An Appliance Budget transferred from its Guided view opens in Guided timing. You say when each appliance runs, and Solar System Sizing places its hours in the day for the selected location, with no clock times to enter.
In Appliance Budget, choose Day for an appliance that runs while the sun is up, Evening/Night for one that runs from about when the lights come on until morning, or Both with its Day and Evening/Night hours. An appliance entered as 24 hours runs all day and needs no choice.
The day is divided into four periods from the location's solar data: Early morning, the Sun window, Late afternoon and Night. The Sun window covers the hours when the panels produce most of the day's energy. Night covers the hours when they produce almost nothing, so it can begin shortly before sunset. Early morning and Late afternoon are the weaker solar hours in between.
Day hours go into the Sun window and Evening/Night hours into Night. Day hours are never placed in Night, and Evening/Night hours are never placed in the Sun window.
When an appliance runs longer than its period, the hours that don't fit are its extra hours. Solar System Sizing does not guess where they go. The appliance is listed for a choice: Early morning, Late afternoon or Both shoulders, which splits them in proportion to the two periods' lengths. Only choices that fit are offered, and nothing is calculated until every listed appliance has one. Your choice is kept and applied again when the periods change, and you can change it at any time.
If an appliance's extra hours don't fit even across both shoulders, it can't be placed. Change its hours or When used in Appliance Budget, or move a period boundary.
To match the site's routine, open Review timing and choose Edit period boundaries to move the start or end of the Sun window or Night, in quarter hours. Every appliance is placed again in the new periods with your shoulder choices. The Sun window and Night are each at least 1 hour; Early morning and Late afternoon can shrink to nothing. A move that would leave an appliance with nowhere to go is not made, and the hours that wouldn't fit are shown.
After a move, Restore location periods returns all four boundaries to the location's periods. If you then choose another location, you're asked first: Continue uses the new location's periods, and Use previous periods in Custom timing keeps your moved periods and their placement in Custom timing.
Guided places hours for you. Choose Custom on the Guided | Custom toggle to place each appliance's hours yourself with Edit appliance hours. Custom starts as an exact copy of Guided. You can then move block boundaries, split a block or move hours between blocks. Each appliance's hours must still add up to its Hours/day, which is changed only in Appliance Budget.
In Custom timing, Switch to direct entry lets you type each block's average load instead. Return to appliance schedule goes back to Custom and discards those edits.
Switching back to Guided keeps your Custom schedule for later. If Guided or the Appliance Budget has changed when you return, choose Keep Custom edits or Reset, which starts again from the current Guided schedule. A location change updates Guided only; Custom and Direct entry keep their times. A transfer from Appliance Budget's Custom view opens Custom timing directly, with each appliance in its Load Period, and Guided isn't available for it.
Guided suits most homes. Custom suits sites with set operating hours, such as an office open 08:00–17:00 whatever the Sun window: enter the appliances in Appliance Budget's Custom view, with Load Periods matching those hours, and the transfer opens Custom timing directly. Custom also fits an appliance that runs at a particular time of day, such as a pump only around noon or a cooker at 18:00, or a scheduled generator or grid supply. Use Direct entry when you know each block's load, for example from metering.