ENGINEERING SERVICES
With so many years of experience in the solar industry RRACKS™ is always committed to providing its clients with the very best solutions and designs to get the job done.
Not every solar project is the same and RRACKS™ understands this better than
anyone. No challenge is too great or too small and our engineers will always
work with your team to get the job done. Our team of engineers are committed
to working closely with the ASNZ/1170 Australian standards code to always
prepare and design the strongest and most durable solar mounting structure for
small households, commercial rooftops or large multi-megawatt utility scale
solar projects.
Understanding that the most important part of PV solar installations is ‘time’, all our products are carefully designed with fast installation always in mind. Time is money and with years of experience in dealing with solar installers RRACKS™ understands just how important it is to have a safe and reliable system that can be installed quickly and efficiently.
MANUFACTURING
Our group has more than 30 years’
experience in manufacturing aluminum
and steel components and works strictly
under ISO 9001 manufacturing standards
with Quality always at the forefront of
RRACKS™ ‘s manufacturing program.
Our manufacturing facilities are strategically placed in both the southern and
northern provinces of China, with our aluminium factory in Guangdong province
where the world’s largest Aluminium producers have been situated for many
years; while our steel plant is situated in Hubei province, China’s heart and soul
of steel production and manufacturing.
RRACKS™ will always work with our customers and our team to get the best
quality products installed on time every time.
ARRAY DESIGN
RRACKS™ has a team of engineers ready
to assist our customers and their own customers with any solar mounting solution design whether it be a small roof or large scale utility solar farm.
Our experience allows us to come up with the most efficient design as well as
making the whole installation as easy as possible.
Over the years, our team has worked on a wide variety of rooftop designs, wind
conditions and soil composition. We make sure that your installation will last for
as long as possible to ensure that you have a smooth running and reliable
installation.
Our team of experts will always be available to answer any of your questions
on existing or upcoming projects.
EARLY WORK STUDIES
Commonly, engineers representing Banks and Financiers will most likely want to
see the following studies to finalise funding.
Our team has been involved in every aspect of engineering services for many
large scale projects. We offer stamped and certified documents for funding
institutions, insurance or EPC companies.
Topographic and boundary studies
Topographic Surveys require “bench marks” to which ground contours are related, information regarding surface and underground utilities, determination of required setbacks, etc.
Flood study and flood protection design
requirement for flood protection from long term (area) flood and short term
flood from storm by: Evaluation of previous flood records from nearby water
resource e.g. river, canal, highway/road drainage etc.
- Investigation of site condition to evaluate for run off coefficient of ground.
- Obtain nearby rainfall data or rainfall intensity curve from the nearest station.
- Check site elevation, surrounded road elevation, bridge and public drain elevation compared to the nearest National bench mark (BM) or permanent structure for datum.
- Estimation of the peak discharges for various return period floods using modelling approach with the help of HECHMS software of US Army Corps of Engineers (USACE);
- Analysis and estimation of the High Flood Levels (HFLs) for the site location using modelling approach with the help of HECRAS.
Subsurface investigation
Our recommendation is to do as many bore hole tests as possible. The more bore hole tests that you do can determine the different layers of soil around the whole site. On some projects we have been able to establish that we can use different size screw piles for different areas saving a lot of money for the total project, whereas if you only have few holes you need to estimate for the whole site. This means you may waste steel in the ground trying to cater for one-size-fits-all approach. For example, for some areas you may be able to use a 1600mm screw and others 1800 or 2000. If you use 2000mm for the whole project you may spend a lot more money trying to cover all areas with one size.
GEOTECHNICAL WORKS
In PV module installations, the types of foundation are spread footing or short pile with their length between 1.0 m. to 3.0 m. with an increment of pile length of 0.20 m. (1.0,1.2,1.4 m. etc). Therefore, the conventional soil investigation by SPT with an accuracy of every 1.0 m. may not be economic for the design of the short pile length. In another area (substation and other building area with heavier structure), longer pile is needed and a deep borehole is required for prediction of settlement and liquefaction study. Penetration Test (KPT) DIN 4094 (Swedish Geotechnical Institute, 1989) with a sampling interval of 0.20 m and up to 5.0 m deep. Or when hard ground has been encountered to determine initial pile length which has to be confirmed by pile load test.Soil sampling for laboratory testing by hand auger (ASTM D1452 09, Standard Practice for Soil Exploration and Sampling by Auger Borings) in order to classify soil type and their index properties. In each borehole, KPT will be conducted at every 1.0 m. depth interval to collect number of blow counts and convert to SPT for further analysis. The scope of work for the geotechnical consultancy services of the project are summarized as follows:
LABORATORY WORK
Laboratory testing of obtained samples to determine the properties of the subsoil which will include:
- Unconfined compression test (ASTM D2166) in soft to medium clay samples.
- Atterberg limits (ASTM D 4318) and soil classification.
- Particle size analysis (ASTM D 422).
- Unit weight and Water content (ASTM D 2216)
Foundation design and pile testing
This is a technical study that presents the results of pile load tests to estimate
the vertical (pullout only) capacities of screw or rammed piles in the proposed
Solar Plant. The total piles tested will depend on the size and location of the
project. It will also depend on the variance of the data gathered from the KPT
soil testing.
Water storage (reservoir) design
Depending on site location and flood study there may be the need for design and building reservoir, also referred as Pond or Dam. Our team has the experience to design and sign off such civil works.
Liquefaction potential study
A study for liquefaction potential is required to ensure safety from the loss of strength in saturated, cohesionless soils due to the buildup of pore water pressures during dynamic loading from large earthquakes.
Liquefaction refers to the loss of strength in saturated, cohesionless soils due to the buildup of pore water pressures during dynamic loading from large earthquake (Sladen et al. 1985).
Generally, clay with fines = 100% does not liquefy. However, soils with high clay content do liquefy in certain conditions. According to the Chinese experience, potentially liquefiable clay soils need to meet all of the following characteristics (Seed et al., 1983)
PV module layout and electrical system design
PV module layout will be designed to optimize land usage and maximum output whilst considering shading and other factors. Electrical system design will be designed to meet international or local country standard.
Bespoke structure design prototyping services
Given the fact that not all projects are the same size, wind region, soil condition, budget, module type, and/or many other variations, it’s important to be able to have a solution no matter what the project may be.
RRACKS™ have the team to design and prototype and test for larger projects, with years of experience in this field. This can be valuable to potential developers or owners wanting to save costs on their future investments.
Soil chemical testing
Sulfate and salinity should also be tested to make sure that we use the correct
coating of galvanization on the steel screws. If there is too much salt in the soil
it can cause corrosion of the ground screw or rammed pile in the ground. The
following tests should cover the following for all steel and concrete footing
(underground structure)
- Sulfate
- Chloride
- pH
This test should be done in one location central to the project site.
Works Supplied
- Chemical analysis of soil sample to check requirement of concrete and steel corrosion. (pH, CL and SO4) Reports to be Supplied
- Determination of geotechnical parameters required for foundation analyses.
- Carrying out engineering analyses for foundation design.
Road and drainage design
Service road for maintenance of solar farm will be a small road 3.0 m. to 6.0 m.A drainage system is required to prevent short term flood from storm water. This will be designed at the early stages of development and can be arranged by our team.
Structural design and engineering sign-off
RRACKS™ has what we refer to as “blanket” certifications using AS/NZ 1170 Australian code. The term “Blanket” refers to certificates that we have in place for ground mount and rooftop projects.
This means that installers follow predefined instructions set out by the certification.
For large scale projects such as solar farms and large scale commercial rooftop projects it is much more common to provide bespoke certification and engineering sign off as the banks, investor or financial institutions will require this as part of the lending requirements.
Structural design and engineering sign-off
This is the report to present the performance of Soil Resistivity Measurement and the findings for solar farm projects.
The scope of work is to perform Soil Resistivity measurement at selected location. The measurement shall be performed at multiple points around the selected area of the solar farm.
Method of soil resistivity measurement will use the Wenner four-pin method.
ENGINEERING CONSTRUCTION WORKS
Our competencies include:
Earth work and drainage
Common civil works for solar farm including backfill, flood protection, dikes,
roads site grading and levelling are all needed in the consideration of building
the solar farm.
Our team have more than 20 years’ experience in project management and construction of various Earthworks and civil works.
Land survey and pilepoint marking
For land survey and boundary, Real Time Kinematic (RTK) satellite navigation is a technique used to enhance the precision of position data derived from satellite-
based positioning systems (global navigation satellite systems, GNSS) such as
GPS, GLONASS, Galileo, and BeiDou. It uses measurements of the phase of the
signal’s carrier wave, rather than the information content of the signal, and relies
on a single reference station or interpolated virtual station to provide realtime
corrections, providing up to centimetre-level accuracy. With reference to GPS in
particular, the system is commonly referred to as CarrierPhase Enhancement, or
CPGPS. It has application in land survey and in hydrographic survey. After
boundary works are finished we switch to conventional survey method for Pile
marking and row spacing. This method is the fastest way of pile making and can
give us tolerance of 12mm per marked point.
Pile installation
This information describes the procedure, equipment and quality control for the installation of PV module pile for solar plant project.
PV module piles are subjected to compression load (from dead load and wind), tension load (from wind load) and lateral load (from wind and seismic).
Mounting installation and assembly
We specialize in mobilization of manpower and provide teams of experienced workers to come in after piling has been completed to start delivering structures
into position. Laser guided levelling systems are used to align structures
perfectly.
Once structures are in place another team will come in to start installing thesolar PV modules.
Cable trench and DC connection
Our teams can also handle all your DC works, including cable management,
module connection, Cable trenching and tunnelling, DC runbacks and Combiner
box installation.
Grounding installation
Not only does RRACKS™ have its own specialized earthing solutions that are designed and manufactured by our factory team for both rooftop and ground mounted solar panel but we also offer installation services for all grounding needs.
PROJECT MANAGEMENT
The RRACKS™ team of engineers has been in the solar farm business for more than 20 years, both leading and consulting on more than 200 MW of solar farm projects globally.
This allows us to have a firmly implanted management system as well being able to help you set up your installation in the best possible conditions.
- Site management
- Staff installation training
- Safety training
- Planning and design
- Logistics and planning
- Schedule and budget planning
LOGISTICS & SHIPPING
Getting your products on time is so important in today’s fast paced solar world.
Our solar engineering company is committed to always keeping stock in our
warehouse together with our dedicated team to handle shipping, paperwork and
clearance documents, making sure your delivery makes it to your door on time
every time.
With offices and team experts located in
Australia, China, Thailand and Singapore our
network reaches far and wide, helping to get
your products delivered to wherever your
project is located.
ALWAYS CHECK YOUR OWN COUNTRY’S IMPORT RULES
RRACKS™ has many years of experience with shipping solar mounting products to various countries around the world, recognising that not all countries’ laws are the same. They all have different governments with different rules, FORME, FTA or even no tariffs in some cases.
For example: Thailand may be zero percent duty for aluminium, but could be 20% duty for steel, and Australia might be different again. RRACKS™ understands this issue and will always work to tailor the best solution for your project whilst optimising the materials used to cater for the relevant tariff rulings in each country. link to our social medias and contact page https
