System Upgrade path

Mzezman

Mzezman

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Second battery installed this morning. all looking good

@Mike Hoxbig could you send me pictures of the following screens on your inverter please:
> LiBMS
> Batt Type
> Batt charge

I'd like to make sure mine are along the same lines, esp around charge and discharge current
 
Mike Hoxbig

Mike Hoxbig

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Mzezman said:
Second battery installed this morning. all looking good

@Mike Hoxbig could you send me pictures of the following screens on your inverter please:
> LiBMS
> Batt Type
> Batt charge

I'd like to make sure mine are along the same lines, esp around charge and discharge current
Click to expand...
Sure, here you go...

20220303_114605.jpg

20220303_114757.jpg

20220303_114818.jpg
 
Mike Hoxbig

Mike Hoxbig

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Mike Hoxbig said:
Is your battery capacity still 100Ah? Or has that now changed to 200Ah?
Click to expand...
Reason I'm asking is because the battery spec recommends a charge/discharge of 50A per battery. Each battery is 100Ah.

Screenshot_20220303-121255_Drive.jpg

However the inverter looks at the entire bank.

Screenshot_20220303-121036_Drive.jpg
The inverter manual says to use the entire battery capacity x 50%. For 2 batteries at 200Ah this would put your charge/discharge at 100A.

I think mine is set to 80A to be safe. But I'm not sure of the implications of setting this to a higher current. The manual does say that the 5kw model can go up to 115A...
 
Mzezman

Mzezman

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Mike Hoxbig said:
Reason I'm asking is because the battery spec recommends a charge/discharge of 50A per battery. Each battery is 100Ah.

View attachment 1258464

However the inverter looks at the entire bank.

View attachment 1258466
The inverter manual says to use the entire battery capacity x 50%. For 2 batteries at 200Ah this would put your charge/discharge at 100A.

I think mine is set to 80A to be safe. But I'm not sure of the implications of setting this to a higher current. The manual does say that the 5kw model can go up to 115A...
Click to expand...
Capacity is now 200Ah so i have mirrored your settings on those screens as well for the (dis)charge rate - thank you!!
 
Mzezman

Mzezman

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@Mike Hoxbig - managed to run the battery test experiment this weekend. Saturday was a bit of a mare - i upgraded firmware on the network kit and everything crashed - so spent 5hrs trying to rebuild it - which led to data loss and inconsistency on my side. On Sunday though i let the PV charge everything up and run the house then from 6:30pm, at 6:30am this morning we used our first grid again (kids warming up food for school)

1646636093055.png

We didn't run aircons last night though which contributed to the energy saving else we might have run out between 3 and 6am. Batteries were set to SOC of 25%.
 
Mike Hoxbig

Mike Hoxbig

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Mzezman said:
@Mike Hoxbig - managed to run the battery test experiment this weekend. Saturday was a bit of a mare - i upgraded firmware on the network kit and everything crashed - so spent 5hrs trying to rebuild it - which led to data loss and inconsistency on my side. On Sunday though i let the PV charge everything up and run the house then from 6:30pm, at 6:30am this morning we used our first grid again (kids warming up food for school)

View attachment 1260640

We didn't run aircons last night though which contributed to the energy saving else we might have run out between 3 and 6am. Batteries were set to SOC of 25%.
Click to expand...
Nice one. I recon if I set my SOC to yours (down from 45%), I would probably get to sunrise as well.

I've taken everything down by 5% now that load shedding is back. That should probably give a couple more hours at base load of 400w while we're sleeping...
 
Mzezman

Mzezman

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Mike Hoxbig said:
Nice one. I recon if I set my SOC to yours (down from 45%), I would probably get to sunrise as well.

I've taken everything down by 5% now that load shedding is back. That should probably give a couple more hours at base load of 400w while we're sleeping...
Click to expand...
Yeah - my 25% is extreme but i figured i must sweat these assets. Will bump them up as well for LS - this is where an integration with HomeAssistant would be perfect as the automation would just run by itself. Tomorrow is also looking like a low PV day so best to have some reserve
 
S

Saba'a

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My batteries on 20% shutdown.

25% is low battery notice

Think that is fairly safe. The pylontechs are 90% DOD discharge unless I'm mistaken.
 
Mzezman

Mzezman

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Saba'a said:
My batteries on 20% shutdown.

25% is low battery notice

Think that is fairly safe. The pylontechs are 90% DOD discharge unless I'm mistaken.
Click to expand...
I think my shutdown is 8%, 12% warning and 10% restart - or something like that.

When are you getting your panels installed and who did you go with in the end?
 
Mike Hoxbig

Mike Hoxbig

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Mzezman said:
workflow? not f(o)llowing
Click to expand...
The times for your cutoff points under normal circumstances. Mine looks like this
20220307_214342.jpg

20220307_214321.jpg
So the lowest I go while the grid is active is 40%. If there's no grid then I go to 20% until the inverter "shuts down". Trying to keep within spec but the installer said that our batteries can safely go as low as 10% with minimal effect on it's lifespan...
 
Mzezman

Mzezman

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Mike Hoxbig said:
The times for your cutoff points under normal circumstances. Mine looks like this
View attachment 1261250

View attachment 1261252
So the lowest I go while the grid is active is 40%. If there's no grid then I go to 20% until the inverter "shuts down". Trying to keep within spec but the installer said that our batteries can safely go as low as 10% with minimal effect on it's lifespan...
Click to expand...
Current settings due to LS else the midnight to morning slots would be 25%

20220307_222816.jpg 20220307_222727.jpg
 
Mzezman

Mzezman

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Joined
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Messages
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Mike Hoxbig said:
The times for your cutoff points under normal circumstances. Mine looks like this
View attachment 1261250

View attachment 1261252
So the lowest I go while the grid is active is 40%. If there's no grid then I go to 20% until the inverter "shuts down". Trying to keep within spec but the installer said that our batteries can safely go as low as 10% with minimal effect on it's lifespan..
Click to expand...
Any plans to get more components (panels or batteries)?
 
S

Saba'a

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Messages
8,232
Mzezman said:
I think my shutdown is 8%, 12% warning and 10% restart - or something like that.

When are you getting your panels installed and who did you go with in the end?
Click to expand...
Jaco - still awaiting installation date.

Must say I'm glad I decided to install, although still need to get more batteries and panels.

Aiming for another 4kw at least and 2 (or 4) batteries.

Edit
Ultimate
12kw panels for winter days (another 545w x 16 more panels)
21kw batteries (another 4 x 3.5 more batteries)
 
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