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motylu avatar image
motylu asked

EVCS - new FW 1.27 in detail

Hello @Lucian Popescu (Victron Energy Staff).

Please, is it possible to describe in more detail changes in new FW 1.27, especially these three points:

  • "Added additional case to start charging when there is no PV power and backup battery has maximum SoC." What is behaviour of this new case? "No PV power" means also situation when feed-in DC excess power is for some reason disabled?
  • "The 'Start SoC' parameter no longer has an effect on stopping charging in Auto mode." This means, that now parameter "Start charging at backup battery SoC(%):" has no effect to stop charging and there will be no "Low SOC" state in Auto mode? When EV charging will be interrupted in Auto mode?
  • "During the charging stop, the current value is reduced to the minimum." This means that after request for stop charging, EVCS will set minimal charging current and then will stop the charging?


Thank you very much!

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3 Answers
Matthias Lange - DE avatar image
Matthias Lange - DE answered ·

1. I think this is related to off-grid systems or systems with zero-feed-in.
In such systems you don't have surplus energy to start the charging in automatic mode.
You are stuck in a "dead lock".

The sun is shining your house battery is full but you can't charge your car because the house battery is full and the PV production is throttled to 0.

You have to start the charging manually.

I guess/hope that with that new feature it will start the charging in automatic mode if the battery is at 100% even if there is currently no PV production.

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Lucian Popescu (Victron Energy Staff) avatar image Lucian Popescu (Victron Energy Staff) ♦♦ commented ·
Yes, that's corect Matthias
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motylu avatar image motylu commented ·

Yes @Matthias Lange - DE and @Lucian Popescu (Victron Energy Staff) , this makes sense, but detail description of this and other changes is not even available on Victron Professional site...

Because I am controlling feed-in based on price, so I must added simple solution to enable feed-in during charging in Auto mode. But some new solution from Victron would be great.

And what about two remaining points?

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Lucian Popescu (Victron Energy Staff) avatar image
Lucian Popescu (Victron Energy Staff) answered ·

And for the 3rd question, yes it is firstly reducing the curent and then stop. This is to increase the lifetime of contactor and to have lower spikes induced by those contactors during opening.

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motylu avatar image motylu commented ·
Yes, also this completely makes sense... :--)
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motylu avatar image
motylu answered ·

And about 2nd point/question @Lucian Popescu (Victron Energy Staff) ? :--)

I suppose, that start of charging in Auto mode is still defined by EVCS parameter "Start charging at backup battery SoC(%)".

So now end of charging is only based on available PV power? If charging from grid/battery is allowed, then (after PV power drops below minimal value sufficient for EV charging according to set minimal charging current) charging continues for defined time and charging is stopped and EVCS state is changed from Charging to Waiting for sun? So Low SOC state is no more used for Auto mode if system is not running off-grid?

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motylu avatar image motylu commented ·
Hi, @Lucian Popescu (Victron Energy Staff) .

I tested this changes during last two sunny days and now the behaviour is completely different from the previous version.

In previous version, when SOC drops below defined value, charging was automatically stopped and EVCS stays in "Low SOC" state. If car was left connected to the EVCS then the next day charging automatically continues when SOC was increased above defined value (and of course there was enough PV power).

But now charging is automatically stopped when there is not enough PV power and next day you must make start charging again, even when car was not unplugged.

Why you changed this behaviour to (for me) this much worse solution? For many end-users, who has limited access to the system (basic level, because Victron system supports only two levels - full and basic), this is problem, because if they left car plugged in, they must manually make start charging command on the EVCS screen as only option to continue in charging next day. This is very uncomfortable - when you left car plugged in, then you want to continue in charging automatically...

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