I have been a Skelion user since it was a for purchase software product. I have been happy with the product as one of several tools for getting my work done and I had no need to upgrade to the new $200 annual lease product. Frankly, IMHO, Skelion Is too simple to do the whole job of Solar design compared to other software options and is just not worth a $200 a year renewal fee.

Unfortunately the creator of the software set it up with an annoying popup and internet browser window which opens every time he updates the software and you open Sketchup. The other day I updated to the latest version just to make the annoying pop up go away and bam! My professional version license and the tools that come with it disappear and I get a pop up that says I need to pay $200 to get my license back. I email Juan and ask him what's up, and he tells me I have to pay $200 to be authorized again. I email him several more times and ask if I can just reload the old version I supposedly own and get reauthorized so I can get back to work and he stops answering my emails. Evidently the man wants some money and if I don't agree to pay I can go pound sand.

Well in America we call that extortion. I didn't buy the software as a lease product I bought it as an ownership product. Imagine if the manufacturer of your automobile from which you purchased your vehicle remotely locked out your ignition of that paid for vehicle and then when contacted said “You need to start paying us an annual fee to keep driving that car.” You’d probably be just as ticked off as I am. IMHO the creator of Skelion has become a money grubber who doesn't live up to his own sales contracts.

So, this situation forced me to get off my rear end and do some comparison shopping in the PV design software market. I was happy to find that there are many more options for a commercial designer like myself which are much better than Skelion.

After a lot of analysis I have become a Helioscope user. I personally don't like leased software but I decided that if I am going to pay a recurring fee for PV software, it is going to be for a product that has real value and really does the complete job of PV design and does it easily. Helioscope is easy to use intuitive and will definitely save me major man hours this year paying for it self many times over. I now realize Skelion is an amateur hour product and given my personal experience and the multiple posts for help with Skelion’s user interface in this forum alone, it is clear it has been costing me value time in my work day.

So, my message to other professional PV designers is don't waste your time on Skelion which I now know to be just a first grade pencil type of software product with too few benefits to justify the now ridiculous annual cost when you can spend a little more money on something like Helioscope and get more work done a lot faster. What used to take me hours in Skelion is now done in minutes in Helioscope and many more design tasks are completed in Helioscope automatically which Skelion isn't even capable of performing . You can even get a free 30 day trial period with Helioscope so check it out if you are a serious PV Designer who needs a serious tool:

http://www.folsomlabs.com/

BW

I have been using this plugin now for several months. It has changed the way I do PV system modeling. I now start every project in Sketchup with Skelion and then go to my cad program to finish the customer presentation. On some projects, I have created the entire presentation in Sketchup/Skelion.

What I like best about working with Skelion, is the ability to set the start time and stop time on any date for the shading from row to row and having the row spacing automatically calculated by Skelion. I have redone several system layouts with Skelion and been able to get more modules on a site then my previous calcs allowed.

I also love the speed at which I can complete a layout and then render it for a client in either jpeg or animation. This program has cut that time by leaps and bounds. For a ground mount where no building must be drawn I can create utility scale layouts in minutes. For projects where a structure must be created, the module layout is now the easiest part of the job. The simple rooftop layout shown in the attached file took 5 minutes and I know the row spacing is correct without doing the math. I've verified several layouts from skelion in other shading analysis programs and just by doing the math and the accuracy is excellent.

Figuring out the Skelion interface didn't take too long with the help of Juan Pons(the creator of Skelion)since he is so quick to reply to emails. He even added some features I requested in one of my emails. Of course a detailed manual would be great and I'm sure once the number of users gets high enough to warrant a redo Juan will do that. If you are a PV designer Sketchup is an excellent tool for Shading analysis. With the Skelion plugin added it can't be beat. I love it.

Barry
C3 Solar Design