Can the Cerbo-GX be used to log all VE.CAN messages?

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Patrick asked May 6, '23

Can the Cerbo-GX be used to log all VE.CAN messages?

Summary
Can the Cerbo GX also be used to log the messages sent on the VE.CAN Bus? I hope this is a thing, it will help me a lot.

Rambling
I want to capture all the messages from a BMS I'm looking at to verify it does send the "Pending Disconnect" messages required for the WakeSpeed 500 to protect the alternator. I looked in the Cerbo Manual and I only see "logging" mentioned in reference to the VRM portal.

The battery distributor (Signature Solar) has shown me the Cerbo displaying alarms for when the EG4-LL V2 BMS sends an over or under voltage (as an example) but they have not shown me that the BMS sends the pending disconnect message that the WS 500 needs in order to shutdown the alternator before the disconnect.

If the cerbo can log these things, I can then direct the support people down the right path to confirm everything.

Thanks!

VE.Can

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Answer 1 · 2023-05-06T20:37:44Z

bathnm answered · May 06, 2023 at 08:37 PM

Yes you an get at the raw CAN messages. The system utilises something called socketcan and there are tools in the low level unix portion of the system. You would need console access via ssh, so do a search for venusOS ssh remote access. That said you will also need a knowledge of the CAN messages to find what you need. A few seconds of capturing the CAN messages without any filtering will generate lots of content.

You maybe better making contact with Wakespeed and asking if they support the BMS you have. A quick look at the Wakespeed site and various documents does nots how that BMS as a tested or approved BMS. That said there is a simple signal in wire than can be used to disconnect the Wakespeed, so if the BMS has some external relay control that can be used to tell the Wakespeed too shut down. It is referred to as the Feature In wire.

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Patrick commented · May 06, 2023 at 08:51 PM

Thanks @Bathnm for your reply. I didn't post the _whole_ story but yes I am working with WakeSpeed and EG4 (via Signature Solar). I am quite technical and could decipher a protocol log, but I don't need to do this analysis. I just need to nudge all these folks in the right direction as I'm working via the support folks and not their engineers directly so there is a lot of back and forth.

I was browsing the Venus OS wiki (why did I not look there before) and I see there is a section about dumping logs. I'll have a look at socketcan and this. Venus OS operational commandline manual [Victron Energy]

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