Confused about ve.direct and smart

DIY
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1

Evening,

I have a SmartSolar 75/15 that i intend to use for a remote/offgrid outdoor shower facility. Panel will be a 100W solar grape panel.

I have a 12V RV water pump, that will be powering the water pressure, a propane outdoor rated hot water heater, and a 12V 30AH Lifepo4 battery, that I already had. I also intend on using a Raspberry pi 3, running VenusOS to connect to Wifi which will connect to VRM. As the battery is a no-name, i was thinking of getting a 500A smartshunt to keep track of SoC.

A few questions,

  1. In some documentation i see that the smart shunt has a temp sensor. Is this true? I am needing this information as the battery will be in this building year round and I need it to stop charging when it freezes.
  2. I can use the Smart functionality to connect the SmartSolar to the Shunt through bluetooth. Now how do I connect this system to the raspberry pi running venusos? Can I use a ve direct to USB cable? Which device do I connect this to, the charge controller, or shunt, or both? Or is this all wrong?
  3. I will also have lighting that will be ran off of 12V led lamps. Is there a way to turn these off after a certain amount of time through a relay?
  4. Would the battery smart sense be the only device I can use to get the temperature by the battery or will the shunt do this? (Kinda related to question 1)
    Thank you for all your assistance.
2
  1. You buy the temp sensor separately- but yes there is an option for it.
  2. don’t use the ve smart network if you are using a PI for a GX. The generator start stop is a great way to do that. Or node red if you like to program
  3. Yes with a relay on a Cerbo or a GX with a relay for signal only you can switch off the load based on time.
  4. The wired temp sensor can go into the mppt or the shunt if you get a cerbo then directly to that, they all transmit temp data to the GX. The sbs does not work with a gx in the system and does not transmit data to the vrm, it is designed for smart networks (those with no gx).
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