Baoding Tianwei Solarfilms solar panels reviews

Chinese manufacturer Baoding Tianwei SolarFilms was among the significant players in thin-film solar panel production in the late 2000's through to the middle of the following decade.

Company Info

Baoding Transformer Factory was founded in 1958 and was subsequently renamed to Tianwei Group. Tianwei entered the photovoltaic industry in 2001 through Baoding TianWei SolarFilms Co., Ltd, focusing on production of thin film solar modules. The company's headquarters were in Baoding, China, which is a city in central Hebei province approximately 150 kilometres southwest of Beijing

By 2009, the company had established a 50MW production line and set the lofty goal of reaching a total annual production capacity of 500MW by 2015. That wasn't to be and it appears the company disappeared sometime in 2014 for reasons unknown.

Baoding TianWei SolarFilms Panels In Australia

Quite a few of the company's panels were approved for use in Australia at one stage; primarily from the TWSE-aSi and TWSF-W-aSi families in capacities of 80 W to 100 W. These were frameless thin-film panels boasting amorphous silicon single-junction technology.

The TWSF series in this capacity range were pretty big and heavy for their capacity (most solar panels available back then were); measuring 1300 mm x 1100 mm x 6.8 mm and weighing 24 kilograms. But a stand-out feature of these modules was their temperature coefficient of 0.21 %/C, which was excellent for the time and even by today's standards. This means the panels would perform better in hot conditions than their conventional counterparts. They were also more effective in low-light conditions.

Warranty Details

TWSE and TWSF series panels were covered by a 5 year product warranty and a 25 year performance warranty. While these modules would still be covered by the latter, the chances of a successful warranty claim today are thin (no pun intended) unless the Australian importer or supplier/installer are still around (as they have warranty responsibility too).

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