Navitron slim line 58mm. I originally thought that my frame was powdercoated steel, but following some fettling (attack with grinder) to make it work, it turned out to be stainless (good!).
I bought a collection of bits and bobs from Navitron, excellent service, both online and face to face.
I'll post some pics of the pipes and stuff later if you want.
