Hi there, I’m new to the community.
Recently I had a Multiplus ii 5kva installed and noticed that when charging the batteries from AC power it gets pretty loud, as the person in this post described here: https://communityarchive.victronenergy.com/questions/191916/multiplus-ii-5000-fan-noise-fixed-for-me-without-l.html
Could someone provide the STL in the above post? I’d like to try his solution and for some reason the link doesn’t work.
Thanks in advance.
Did you try search thingiverse?
When I looked inside my Multiplus 2, due to excessive noise, I found that power cables had been wedged between the fan and the case, giving direct noise propagation to the case.
Did you end up re-routing the cables?
Thank you! I didn’t think something this specific would be on thingiverse. I’ll check before posting next time.
No stress. Let us know how your quest for quiet goes.
BTW, is the Multiplus fan actually driven by both load and temperature? Reason I’m asking is the following:
When the Multiplus is first charging the battery at say 600-700W, it’s not audible from the floor immediately above. When it increases past 1kW, pushing 50 or 60 Amps, it gets real loud. My office is in the room directly above and it’s pretty annoying and frustrating. However, if the charging power goes back down to 600-700W the noise level remains the same as when it was charging at 2kW.
If the fan is load driven, how come it says loud? I went to check and it wasn’t even warm to the touch, yet it was loud. It’s not loud when it starts charging first thing in the morning at 700W.
Anyhow, besides installing the external fans. Should I modify the fan configuration in the inverter? I’m not sure how to do that, as I had someone else install and set it up for me.
The fan is driven by load and temperature. It will ramp its operational speed as these increase.
Historically it was noisiest at lower speeds, and used to pulse.
The control unit was improved a couple of years back which made the unit quieter at lower usage, I can attest to this myself.
It made no difference to the full-speed operational noise under high loads.
I did. I just carefully loosened the connections and lifted the cables to go over the top of the fan. There isn’t much clearance on the top either. It made a huge difference.
My choices were:
Leave it as it was and get angrier at the obscene noise level. The noise travels through the garage wall to my bedroom above.
Remove the unit and post it back to my supplier. There were too many unknowns about when I would get it back and lack of availability in the meantime.
Put a Dremel to the fan housing - I didn’t want all the debris inside the unit
Remove the unit from the wall, take the fan out and cut a channel for the wires - Too difficult.
Relocate the wires - option selected.
I also put some Canopus sound deadening material on the cover.
I may have voided my warranty but that is a risk I felt I had to take.
Last night was my first real test. I set the Max charge current at 44A in DVCC and the unit ran for 5 1/2 hours to take advantage of Octopus’ very low rate. Although it was still audible it was quiet enough that both my wife and I slept through OK. I might put rubber mounts under the top support bracket - I have already slipped rubber grommets under the bottom screws - the screws are not done up tight to avoid noise transmission, just loosely in place to stop the unit being nudged up off the support, which is highly unlikely given its weight.
I have loaded the Fan Noise Assistant and tested that. It works but I am not keen on letting the electronics get hotter than necessary. Next step is to print the adaptor plates and mount a couple of fans and see what happens. I am away for a couple of weeks so nothing will happen there for a while.
It’s still loud under load, I guess that’s because I did not adjust the internal fans.
To check if the wiring is making contact with the fan/multiplus case, should I remove all the screws around the blue cover? and in doing so, am I losing my warranty?
You do have to undo all the screws and lift it up. I would doubt that this would affect your warranty. There are no tell tale signs on the case to indicate that you have looked inside. If you look at the photo there are black dots on some of the screws that would potentially show signs if you were to disturb them.
I removed the cover today to check if the wiring was wedged between the fan and Multiplus frame, and lo and behold, it was.
Do you guys have a picture of your final wire position? I’m guessing it should be something like the red line I draw, going over the fan? Are you sure it won’t contact the blue cover? These wires aren’t very flexible.
