I have 4 Orion XS 1400 connected in parallel to two engines with alternators 185A each. All Orions are connected to Cerbo via VE.Direct and are governed by the BMS of the lithium battery bank. When the engines are running one Orion is not charging the battery for some reason. All other work OK. The picture is with the engines at idle. All 4 Orions share the same default settings. The one that is not charging otherwise works in the sense that I can connect to it via BT and the Cerbo sees it. Any idea why is this strange behaviour?
In the picture the first two lines are teh starter batteries’ shunts and the next four are the Orion XS’
Is that a wiring an issue? I see the #2 voltage is lower with no draw, vs. #1. Assuming #1 & #2 are a pair on an alternator. Or hitting a DVCC charge current limit?
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Look on the VictronConnect app so you can see input and output voltages. Capture and post a screenshot.
The picture in Victron Connect is the same as on the Cerbo monitor. Input voltages are all perfectly aligned and output voltage of the second Orion is 0.3 lower systematically. I tried to lower the engine detection voltage by 0.4 but it didn’t solve the problem.
The first two are on the port engine alternator and the second two on starboard.
We are too far from the DVCC charge current limit. They are charging a battery bank of 6x5.5kw MG Energy lithium batteries. When underway the otehr three Orions go up to the limit of 50A while the problematic one stays at zero.
Another strange thing is that when I am connected to shore and the Orions receive current from the engine batteries chargers the second one works albeit at lower output. See picture below
Today I started the engines again and at idle the picture is different. Two Orions give almost full output and two do not start at all.
I don’t know what to think. Cabling issue, although it can never be rules out is highly unlikely. All Orions are connected at the same time with equal length brand new cables. VE.Direct seems to work as I can see them all on Cerbo, but somehow they do not work in sync.
Feedback from Cerbo is different than feedback you would get locally, when connected through bluetooth. You latest image is from local bluetooth connection. When trying to detect cabling issues, connecting locally through bluetooth is better, because you get the per-charger voltage values and not the adjusted system voltage value.
Check the bridge wire in the remote terminals are not loose or any other wiring connected to the remote terminals.
We haven’t connected anything on the remote terminals. I thought that the XS 1400 detects the engine start and the remote is optional.
Yes, but it comes with a bridge wire connected, if that has come loose it might be a problem. People have had this before.
Indeed, I checked all the bridges, they are in place and tight.
The eratic behaviour is confusing. Can’t explain it and it is a critical component since this is the only way I have to charge the batteries while underway.
Yes but this picture tells me that all 4 have the same input voltage so I guess there is no cabling issue.
Why do 2 say “off” and 2 say “external control”? Can you get any more data about the status of each one?
That’s the question. Sometimes two of them stay off and not start charging, sometimes three of them start charging and one stays off. It is very bizarre.
It says external control because when they are charging they are controlled by the BMS of the service battery, this is normal I think. In the Cerbo settings I have selected the service battery BMS as the governing BMS for CVCC so they should all follow this BMS and not be confused by the smartshunts connected to the starter batteries which are also connected to teh Cerbo with VE.Direct.
In the settings I have selected “Regular Alternator 24v” and I have left the voltages at default. I imagine that a marine engine internally controled alternator is not “smart”
Sorry, should have been clearer – I know what “external control” means (it’s what my BMS-controlled Quattro says), what I was asking was why two (or one…) of them registered “off” – which is the $64k question, because they should all say “external control”. The fact that the number which do this varies is even more confusing – I know Orion XS are designed to be paralleled (and share current?) when under internal control, but can anyone confirm that this works under external control?
Maybe it’s just a previously unreported bug which will need a firmware update to fix it…
Play a bid with the DVCC settings. Maybe the voltage and shared current is not properly being fed to the XSs.
We reinstalled all 4 of them. Checked again all cabling and followed religiously the instructions i.e. remove the remote plug, connect the inputs, then setup via bluetooth all the devices then connect the output cables and then put back the remote plug. We also swaped positions of the first with the second.
The result you can see in the picture below with engines under some load.
They all seem to work now, but still the same one that was not starting at all before is now having lower output than the rest. I will send it back for replacement. Can’t think of anything else.
I’d try a test of disabling engine running detection on them temporarily. It ramps the output down as the input voltage drops and I’ve had funny results with it on occasion.