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roblatour avatar image
roblatour asked

SmartSolar MPPT 150/35 without battery

I am building a small solar system, to start it will have only 4 100 watt panels, but I may expand it to have 8 in the future.

For this I have bought a SmartSolar MPPT 150/35.

However, I have not yet bought a battery / batteries nor an inverter.

My question is, can I hook the solar panels up to the MPPT without having a battery connected?

I want to do this in order to be able to:

a) to check periodically thru the day to see what volts / amps are coming into the unit,

b) connect the MPPT thru to home assistant, and

c) help ensure the MPPT I get works (at least to some extent).


MPPT SmartSolar
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3 Answers
nickdb avatar image
nickdb answered ·

Without a load you're not going to get any benefit from doing this. While not recommended, the mppt can be used as a power supply, so perhaps rather find yourself a suitable DC load to attach.

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pwfarnell answered ·

Make sure that you set the MPPT voltage before you start rather than let it auto detect the system voltage, without a battery it will not have a reference for its voltage. It is usually recommend that you connect the battery before you connect the panels.

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roblatour avatar image
roblatour answered ·

ok thanks very much - sounds as if I should wait until I get the battery

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