Easysolar issues

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fash asked Oct 29, '19

Easysolar issues

Hi

I have an EasySolar48v 5K 70a controller charger set up in July this year. Summer has been great, the 6 x 500w panels have been rocking it. Charger and panels came from Bimble Solar who haven't given me any answers to my problems.

We have 4 x AGM 200aH batteries in the system, they're about 3 years old now.

The SOC on the colour panel has never dropped below 99% the BMV attached dropped a little more but no less than 97% ....so the last couple (ahem) of weeks have been cloudy and wet (I'm in the East Midlands - UK ) and the low battery warning has come up a few times and the controller has even switched off. But the SOC still reads 99% ???

We have a 5Kv Honda genny plugged into the AC input on the controller, when I give it power, it accepts for about a minute (in bulk charge) switches to float for about 5 seconds then cuts the AC input. The batteries remain in a low power state. Once the sun comes out, it's happy again taking charge from the panels.

I haven't had a comprehensive wiring diagram to follow, just used common sense and deciphered what I could from the manuals for each device... the one thing I wonder about is the v-sence port on the charger controller, it's not attached to anything at the moment, should this be attached directly across the battery terminals? Does this feed the metering for the SOC? Its the 2 pin connection.

Help much appreciated as I don't want to damage another set of batteries!

Cheers

Fash

Generator EasySolar All-in-One error

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Justin Cook answered · Oct 29, 2019 at 10:03 PM

@fash, the immediate possibility I see is that the shunt for the BMV may be connected incorrectly, as it is this that measures all in- and out-bound current from /to your batteries and reports this data not only to the BMV display head but also to the CCGX. It is absolutely critical that the only thing connected directly to your battery bank NEG is the "battery" side of the shunt; ALL other systems NEGs including loads, chargers, "chassis" grounds, etc must be connected to the other side of the shunt, labeled "loads and chargers" (or sometimes just labeled "loads").

The shunt -and therefore your BMV, and therefore your CCGX- can only "see" current that travels through it, so any load or charger that connects directly to the battery is bypassing the shunt and can't be measured by it. That's how you get a 100% SOC reading while your batteries are dead, because the SOC is calculated by a measurement of the current in and out of the battery bank through the shunt, not the battery voltage... so if a load or a charger is bypassing the shunt, the BMV doesn't know about it and can't adjust the SOC up or down accordingly.

Another common mistake is an inaccurate Ah capacity being entered into the BMV upon initial setup, which makes the BMV think that the SOC is different than it actually is. In your case, if your (4) 200Ah AGMs are connected in series to 48v, of course your battery bank capacity is only 200Ah... it's worth checking that someone didn't accidentally enter 800Ah as your capacity, as that's a fairly common miscalculation.

One other fairly common mistake to consider is that the shunt is connected backward, that is, the batteries being connected to the "loads" side of the shunt and the loads connected to the "battery" side of the shunt, which results in the BMV thinking a load is a charge and it therefore reports an inaccurate SOC, so that's something to check as well.

From what you describe, I virtually guarantee that you either have both loads and chargers that are bypassing the shunt or you have an inaccurate Ah capacity entered into your BMV... or both. Check and correct as necessary and then report back to us if the system is still misbehaving!

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Answer 1 · 2019-10-30T08:23:10Z

fash answered · Oct 30, 2019 at 08:23 AM

Thanks Justin

Yes! School boy errors on the battery setting...it is set to 800aH!

I'll go over the shunt connections again and see what other things need rectifying.

So the v-sense is nothing to do with this?

Thanks again

Fash

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Justin Cook ♦♦ commented · Oct 30, 2019 at 11:06 PM

Hmmm bear with me on this; we don't particularly deal with the EasySolars here in the US, so I'm not as intimately familiar with them as I am with my normal individual components. I'm researching the operation/connection of the device and I'll let you know what I come up with...

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fash Justin Cook ♦♦ commented · Oct 31, 2019 at 06:07 PM

Thanks Justin. I can send photos if they help?

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Answer 2 · 2019-10-30T17:28:30Z

fash answered · Oct 30, 2019 at 05:28 PM

Hi again

So the BVM seems to be reading more true now, but at the moment this is not connected to the main Easysolar Unit. So the SOC on the easy solar is still not a true reading (it's still not changed from 99%) ... Do I need to connect the BVM to the main unit?

As far as I can see the shunt is connected as it should be, but as it's not feeding back to the easy solar it doesn't seem like it makes any difference.

Also I can't see a menu where I can tell the easysolar about the size of the battery bank...

thanks again

Fash

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JohnC ♦ commented · Oct 31, 2019 at 04:25 AM

Hi Fash. Just grab a VE.Direct cable to connect the BMV display to the rear of the onboard CCGX. Sure you'll have to pull the front cover on the Easy to do it, just as you would with an ethernet/wifi link and anything else you want to add to the system.

https://www.victronenergy.com/upload/documents/Datasheet-BMV-700-series-EN.pdf

Then set the GX to use the SOC provided by the BMV. That's in 'Settings' somewhere. We can help, but best search it out yourself to get to know your kit better. :)

The Easy doesn't need the batt bank size directly, it will take the results from the BMV as provided.

The '99%' SOC you see now does need batt size set up, but it should disappear now the BMV is in the system. Just forget it.

The Easy isn't to be feared. It's just a combo box of individual parts, each part with it's own manual.

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fash JohnC ♦ commented · Oct 31, 2019 at 07:55 PM

Thanks John

I was almost at ordering point for the VE cable for the BMV, I'll do that now :)

Thanks for the advice :)

Fash

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Answer 3 · 2019-11-23T21:44:41Z

fash answered · Nov 23, 2019 at 09:44 PM

Hi again. So I'm still having spurious issues with the AC charger from the genny.

This morning I switched the genny on and watched the charger happily go up to 3.1kw of power for about 20 seconds.....then switch off. Current SOC on the BMV monitor was about 80%...but the V reading on each of the 4 batteries is below 12v (11.8v roughly)

I walked away, perplexed!

This evening, I tried again. First throw of the switch and it did the same as above, second try and it holds. For about 25 to 30 minutes it's happy charging the batteries at just over 3Kw, SOC now up to 91% but it kicked out on its own.

Any explanation is welcome!

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JohnC ♦ commented · Nov 24, 2019 at 03:22 AM

Firstly, try to determine 'what' is kicking out, the genny or the Multi.

Depends where you're getting your 3kW reading from too. If it's the bmv, then it can't see other ac loads, and may exceed genny capability. There's also this if it's the Multi:

https://www.victronenergy.com/live/multiplus_faq

And if you have 200Ah batts @ 48V nominal, then 3kW is likely exceeding the batt maker's max recommended charge rate. Perhaps closer to 2kW would be more suitable? These limits can be set, and I'd encourage you to do so for batt life considerations.

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fash JohnC ♦ commented · Nov 27, 2019 at 09:34 PM

Hi John, Just revisiting this, I can't see where to set a charge limit. I think this may be causing issues. I've just posted again on this issue. Sorry to double up on the board! Feeling a bit desperate as I can't charge at all tonight :-/

Thanks

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JohnC ♦ fash commented · Nov 28, 2019 at 04:56 AM

That setting's available in 2 places. In VEConfig (via VRM for you would work). In the 'General' tab, and there's a tickbox there for 'Overruled by remote'. Tick that and you can then change it within the GX itself (easier).

Now doing that may work for you if the genny is overloading, but if the Multi is rejecting the genny, work through this: https://www.victronenergy.com/live/multiplus_faq

Again via VEConfig, and for a quick result, go Charger tab and tick the 'Weak AC Input' box. There are efficiency issues (maybe power factor too) with going straight there, but if time constrained should get you out of trouble.

Hopefully you're familiar with VEConfig. Come back if you need help with that.

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