question

boekel avatar image
boekel asked

Example of using assistants: partial off grid (boat), solar priority, low shore power current limit.

To show what you can do with assistants, here's a small example, installation is on a boat (15m 'replica' Dutch Barge) now travelling the inland waterways of the Netherlands, Belgium and France.

Components: Quattro 24/8000, 20kWh Lithium ion (Eco-Lithium), 2x MPPT 150/35 + 6 320 Wp PV panels, Venus GX, digital remote panel.

As the Quattro has a minimum AC input Current limit of 11 A, this gives problems with low power shore connections, so I've made a switch for the customer to engage 'low shorepower limit'.

When shore power is available, usually you don't want a full charge, as the solar panels are usually capable of providing enough power, so another switch is to select 'full charge' of 'half charge' from shore power

(best picture I could find, not all switches installed and SOC meter going to 12)

assistants:


Details:


AC-in is ignored when 'aux1' is closed

The 'solar priority' uses a switch wired to 'relay K2' and then to 'aux1'
the generator start stop assistant is used for this, if the battery is charged above 27,5 V the relay is closed, so if the switch is 'on' it than it will ignore AC2 input (shore power)
Also, when load is higher than 1800 W it will re-connect shore power, to release again when load is below 1200 W

Low current shore power function:

When this is engaged (switch closed), a lower charge current is set by wiring the switch to 'aux 2' activating the 'charge current control' assistant.
The switch is also wired to 'relay K1' and from this relay to 'aux 1'
When the AC load is higher than 400 W the K1 relay closes, so ignoring AC-input. when load is below 300 W it is opened again.

The trick to using a 6A or 10A shore power connection:
-lower charge current so it only uses about 5A
-disconnect AC input when loads are higher than x W
It might sound strange, but this works perfectly on this system, as the inverter has enough power to run all loads (including Air Conditioning, induction hob and oven)

the first two assistants (programmable relays) in the image are to disconnect AC out 2 when battery is low on SOC, the electric cooking and Air Conditioning are on this output.

Yes I really like the assistants ;)


solarAssistantsshorepower
1 comment
2 |3000

Up to 8 attachments (including images) can be used with a maximum of 190.8 MiB each and 286.6 MiB total.

That is easily the most sophisticated assistant I have ever seen.

You are some kind of wizard, when people have question about the assistants I am going to be learning from you now :)

0 Likes 0 ·
4 Answers
Simon Schneider avatar image
Simon Schneider answered ·

Hello,

I want to set up some assistants for my multiplus but it seems like I can't figure it out just right.

I want to use the AUX-in to tell the Multi to use Battery power only until a certain SoC (provided from BMV-712). While I'm using Battery power I also want to switch temporally to AC in case the draw is higher then what the Inverter can handle alone.

I managed to make always only one of the two things work but together it seems difficult. Can someone please help me with setting up the assistant? Thanks,pxl-20211228-131113583.jpg


1 comment
2 |3000

Up to 8 attachments (including images) can be used with a maximum of 190.8 MiB each and 286.6 MiB total.

bigbadbob76 avatar image bigbadbob76 commented ·
You have it set to ignore ac input when load is > 2300w.

you need to "Open relay to start generator." ;-)

0 Likes 0 ·
mvader (Victron Energy) avatar image
mvader (Victron Energy) answered ·

Nice @Boekel!

2 |3000

Up to 8 attachments (including images) can be used with a maximum of 190.8 MiB each and 286.6 MiB total.

abrahamsolar avatar image
abrahamsolar answered ·

Hello, @Daniël Boekel (Victron Energy Staff)

Helpful & innovative as always. For the "low power shore current" function, you describe one switch connected to do two things at the same time. Does that switch need to be double pole or can both connections happen through just a single pole?

If the + output on Quattro Aux1 is electrically identical to the + output on Aux2 (& the minus outputs are also electrically identical), it does seem a single pole single throw switch could do it all. In some scenarios Aux1 voltage will be connected parallel to Aux2 voltage so I need to make sure they will not harm one another. Below is pasted my wiring diagram; advise when convenient. Thanks as always.





1582222027731.png (61.8 KiB)
1 comment
2 |3000

Up to 8 attachments (including images) can be used with a maximum of 190.8 MiB each and 286.6 MiB total.

Hi @abrahamsolar

your drawing is correct :)

0 Likes 0 ·
abrahamsolar avatar image
abrahamsolar answered ·

Hello again @Daniël Boekel (Victron Energy Staff) I updated both of my client's Quattro machines to firmware 469, wired the SPST switch per my diagram & loaded my list of Assistants. See attached summary of the requested behaviors. Our test results were almost as expected, except:

* The CCGX display shows Hub-1 although I didn't load that Assistant & Hub-1 doesn't show in the list of Assistants. Have you any theory about why we're seeing this, or should we just ignore it?

* The DC charging amps showing on the CCGX do not match the requested value in the Assistants listing. It was charging @ 12 to 14 amps which was nearly double so I thought maybe that was because we have twin Quattros. I halved the two requested values & revised the Charge Current Control Assistant values but the error swung the other way & still didn't match expectations.

Probably some more adjustment of the amp values will get us closer to the desired charge amps when switched for limited shore current. Thanks again for helping us community folks. Assistant summary for Tiny Shore_final.JPG


1 comment
2 |3000

Up to 8 attachments (including images) can be used with a maximum of 190.8 MiB each and 286.6 MiB total.

harold avatar image harold commented ·
The amps could also be change by temperature compensation.
0 Likes 0 ·

Related Resources

Additional resources still need to be added for this topic

VEConfigure Assistants manual