I am currently using an installation with 2 Cerbo GX units (1 master and 1 slave).
Three Solarsense750 sensors are connected to the slave, and I retrieve the data in Node-RED to send it to the master. The reason I use 2 Cerbo units is that the sensors are too far from the master. Both Cerbo units are on the same local network.
The information is retrieved and sent to VRM using these nodes: (W/m² instead of W).
There is a problem in Node-RED with the Victron palette because the virtual “Weather” device does not allow the system’s potential power to be sent (natively "/InstallationPower’’ as an output from a Solarsense750), because this metric is not available in the Virtual Device:
To make it possible to receive data from my 4 sensors on the CERBO Slave, I had to modify it and add an SMA connector connected directly to the board’s Bluetooth output:
I connected a 2.4 GHz 12 dBi antenna to this connector, and reception is acceptable but weak for all 4 sensors (intermittent disconnections on one of the sensors).
Do you have a solution that would allow me to display the correct units from a virtual weather sensor in VRM, and is it possible to clearly display the reception levels in dBm for BLE devices connected to a Cerbo?
The purpose of this project is to make full use of the system’s capabilities, particularly to maximise the use of surplus production and send it to my water heater and, later, to a heating system in winter.
Here is the complete Node-RED diagram for reference:
Hi there, you have gone a long way down the modification route. Obviously this is not going to work as expected as a master/slave GX topology is not supported and you will be constrained by what data you can feed to the primary GX by what virtual nodes or API’s support, all of which have limitations.
I have moved this to the node-red section, though it could equally fit in the modifications section.
Maybe someone has some ideas for you, but this is very much an unsupported area you are in.
Are you aware that you can now also relay bluetooth devices via supported Shelly devices?
This would allow you to natively connect the victron device to a remote GX.
(might required v3.80 but that will be released imminently).
I would like to correct your assumptions: the system works very well in its current state, and my only questions are as follows:
Can Victron modify the Virtual device capabilities for a weather sensor (which includes the Solarsense750) so that I can display the units correctly in VRM (W instead of W/m²) by adding the /InstallationPower path to the list below?
