Inventions

Hey all, Open for improvements, comments & suggestions for my v0.1 and lurked here a bit and the forums and my first topic because I built a thing! History: The forums have been great for my first IOT inverter monitoring setup with my old RCT 2.5KW Inverter where I managed to read the inverter data via RS232 and an ESP to Home Assistant's energy Dashboard which was fantastic... Until ...we upgraded to 3 Esener 5.5Kw inverters to cater our loadshedding/power needs. What I tried: The inverters where a great setup and they seem to graft well delivering 60+Kwh of power a day (we top up with Eskom in the winter months over night). T…

I present my solution, in the circuit that you can see in the image, to be able to connect 2 Strings to a single MPPT input of any power inverter, in my case East string and West string with automatic switching at a time close to solar noon to the PV2 input of my inverter. I have a Goodwe ES5048 inverter, for those who don't know, this almost 5Kw inverter has only 2 photovoltaic inputs (2 mppt) for 2 strings. The idea arose a little over 2 (two) years ago when I wanted to expand the area of solar panels to increase my solar production but I found myself with the problem of not having more space in my house to install more panels to the North. I was not interested in…

Not sure if this qualifies as an "invention" but it is a bit of a hack, at least... 😃 As a first step to get proper backup power, I've installed the Victron Multiplus 24|800|16 that a mate gave me for my birthday last year. We've been using it as a "portable" inverter, hooked up to a couple of 2nd hand deep cycle RV lead/acid batteries, but now that we've moved into our new house it was time for something more permanent. For the moment it's still hooked up with plugs; DB boxes with breakers and a main switch will come later when I put in the solar panels, MPPT and additional inverter. (Image 1 - the enclosure at the bottom houses the new 2.6kVA LiFePO4 battery.) …

Vital to being able to keep within the inverter output limits (and avoid importing expensive grid power unnecessarily) is having the means to display the relevant information in an immediate and accessible way. That's what I told my wife, anyway. Really, I'd just scored a bunch of old RC servos on ebay for £5 and I wanted to play with them. 😉 In context: It uses 6 servos, a Wemos d1 mini clone and a tri-colour LED. Dial faces are 3D printed, with a filament change from white to black (which turned out much better than I imagined, TBH). The servos only had around 90° of sweep angle, so I 3D printed some little holder/gearbox …

So, after various DIY attempts to monitor my Axpert inverter, I settled on using SolPipLog, which is great for monitoring live data via MQTT, using a Raspberry Pi. I use that in conjunction with the HomeHabit app on my Android device. It allows me to monitor various inverter stats in real time, and also to control some functions (such as charge profile, equalization on demand, etc.). However, the one thing that neither SolPipLog or HomeHabit offer is historical data via graphs/charts. Although SolPipLog does export to EMONCMS, this is no longer free and setting up a self-hosted instance is quite painful. I really wanted to have some sort of historical data available,…

Background: I have certain 'trust issues' when it comes to utility supply companies. Whether it was 'Good Energy', who helped themselves to £3,000 from my bank account in the week my first child was born (they apparently transposed two digits on a meter read), or the corporate behemoth 'Octopus Energy', who in the 18 months I was with them (and since) never once managed to produce a bill that reflected the tariff or rates that I was supposedly on, or any number of sh*t-weasels in between, I don't know. Suffice to say, they all rank somewhere beneath Estate Agents in my book. So I like to keep tabs on my energy consumption. We have a 'SMETS2' Smart Meter …

Not going to go into too many details, and a lot was already shared in other threads, but thought I would create this thread, should someone want to get some inspiration or ideas when it comes to building your own "Inverter Trolley". History During the December 2023 holidays, my dad and I were discussing options to combat loadshedding, having a little 555W portable unit (which worked remarkable well to keep the TV and DSTV on) as well as a 1440W Ellies trolley with 2 X 105Ah LA batteries (standard pre-assembled). Obviously these two were not enough, so we started toying with the idea of building our own trolleys ... and thus the project started Design Building off…

Hi everyone, I've made my own mobile monitoring solution using the following software/apps, and my own code, running on my Raspberry Pi 1B. The inverter is connected to the Pi via USB. This software runs on the Pi for polling: https://github.com/manio/skymax-demo I use this app on my phone for monitoring: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.cpk.iotdashboard&hl=en_US Credits to the original developers of the above software. My own custom script does the polling every 10 sec and dumps the data to JSON files in the Pi's public webserver folder. The mobile app queries the JSON files every 5 sec. Mobile app results (extensive con…

Who thinks that this is a good idea? I have built a battery backup for my lights. It is connected to my regular light switch via an extension box. When the mains are on it charges 6 x 18650 cells, storing about 50wh of power. When the power is out it switches to battery and a mini inverter. This will power a single 5w light bulb for 10 hours, a 10w for 5 hours etc. This is at full brightness, no dimming as with the rechargeable bulbs. The cost for the entire system is about R600 using off the shelf parts, making it really affordable, even for multiple units around the house. This is a solution for those who can't afford a full on lithium battery / invert…

My girlfriend is currently doing her masters degree and requires backup power during load shedding to work on her laptop, keep the internet going, keep a light on and run a fan. I have a 1440w Mecer trolley inverter system which currently has two deep cycle batteries. With the current load shedding, I can see the batteries deteriorating every day, so I would like to make use of the trolley and upgrade the whole system and give it to her and do so as affordable as possible. It would be a plug and play system - connected to a plug point in the house and charge through Eskom, and a multiplug output for her to connect her laptop/fan/router etc. I was looking at the …

I needed to find a solution for my parents and mother in law to watch tv and run Wi-Fi etc. during 4 hours continuous load shedding. Built 2 system 9 months ago in a plastic utility "ammo" box and works very well, their friends and my people at work asking me to build for them to , so "JuiceBox" started. 350W pure sine wave inverter, 640wh Lithium battery and 7ah Victron lithium capable charger. Here's my FB page, I sell them for R8750 each and can ship anywhere in SA. https://www.facebook.com/JuiceBoxSA 2 page Brochure.pdf

Hi I hope this is in the correct section of the forum. I apologies in advance if this is the incorrect section. I have read the other threads and found them very informative. My parents currently have an old Mecer 1200va trolley inverter with a lead acid battery. unfortunately these batteries do not last very long and get progressively worse very quickly. I wanted to change the battery for a Lithium one but was told i couldnt due to the inverter not being able to charge the battery correctly. I am now in a position where we do not want to spend a large amount of money on a 'overkill' setup to just power the TV, dstv, fibre router, ONT fibre bo…

I have build 5 of these back up systems i use one and delivered 4 to clients and they are happy. 1200 watts ac output true sine wave with 2.56kwh 24v dc lifep04. Victron battery balancer. 100 A dc breaker on ups, 5 way Ac output socket with earth leakage. Ups change over mains to backup <3ms. There is 480w and 620w 12v lifep04 units available. My unit has been running for close to 2 years with 400- 500 watt ac essential load without any problems during loadshedding. I have 4 solar panels 2s2p with a Victron 100/30 mppt.