My inverter went kaboom

daveza

daveza

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My inverter was recharging after a session of load-shedding, when there was a very audible 'explosion' coming from it, followed by a strong smell of burning.

Heart sank as I can't afford to be in a load-shedding cycle without power.

Burning smell went away, inverter finished charging, life went on as normal and inverter is doing what inverters do.

So the question is, how can something explode inside the inverter, yet everything still works ?
 
Did you open up the battery housing to look at the state of the batteries..? One of them may have exploded and your inverter would not know any better, really..

That is assuming you have one of the battery trolley setups that are common place..

In fact, I think it was @Tinuva who had one of his batteries go kaboom on his ellies inverter trolley..
 
I would power off and get it check out. Maybe a capacitor has exploded. Complete guess here but it could be this was used for smoothing and still kinda works but now not efficient anymore.
Could be one of the batteries died?

Its quite possible for electronics to still work after something goes back, only for it to die a complete death soon after.
 
daveza said:
My inverter was recharging after a session of load-shedding, when there was a very audible 'explosion' coming from it, followed by a strong smell of burning.

Heart sank as I can't afford to be in a load-shedding cycle without power.

Burning smell went away, inverter finished charging, life went on as normal and inverter is doing what inverters do.

So the question is, how can something explode inside the inverter, yet everything still works ?
Click to expand...
What type of inverter, inverter on top of trolley type? Something blew and maybe it's not yet apparent, but you will soon find out.
 
daveza said:
My inverter was recharging after a session of load-shedding, when there was a very audible 'explosion' coming from it, followed by a strong smell of burning.

Heart sank as I can't afford to be in a load-shedding cycle without power.

Burning smell went away, inverter finished charging, life went on as normal and inverter is doing what inverters do.

So the question is, how can something explode inside the inverter, yet everything still works ?
Click to expand...
Sounds like a job for a warranty.
 
WAslayer said:
Did you open up the battery housing to look at the state of the batteries..? One of them may have exploded and your inverter would not know any better, really..

That is assuming you have one of the battery trolley setups that are common place..

In fact, I think it was @Tinuva who had one of his batteries go kaboom on his ellies inverter trolley..
Click to expand...
It would know better if the battery explodes because there will be sudden loss of power, however an internal short that kills one of the cells wouldn't raise an alarm if the voltage is still within threshold.

He needs to open the inverter as well as the trolley and check.
 
And here I thought you get batteries, you charge them with a charger and the DC electricity is then converted to AC by an inverter
 
WAslayer said:
Did you open up the battery housing to look at the state of the batteries..? One of them may have exploded and your inverter would not know any better, really..

That is assuming you have one of the battery trolley setups that are common place..

In fact, I think it was @Tinuva who had one of his batteries go kaboom on his ellies inverter trolley..
Click to expand...
Yeah one of my batteries exploded, but it was dead after and so the inverter wouldnt power up anymore.
Also, there was battery fluid all over the floor, so it was real obvious as to what happened.
The inverter was on new batteries, but it was sold a while later.

This case here sounds a bit more complex.
 
WAslayer said:
Did you open up the battery housing to look at the state of the batteries..? One of them may have exploded and your inverter would not know any better, really..

That is assuming you have one of the battery trolley setups that are common place..

In fact, I think it was @Tinuva who had one of his batteries go kaboom on his ellies inverter trolley..
Click to expand...

Yup it's one of these -

1616142800690.png
It's in a not so easy to access location but I'll get to it and see if I can spot something out of the ordinary.

One thing - I normally have 4 pcs running off it and they stay up for a 2 hour session of loadshedding.

Yesterday I had only 2 pcs on and at the 2 hour mark the inverter started beeping.

Is it possible for only one battery to be active, but the inverter still works ?
 
daveza said:
Yup it's one of these -

View attachment 1038922
It's in a not so easy to access location but I'll get to it and see if I can spot something out of the ordinary.

One thing - I normally have 4 pcs running off it and they stay up for a 2 hour session of loadshedding.

Yesterday I had only 2 pcs on and at the 2 hour mark the inverter started beeping.

Is it possible for only one battery to be active, but the inverter still works ?
Click to expand...
The 1200w version needs 24v so it needs both batteries online in serial.
 
daveza said:
My inverter was recharging after a session of load-shedding, when there was a very audible 'explosion' coming from it, followed by a strong smell of burning.

Heart sank as I can't afford to be in a load-shedding cycle without power.

Burning smell went away, inverter finished charging, life went on as normal and inverter is doing what inverters do.

So the question is, how can something explode inside the inverter, yet everything still works ?
Click to expand...

Explosion = bug inside got zapped? :D

Sounds like Battery went Bye bye.. Maybe Parallel 12V and now only have 100AH instead of 200ah?
 
daveza said:
Yup it's one of these -

View attachment 1038922
It's in a not so easy to access location but I'll get to it and see if I can spot something out of the ordinary.

One thing - I normally have 4 pcs running off it and they stay up for a 2 hour session of loadshedding.

Yesterday I had only 2 pcs on and at the 2 hour mark the inverter started beeping.

Is it possible for only one battery to be active, but the inverter still works ?
Click to expand...
It depends how compromised the other battery is, it will only be visible if one battery is really dead.
 
oh dear welcome to the Mecer explosion club. I know 3 people sitting with blown up trolleys/inverters blown seems like they like to go boom when warranty has just ended
 
Last edited:
x7razor said:
oh dear welcome to the Mecer explosion club. Know 3 people sitting with blown up trolleys seems like they like to go boom when warranty has just ended
Click to expand...

Trolleys or battries?

Only know of 1 trolley, rest are all batteries. Which makes me more determined to swap over to LiFePO4's as soon as funds become available.

Also LA's going kabooom seems to be a normal thing... not just here in SA
 
Dont let that **** burn your house down, have someone look at it.
 
Lupus said:
Mine is from 2014 and still going strong.
Click to expand...

calypso said:
You shouldn't have said that.
Click to expand...
e20876abb285bc3341a1c04084927e50.jpg
 
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