The alarm panel has it's own SIM card and you can control a relay via SMS, I use this to switch a 12v line on or off as needed. It's been on most of the time, but when it sent me a battery low warning (that means the 100aH battery has been disconnected by the charge controller) a simple text message turns off the Mikrotik Router and SiteMonitor, so when the sun comes back up as much power as possible is put into the battery.

I did get about 5-6 days of dull weather, but the days are getting shorter and shorter. It's really hard to tell as the system actually stopped logging data for 2 weeks before it cut off and I didn't notice!

The controller is pretty limited, it can't act as a gateway/router. It only sends packets of data back to a server for collating into a very nice but basic site. At the moment you can't control the relays remotely, only via pre-set parameters set up locally. They say they are working on a solution.

In an ideal world I'd like a one box solution, that uses almost no power. But where would be the fun in that!

I think I might try the extra battery and see how I go on. I actually need to move the battery outside the container anyway, so now would be a good time to do that. Hydrogen gas and fireworks don't mix! Who would have thought!

Cheers

Cris