Rage quitting Eskom, my setup...

[SauRoNZA]

Guys taking about using the geyser in Aux where does the CBI Astute come into the mix?

Surely it will only turn on when the Auxiliary activates it? So how does the Astute fit in as that can surely only work after the aux turned it on? And therefore somewhat meaningless?

 

[Snyper564]

Guys taking about using the geyser in Aux where does the CBI Astute come into the mix?

Surely it will only turn on when the Auxiliary activates it? So how does the Astute fit in as that can surely only work after the aux turned it on? And therefore somewhat meaningless?

Or do what I do everything including geysers on essential

 

[shadow_man]

Guys taking about using the geyser in Aux where does the CBI Astute come into the mix?

Surely it will only turn on when the Auxiliary activates it? So how does the Astute fit in as that can surely only work after the aux turned it on? And therefore somewhat meaningless?

It can I guess be viewed as a double fail safe, to ensure that aux does actually switch off and not bug out and use power when it shouldn't - but really for the most part it's not necessary then.

Right now my one geyser = essential, so it works regardless. My second geyser is non essential - so it only works if the grid is up. I'm going to what a timer on both of them for now (and in time move the second one to aux as a "set and forget" type model.

 

[SauRoNZA]

Or do what I do everything including geysers on essential

Kind of my plan hence the question.

I already have an Astute and pretty decent control over it.

Could easily make it run when PV input is X only.

 

[Snyper564]

Kind of my plan hence the question.

I already have an Astute and pretty decent control over it.

Could easily make it run when PV input is X only.

Exactly!

 

[Mortymoose]

That's because I'm still crying and rocking myself to sleep in the shower

It's probably a bit higher than it should be:
a) as there's so much demand
b) lithium pricing world wide is through the roof
c) i went for a decent big brand battery with a good bms

In the interim I'll let forumites guess and confirm / append the post with values later ; )

ELECTRIC DREAMS, Edgar......

 

[shadow_man]

An update - it turns out my meter was disconnecting (unhappy face and a closed circuit icon). Logged a c3 and CoCT came out to reset it, problem is it did the same thing the next day (reset again), and then the next day was fine - no disconnection...

Woke up this morning only to find it's finally disconnected now - apparently the city will install a new meter after the third occurrence (as mine's ancient).

First disconnect: 00:57 (FRI)
Second disconnect: 22:59 (SAT)
Third disconnect: 08:15 (MON)

I doubt it's due to my solar (as it's been up for 3 weeks prior, with no changes). More than likely there's some unclean city power coming through - inverter is correcting this and the city's meter is spazzing out...

 

[Mike Hoxbig]

An update - it turns out my meter was disconnecting (unhappy face and a closed circuit icon). Logged a c3 and CoCT came out to reset it, problem is it did the same thing the next day (reset again), and then the next day was fine - no disconnection...

Woke up this morning only to find it's finally disconnected now - apparently the city will install a new meter after the third occurrence (as mine's ancient).

First disconnect: 00:57 (FRI)
Second disconnect: 22:59 (SAT)
Third disconnect: 08:15 (MON)

I doubt it's due to my solar (as it's been up for 3 weeks prior, with no changes). More than likely there's some unclean city power coming through - inverter is correcting this and the city's meter is spazzing out...

Are you on prepaid? Some prepaid meters are known to give issues because the anti-tamper is triggered..

 

[Thugscub]

Something interesting. I had 6 100 A/H batteries collapse after 14 months of use. Now I am skirmishing with them to replace or refund.
So check your guarantee on your 220kg battery.

 

[Mzezman]

Something interesting. I had 6 100 A/H batteries collapse after 14 months of use. Now I am skirmishing with them to replace or refund.
So check your guarantee on your 220kg battery.

which batteries are these? what make and model?

 

[shadow_man]

Are you on prepaid? Some prepaid meters are known to give issues because the anti-tamper is triggered..

Correct I am - but I've been on solar for 3+ weeks and this is the first issue.

The first time round I confirmed that the area had a surge, the other occurrences i'm not sure...

 

[shadow_man]

Something interesting. I had 6 100 A/H batteries collapse after 14 months of use. Now I am skirmishing with them to replace or refund.
So check your guarantee on your 220kg battery.

With FreedomWon? You should have a 10 year warranty - unless you seriously abused the batteries, at which point you're probably hitting one of the warranty t's and c's.

 

[ADrunkTeddyBear]

With FreedomWon? You should have a 10 year warranty - unless you seriously abused the batteries, at which point you're probably hitting one of the warranty t's and c's.

IIRC freedom won still will swap out/repair batteries even if they are abused AF. There is a small fee that you have to pay I.E 20-50% of the battery's price to have it swapped out/serviced

 

[Thugscub]

With FreedomWon? You should have a 10 year warranty - unless you seriously abused the batteries, at which point you're probably hitting one of the warranty t's and c's.

Sorry Guys, it was Voltex batteries, normal solar deep cycle.
They were not abused as they only powered the led's, pc, TV, and router.

 

[shadow_man]

Correct I am - but I've been on solar for 3+ weeks and this is the first issue.

The first time round I confirmed that the area had a surge, the other occurrences i'm not sure...

CoCT came round today to swap my ancient prepaid meter for a newer one.

Also tweaked the solar to a higher value for pulling from the grid, so will see if either of those make a difference.

 

[Mzezman]

CoCT came round today to swap my ancient prepaid meter for a newer one.

Also tweaked the solar to a higher value for pulling from the grid, so will see if either of those make a difference.

CoT working on replacing my spinner to prepaid as we speak - was out of the blue - didn't request it or anything

Edit: its done - took all of 5mins

 

[shadow_man]

CoT working on replacing my spinner to prepaid as we speak - was out of the blue - didn't request it or anything

Edit: its done - took all of 5mins

The older spinning meters are nicer - as technically you could run it backwards

My meter hasn't tripped for tampering, since they replaced it - and since I upped the wattage from grid.

 

[Mzezman]

The older spinning meters are nicer - as technically you could run it backwards

My meter hasn't tripped for tampering, since they replaced it - and since I upped the wattage from grid.

yeah i was also 'running it back' on some days when we had excess and everything was done - will have to switch off that function now. Interestingly - mine fed back for a short whiole just now and the meter didnt trip / lose sync. I didn't get any more units (of course) but it doesnt look like the feed-back was read as consumption. I have one of the wireless Conlog units so no need to plug it in

 

[Mike Hoxbig]

yeah i was also 'running it back' on some days when we had excess and everything was done - will have to switch off that function now. Interestingly - mine fed back for a short whiole just now and the meter didnt trip / lose sync. I didn't get any more units (of course) but it doesnt look like the feed-back was read as consumption. I have one of the wireless Conlog units so no need to plug it in

That's actually a good thing. Your meter is not smart enough to recognise current direction. So you don't have to deal with issues around the anti-tamper being triggered, and having to call in to reset it each time...

 

[Mike Hoxbig]

That's actually a good thing. Your meter is not smart enough to recognise current direction. So you don't have to deal with issues around the anti-tamper being triggered, and having to call in to reset it each time...

Sorry I read that wrong. If it's not reading feedback as consumption, then it might recognise the current direction and trigger the anti-tamper. But the CT should prevent that in any case.

What you do need to be careful of is that your UI (the keypad) is connected directly to grid (so it needs to sit after CT but before grid), and not to one of the plugs connected to the inverter. Otherwise this might cause the UI to go out of sync with the meter...