MPPT 100/50 Sometimes won't start charging in the morning

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david-p asked May 7, '24

MPPT 100/50 Sometimes won't start charging in the morning

Hi,

I have two PV Strings - 1 connected to a SmartSolar 100/20 and the other (larger) string connected to a SmartSolar 100/50. Whilst the 100/20 works perfectly well, the 100/50 controller occasionally does not restart charging in the morning. This may happen once every 5 to 10 days. I can get it going again by turning charging off then on and all will work fine until next time. If it does not start and I leave it not charging, then it may start charging again the following morning! There doesn't appear to be any consistency as to when it might not start charging.

I reckon this started happening after a firmware upgrade about 3 or 4 updates ago. Each time I try to update to a newly released version I hope that it will fix the issue - but unfortunately not. It used to work perfectly fine for over a year. Both units are configured with exactly the same settings.

Is anybody else getting the same issues? Any suggestions?

Thanks!

David

smart solar charging behaviour

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Answer 1 · 2024-05-07T04:45:27Z

klim8skeptic answered · May 07 at 04:45 AM

@david-p it sounds like your PV voltage might not be high enough tfor the mppt to start charging the battery.

Post a screenshot of the mppt's detailed history, and charge settings.

Specs of your solar panels would be useful.

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Answer 2 · 2024-05-07T06:37:11Z

david-p answered · May 07 at 06:37 AM

Thanks for the quick response. Here is a screenshot of when I was on holidays and didn't restart the charging. As you can see there is plenty of PV voltage. The unit started charging by itself the next day.

Here are the charge settings:

Also please note that if the unit is not charging, I flick the 'Charge Enabled' button off then on and it immediately starts charging so I suggest it would not be a low PV issue.

For the panels in this string, there are 6 x 150w in a 3 parallel lots of 2 panels connected in series (if that makes sense!) They are fairly old panels.

Let me know if you require more info.

Cheers,

David

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Answer 3 · 2024-05-07T09:30:55Z

Guy Stewart (Victron Community Manager) answered · May 07 at 09:30 AM

Hi @david-p,

Apologies for the issue and thanks for the detailed report, I've asked R&D to have a look at your post.

We recently release firmware v1.64 to address a similar issue with the smaller models - https://professional.victronenergy.com/news/detail/244/

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david-p commented · May 07 at 12:16 PM

Great, thanks @Guy Stewart (Victron Community Manager) . Looking at the fix for the 100/20, it certainly looks like it may fix the issue with the 100/50. I look forward to trying the fix when it comes through.

Cheers,

David

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