TheMafiaMan - NotMuffinMan

Eskom is making the finance case to add an additional battery add 8 more panels and go from 20% grid usage to 0% grid usage.
Then I disconnect and go 100% offgrid.
Problem solved.

On the 8 August 2023 @ 11:00 am,  my CFE debacle came to an eventual end -  the saga if anyone has interest or wants to see the history HERE
I would love to be able to say that the many many hours of trouble shooting - help, comments and questions from numerous forum members like @HendrikBigChief for analysing endless graphs and reports - much appriecated your advice and willingness to hear me out and offer solutions to look at, @Zak @I84RiS and others i'm sorry if i forget to mention you, not least being banned/kicked out from a CFE whatsapp group (what a misreable lot) resulted in the problem batteries being sorted out - rather the situation with the CFE batteries got so bad that no load over 2000watt could be run in BMS only mode (which i'm sticking to my guns on is how the batteries are supposed to be run) without getting F56 errors F26 errors the list was endless - CFE where unhelpful eventually flashing the 2 batteries at least two more times and then proclaiming that it was the inverters firmware that was the issue - we (SolarAdvice and I) relented and got DEYE to push an unneeded but never the less non-problematic firmware update to my 8kw inverter for only the exact same things to continue happening. (just a note we did try to run the batteries in AGM but we couldn't get more than 30min reliably in AGM / manual settings without both batteries tripping out even when idle and not under load)
I had to travel for work and its been more that a month but it had already been agreed with SoalrAdvice that we had exhausted all options - they really have been no nonsense about exchanging them - the delay was more from my side to exhaust all options and mostly my patience. But its the batteries and thier bad BMS.
The contenders where Solar MDs 14.3kw(single battery) or two DEYE 6.14kw batteries and given Budget and my existing diesel gensets conversion to automation and final sound proofing of the generating room,  just a few weeks from being completed, the DEYE where deemed the best compromise as the 8.1kw solar array still to be commisioned together with the Genset and automated system in place as well as low household base load means we'd be fine off grid. There is space being made for a posiible 3rd DEYE Battery towards December but right now the Genset project needs to be completed and Solar Commisioned before Feb 2024 to claim the rebate.
Almost one week in and with Loadshedding back to 5-6hrs for us i'm happy to report so far that the DEYE batteries have performed flawlessly (fingers crossed of course) -  even though we've only grown usable capacity buy 2kw or +-18-20%  we're seeing different consumption/efficiency/conversion numbers running all the same loads as before and conversion/efficiency wise we're seeing an actual net gain of almost 25-30% from the batteries. I cannot say why right now and I only have 6-7 days data vs 255days data from the CFE's but something is different (time will tell if this a indeed a gain of sorts and i'll be monitoring it) - off the top of my head the only notable change is battery temps. the inverter battery settings have remained unchnaged and we're running in BMS mode with the inverter showing 00 & deye next to it under lithium - the CFE's always opperated between 27-35°C even at idle in a 21°C space - and loads even reaching 39-40°C - but the DEYE units are sitting @19-21°C under load, maybe there is a better thermal layout inside or better passive cooling but even now with them being on load for 2.5hrs during loadshedding and then charging @40A back to 100%, tempreture is 21°C and its notably warmer outside today. Time will tell is guess.
I'd just want to again mention that SolarAdvice where champs in getting this all sorted from the re-order, allocation, booking a team to do the swap/install and keeping me in the loop the awesome two guys (cannot remember their names) that did the swap out and wall mounted them for me without makign a mess, breaking anything and just being really pleasant to chat to - this business is doing this right and all my interactions with them over the last 7+ months has been consistently excellent - they're patient and I know I can be difficult - but there was no need to be as they where just really professional about dealing with all of this - highly recommend them.
I'll post an update in about a months time and again am happy to answer any questions and hopefully keep up and contribute info to the forum - theMafiaman - out.
 

Hi @HendrikBigChief here is hopefully what you need/asked for
Whole 24hr for the day in question

Battery voltage is 53.99-54.00 from 00h00 to 09:28:29 when I start the run down - rundown below

 




At 7% Eksom feed is restored - next images are charging @40amps





Finally from 22h00 to 23h59 is a loadshedding slot with my usual base load of 480-630watt TV, fridge, routers, fiber and a few devices in standby etc. that base load comes into play most days from about 20h30 and will reduce to about 340-480watt from 1am to 6.30am
The latest firmware update (13/06/2023) from CFE eliminated the SOC cycling, prior to that the update the did changed SOC to cycle between 100-95% & before that it was 100-90% when the system was originally commissioned.
Here is the 13/06/2023 data (last firmware update) you can see the batteries drop out at 12h48 this is when the firmware was updated the batteries where powered on/off twice. At 16h06 you can see the same catastrophic issue appear again after reaching 100% "SOC" at 13:55:53 until 16h06 when load shedding starts and at 18h01 an active load kicks in, @18:07 its hits 46% and @18h13 10% just as Eskom power is restored and at 21h13 100% SOC is achieved @ 53.49v

The below is from Solarman, a steady SOC @ 100% for 6+hrs - it would appear that in data going back to commissioning date, float voltage has always been 53.88-5399 and now 54v after the latest update - charge voltages have always been maintained up to this last update at 56.1v I believe for LFP charging in parallel the parameter is normally 56-56.8v

Hi all - yes click-bait like topic for good reason.
Before I decided to write this particular post I also scoured this forum and noted that various users are having quite frankly unacceptable levels of SOC issues with all kinds of batteries even Pylontech and other "reputable" brands - so I'm starting to think that the majority (i.e. not all but 50-60%+) of the batteries and new makes and models that seem to land on our shores every other day, are simply not suitable for our unfortunate and insidiously unique power problems here in SA - I'm talking about frequent loadshedding, multiple times per day for 2-6 hours at a time, depending on where you are fortunate or unfortunate to be in our country.
Those that would like to follow previous long CFE discussions can view them  here  and I have a very long (sorry) but complete view of my installation, how I use it and the dreaded SOC drop from 40%-10% in 5 minutes or less or worse still 40% to 0% almost instantly here
For those that don't to go read them, a very summarised version is bullet pointed below which doesn't give you 100% context - so if you're going to ask questions or tell me I'm 'stupid' without referencing important info in the original post(s) - be warned - I'm called the TheMafiaMan for a reason...🤣
8kw DEYE inverter 2x CFE 5100s batteries setup as 30% restart 20% battery warning and 10-15% Shutdown. Final Battery setup will be 20kWh of storage via 2 more 5.12kWh batteries to be added in 2023 still. The system is protected by 200amp keto fuses and each board has surge protection as well - the house sits behind the inverter because A) I want clean pure sinewave power to all my plugs, lights and screens and B) fridges and appliances with inverter type motors are all better protected that way too. Your electronics will thank you. I charge the batteries @40amps so roughly 2kWh have experimented with 20amps and even 75amps - for my use case for now 40amps is my sweet spot giving my inverter head room to still run other higher draw loads when the batteries are charging. No solar currently, only used as a storage system to facilitate work from home and a "normal" quality of life (8.1kWh solar array is being commissioned) 6kva diesel Genset (dedicated generator room for Genset and fuel - already wired in with manual change over) just finishing off sound isolation, ventilation and then will automate change over with the dry contact and Gen feed-in on the DEYE Inverter Finally Eskom connection will capped off once solar is in and run in my own "Islanding" setup where I am my own "Utility provider". Let me start by pointing out that my supplier for all my equipment mentioned is Solar Advice - solar.co.za and that they have been only helpful, support providing and quick to execute where CFE keep dropping the ball - silver lining they will be sorting out my problem without fanfare - the way a reputable business should and I keep recommending them over and over.
From my side I agreed to go through not one but 2 firmware updates with the "overseas - team" at CFE, resulting in about 75% of my frustrating 2+ weeks of irritability.
Let's get on with it - two plus weeks of frustration, hair pulling and plenty, and I do mean plenty of potty mouth later - I now have the latest CFE-5100s firmware on both of my batters and the great news is...
I am at least 50% worse off than before, cannot make it through 2hrs of loadshedding with 10.24kWh of storage and less than 2kWh load, and those that are good at math that means? Yup 79-80% and then 3% 3-5min later, and then off. Unacceptable by any standards - I mean are there a few AAA batteries inside my two 5.12kWh LiFePo4 units.....???
But this doesn't really paint the whole picture so let’s start in Nov 2022
November 2022 system is commissioned and installed. Batteries are charged from +-56% to full over about 3hrs at 30amps or roughly 1.67kWh - for the Mathematically/Electrically inclined, 1602watt to be precise - DC wattage and AC wattage are not 1:1 parity 30amps at 53.4v is 1602watt - I was not charging my batteries at 6.6kw - if you think that, then this thread is not for you! load$hitting had not hit its full stage 6 stride at that time, so think mixes of stage 2/3, 4 and 6. Batteries were being used and run down to about 80-85% in stage 2 over 2 hours with mixed loads ranging from 1-2.5KWh and 55-60% in stage 4 or 6. We had no interruptions and not a single error or problems. We had a 12hrs long load$hitting event twice in the Dec/January and batteries hit 41% with a very OCD (me)controlled 350-450w/h load on these specific occasions – again no problems. Then we got into full stage 6 load$hitting 3 times a day - yep, I live in an area where we got 9-12hrs per day, day after day. Finally but irrelevant to the SOC issue like many other CFE and Raytech battery owners I had the 100%-90% cycle which I didn’t particularly have a problem with – go read the long post I made, to understand why – batteries should not sit at 100% for hours and days on end – I hope you have a fire extinguisher near – more info about that in my long ramble as well – go read it! This is when the problem reared itself for the first time between 40-38% left in the tanks and the inverter would either throw anything from a F56DC_VoltLow_Fault usually followed by but no exclusively F58BMS_Communuication_fault to even one or two F59AC_V_GridCurr_High Fault – for this discussion the most frequent by an overwhelming margin is the F56DC_VoltLow_Fault just as or about when the system hits 11/5% or 3% whichever the Chinese battery lotto gods deemed fit that day and then off.
The First update which required the inter-battery comm cable to be disconnected - took less than 3 min OTA (over the air) – each battery has a WiFi Module and independent battery monitoring software that can only seem to report voltage correctly as confirmed with a Voltmeter - but is useless at doing anything else.
I was instructed to cycle the batteries a few times between 10/15% and 100% and Monitor it.
The looping 100-90% discharge had changed to a 100-95% loop but again refer to my first long post (yes this current one will probably become known as the longest waffle on this forum – hopefully I’m a little entertaining at the very least) I still didn’t take issue with that.
1 week later the batteries now don’t cut out at 40% but now “gracefully” (intended sarcasm) go from 80-60% in 3min flat, then on to 50% at a leisurely pace and then when they hit 43% descend rapidly form there to 30/20/10/5/3% and then dead in 5-10min.
CFE stop responding in our happy little WhatsApp group containing expletives of me telling them everything from "they don’t know anything about BMS implementation, firmware and code writing" to how generally useless they are in responding to real issues – this goes on for the rest of the week.
They then announce how sorry they are ("Sorry Dear"??? I'm not anyone's darling/dear), that there WhatsApp wasn’t allowing them to log back in but that they had triumphantly a “new” firmware that would sort out all my trouble 😊
Disconnect comm between the two batteries again, never hear form them for another day but during the early evening get plunged into darkness because the batteries are flat and now to add to my annoyance charge from 0-100% in 45min going form 40-80% in 5min because can you guess why? They’re completely unbalanced – remember the inter-battery comm cable is disconnected waiting for the firmware update that never happened, and I now spend the next 2 days manually discharging each battery – via voltage control not BMS (by now it should be apparent to you that the BMS is $hit) and then charging each one individually, paralleling them again and reconnecting comms etc.
Firmware the 2nd finally happened on Tuesday this week – remember the one that will solve all my trouble😊 – batteries turn off after a successful OTA - Firmware update complete.
100-95% cycle now replaced by 100% and no cycling – hmm not too happy about that but I have other things to do, like work… and then Load$hitting that night 6pm - and 18min later plunged into darkness – 100% to flat - yes my troubles are truly over!
By now some of you probably have an idea as to what is the root cause of at least one of the problems – their BMS is beyond $hit – how do I know? Read on…
With torch in mouth while hurling profanity (I am quite talented you can tell) I disconnect everything to a safe point, reconnect only the master battery i.e., 1 of them and start everything up – switch to voltage monitoring mode to bypass the BM$hit (see what I did there) and apply a 4.2kWh load which runs for a whole 50min before the battery enters a fault mode and the solenoid disconnect trips – Thank god that actually works. Inverter shows voltage dropped below 47.9 (my own setting) and therefore the battery is at 5% or less.
Wash, Rinse, repeat – do the same with battery 2, the slave – and run for about 70min with a mix of 2/3.5 and 1.1-kWh loads during that time and then click - solenoid disconnect trips at 47.8v.
This all after the BM$hit declared that they where both flat to my poor DEYE inverter almost 2hours prior. By now I'm sure the inverter has developed or is developing schizophrenia.
Luckily by this time the power is back on and both batteries are at 1-2% each so I reconnect, re-parallel the batteries and connect the inter-battery comms and let the unit charge up in BMS mode (shocked I'm using the BMS again? There is a method to my madness) @40amp so 2.01kWh and monitor.
3hrs later we’re at 61% - great that is more or less correct, but then it all goes to $hit once again as 61-83% happens in about 10min and then 83-100% took 45min further – confirming my “rubbish BMShit” hypothesis in both directions conclusively. I did this 2 more times in both directions to confirm. Confirmed – in case you’re wondering - exactly repeatable.
I worked out on some spreadsheet – because I have time to kill like that – TheMafiaMan remember. At best, I can get about 6.5 maybe 7kWh of usable power out of my 10.24kWh storage but not without a massive, probably warranty voiding and time consuming workaround as you've seen above. Sorry, not good enough – I allow for 10% DoD as per the manufactures spec or maybe that should be claims. I paid like many people, a lot of money for storage, one of if not the most expensive single components in your system and I will not accept 60-70% and of that completely unreliable capacity – neither should anyone.
Anyone who has read this far – congratulations – but you must also by now agree, enough and no more. Which is exactly what I communicated to SolarAdvice – who have been privy to my WhatsApp “consult” with CFE and agree that I’ve exhausted all options.
I have options that I will be exercising and that is getting rid of CFE off my property once and for all – but this is basically a warning to all and sundry.
STAY AWAY from the CFE product – A properly working, reliable and trustworthy BMS in a LiPo, LiFePo4 and the like is non-negotiable.
You shouldn’t have to wonder if you can make it through 2hrs of loadshedding because the data you get from one of the most expensive items in your alternative power solution is “wonky” at best.
Unless you like dancing with fire – literally - and have a few chemical fire extinguishers on hand – you should have at least one with any large Lithium-xxxx-insert-your-particular-battery-chemistry-here anyway, but right now – for me, these represent a substantial electrical and fire risk to my property and the vehicles in my garage. I’m 100% not prepared to roll the dice on either side. Besides the fact that if you’ve followed my rant this far (thank you) this is not a workable use case and why I’ve had to postpone the Solar Array until I have reliably working storage solution.
As my intro eluded, this seems to be a far wider reaching issue cropping up on other battery systems too – so like others I’m left wondering what my options for a reliable battery brand are. One that can provide a battery system suitable for the SA market with our unfortunately unique power situation that actually works…
My Short list so far is 10-15kWh, 1C discharge rate and 10yr warranty
SolarMD’s 14.3kWh battery. Freedom Won 15/12 battery -  but not so sure I'm onboard with Local-is-lekker - Solar MD are supposedly also local but I know of a couple of installations    with both brands that are more than 12-18 months old and have had zero issues with the batteries, so I'll need to investigate some more -  there is at  least one horror story which seems like a 5 year old model with 470+ cycles that is basically dead and FW cannot offer replacement cells because they're EOL(end of life) according to the comment placed this guy purchased 5 x 30/24 units which he must have sold organs for    LG Chemistry – I don’t believe I will be able to source or afford it – at the moment rated worldwide as one of if not the best, but a 16kWh unit is almost the cost of a Tesla Powerwall think €9,377.00 sourced international with shipping and then add what ever bend-over-tax when it gets to SA and I'll most likely be at R220-240k+ and that’s without the Tesla’s already built-in inverter. You also need an installer with LG Chem Installer Certification and I've only found the 6.5kWhunit locally but no pricing from SegenSolar who to date have not responded to email or phone calls - I might try again. DEYE – I’m hearing good things, but they are also expensive – R38k-R43k for 6.14kWh (R6.1-7k per 1kw vs R5.2k I paid) - in Fairness if you pair it with a DEYE inverter they extend your inverter warranty to 10 yrs from 5yrs to match the 10yr battery warranty,  in essence you're paying for the 5yr extra warranty on your inverter so this is looking like an option but only if I can get a higher capacity single module between 10-15kWh will I consider this Sunsynk which is DEYE vice versa have a 15.97 LFP wall mount unit for about R96k so that is priced in my opinion more inline but I'm not sure if you get the same inverter warranty extension for a DEYE inverter because you do get an extra 5yrs on the Sunsynk invert... I’m not really interested in Hubble for personal reasons (but feel free to change my mind - also in the same boat with local is lekker - but I see that actual capacity seems to be questionable), anything with ESS in the name – I think CFE and few others are all the same 5.12kWh battery in fact wrongly or rightly so they’re unheard of in Europe, the US and Australia, both large markets for Batteries, which aren’t accepting inferior LiFePo4 and the like batteries onto their shores and we should be asking ourselves why.
The Only exception here is AlphaESS which SolarAdvice use to carry but no longer do and in hindsight while I was told the systems cannot be paralled to each other the 5kWh/10kWh Storage & Inverter Combo Smile5, is well documented and supported in Australia, Singapore and in some parts of Europe and the paralleling issue can easily be worked around by creating separate 5kW circuits and running separate subsystems - if I had to do it all over again which I cannot afford to do now, I would go this route because I have an honest Sparky and that means I would have split my solar array into 4x 2.025kw Arrays (2xMPPT per inverter) feeding 2 separate 5kw circuits with 20kWh of storage between the two and cost wise, would have come out about the same as my 8kw Inv. 20kWh(eventually) storage and 8.1kw Solar Array - However, I wouldn't attempt this type of setup with the majority of unscrupulous 'electricians/installers' I have had the displeasure of dealing with over the years.
Rant over - For now...
 
 
 

On the 8 August 2023 @ 11:00 am,  my CFE debacle came to an eventual end -  the saga if anyone has interest or wants to see the history HERE
I would love to be able to say that the many many hours of trouble shooting - help, comments and questions from numerous forum members like @HendrikBigChief for analysing endless graphs and reports - much appriecated your advice and willingness to hear me out and offer solutions to look at, @Zak @I84RiS and others i'm sorry if i forget to mention you, not least being banned/kicked out from a CFE whatsapp group (what a misreable lot) resulted in the problem batteries being sorted out - rather the situation with the CFE batteries got so bad that no load over 2000watt could be run in BMS only mode (which i'm sticking to my guns on is how the batteries are supposed to be run) without getting F56 errors F26 errors the list was endless - CFE where unhelpful eventually flashing the 2 batteries at least two more times and then proclaiming that it was the inverters firmware that was the issue - we (SolarAdvice and I) relented and got DEYE to push an unneeded but never the less non-problematic firmware update to my 8kw inverter for only the exact same things to continue happening. (just a note we did try to run the batteries in AGM but we couldn't get more than 30min reliably in AGM / manual settings without both batteries tripping out even when idle and not under load)
I had to travel for work and its been more that a month but it had already been agreed with SoalrAdvice that we had exhausted all options - they really have been no nonsense about exchanging them - the delay was more from my side to exhaust all options and mostly my patience. But its the batteries and thier bad BMS.
The contenders where Solar MDs 14.3kw(single battery) or two DEYE 6.14kw batteries and given Budget and my existing diesel gensets conversion to automation and final sound proofing of the generating room,  just a few weeks from being completed, the DEYE where deemed the best compromise as the 8.1kw solar array still to be commisioned together with the Genset and automated system in place as well as low household base load means we'd be fine off grid. There is space being made for a posiible 3rd DEYE Battery towards December but right now the Genset project needs to be completed and Solar Commisioned before Feb 2024 to claim the rebate.
Almost one week in and with Loadshedding back to 5-6hrs for us i'm happy to report so far that the DEYE batteries have performed flawlessly (fingers crossed of course) -  even though we've only grown usable capacity buy 2kw or +-18-20%  we're seeing different consumption/efficiency/conversion numbers running all the same loads as before and conversion/efficiency wise we're seeing an actual net gain of almost 25-30% from the batteries. I cannot say why right now and I only have 6-7 days data vs 255days data from the CFE's but something is different (time will tell if this a indeed a gain of sorts and i'll be monitoring it) - off the top of my head the only notable change is battery temps. the inverter battery settings have remained unchnaged and we're running in BMS mode with the inverter showing 00 & deye next to it under lithium - the CFE's always opperated between 27-35°C even at idle in a 21°C space - and loads even reaching 39-40°C - but the DEYE units are sitting @19-21°C under load, maybe there is a better thermal layout inside or better passive cooling but even now with them being on load for 2.5hrs during loadshedding and then charging @40A back to 100%, tempreture is 21°C and its notably warmer outside today. Time will tell is guess.
I'd just want to again mention that SolarAdvice where champs in getting this all sorted from the re-order, allocation, booking a team to do the swap/install and keeping me in the loop the awesome two guys (cannot remember their names) that did the swap out and wall mounted them for me without makign a mess, breaking anything and just being really pleasant to chat to - this business is doing this right and all my interactions with them over the last 7+ months has been consistently excellent - they're patient and I know I can be difficult - but there was no need to be as they where just really professional about dealing with all of this - highly recommend them.
I'll post an update in about a months time and again am happy to answer any questions and hopefully keep up and contribute info to the forum - theMafiaman - out.
 

On the 8 August 2023 @ 11:00 am,  my CFE debacle came to an eventual end -  the saga if anyone has interest or wants to see the history HERE
I would love to be able to say that the many many hours of trouble shooting - help, comments and questions from numerous forum members like @HendrikBigChief for analysing endless graphs and reports - much appriecated your advice and willingness to hear me out and offer solutions to look at, @Zak @I84RiS and others i'm sorry if i forget to mention you, not least being banned/kicked out from a CFE whatsapp group (what a misreable lot) resulted in the problem batteries being sorted out - rather the situation with the CFE batteries got so bad that no load over 2000watt could be run in BMS only mode (which i'm sticking to my guns on is how the batteries are supposed to be run) without getting F56 errors F26 errors the list was endless - CFE where unhelpful eventually flashing the 2 batteries at least two more times and then proclaiming that it was the inverters firmware that was the issue - we (SolarAdvice and I) relented and got DEYE to push an unneeded but never the less non-problematic firmware update to my 8kw inverter for only the exact same things to continue happening. (just a note we did try to run the batteries in AGM but we couldn't get more than 30min reliably in AGM / manual settings without both batteries tripping out even when idle and not under load)
I had to travel for work and its been more that a month but it had already been agreed with SoalrAdvice that we had exhausted all options - they really have been no nonsense about exchanging them - the delay was more from my side to exhaust all options and mostly my patience. But its the batteries and thier bad BMS.
The contenders where Solar MDs 14.3kw(single battery) or two DEYE 6.14kw batteries and given Budget and my existing diesel gensets conversion to automation and final sound proofing of the generating room,  just a few weeks from being completed, the DEYE where deemed the best compromise as the 8.1kw solar array still to be commisioned together with the Genset and automated system in place as well as low household base load means we'd be fine off grid. There is space being made for a posiible 3rd DEYE Battery towards December but right now the Genset project needs to be completed and Solar Commisioned before Feb 2024 to claim the rebate.
Almost one week in and with Loadshedding back to 5-6hrs for us i'm happy to report so far that the DEYE batteries have performed flawlessly (fingers crossed of course) -  even though we've only grown usable capacity buy 2kw or +-18-20%  we're seeing different consumption/efficiency/conversion numbers running all the same loads as before and conversion/efficiency wise we're seeing an actual net gain of almost 25-30% from the batteries. I cannot say why right now and I only have 6-7 days data vs 255days data from the CFE's but something is different (time will tell if this a indeed a gain of sorts and i'll be monitoring it) - off the top of my head the only notable change is battery temps. the inverter battery settings have remained unchnaged and we're running in BMS mode with the inverter showing 00 & deye next to it under lithium - the CFE's always opperated between 27-35°C even at idle in a 21°C space - and loads even reaching 39-40°C - but the DEYE units are sitting @19-21°C under load, maybe there is a better thermal layout inside or better passive cooling but even now with them being on load for 2.5hrs during loadshedding and then charging @40A back to 100%, tempreture is 21°C and its notably warmer outside today. Time will tell is guess.
I'd just want to again mention that SolarAdvice where champs in getting this all sorted from the re-order, allocation, booking a team to do the swap/install and keeping me in the loop the awesome two guys (cannot remember their names) that did the swap out and wall mounted them for me without makign a mess, breaking anything and just being really pleasant to chat to - this business is doing this right and all my interactions with them over the last 7+ months has been consistently excellent - they're patient and I know I can be difficult - but there was no need to be as they where just really professional about dealing with all of this - highly recommend them.
I'll post an update in about a months time and again am happy to answer any questions and hopefully keep up and contribute info to the forum - theMafiaman - out.
 

Wow Wow - Pylontech commenting that the BMS is "passive"? really.
I rest my case / hat / cape  what ever you prefer - as someone noted we're into the first 5yr window of battery/inverter warranties and the alarming overtone is that warranties seem to not be worth the paper they're printed on and of course the importers and dealer are dare I say it as unscrupulous as always - any excuse to not honor a warranty.
I personally just on the comments thus far wont look at Pylontech - there is an alarming read between the lines situation brewing - the battery swelling issue is not new and has been happening for years with various 2000 and 3000 series models probably more than most people know/admit/report
The bottom line is this - international standards which lets be honest seem to mean little in SA dictate that LiFePO4 and other/simlar Li-chemistry are required to have a  BMS, Battery Management System, a mandatory component for LiFePO4 batteries. LiFePO4 or all lithium battery cells are sensitive to over-voltage, under-voltage, and over-current. If a LiFePO4 battery is kept under one of the above conditions for a long time, it can easily cause capacity degradation, battery damage, or even the risk of fire. There was an EU/EE statement I read once that was much like the above and added ..."should invoke (I love that word) a hard disconnect from the inverter to circumvent the damage and or fire and or exhausting of chemical gases or other unsatisfactory expulsions at all costs" I've butchered it a bit most likely, but I know some manufactures actually employ a solenoid/engergised disconnect that physically breaks the incoming charge or out going load if an inverter doesn't respond in xx millisecond of a fault being registered.
If Pylontech want to assert that they have a Passive BMS then I think they should be "passive aggressively" banned from selling their product here unless they can demonstrate that their BMS does what its actually supposed to do - protect the internal cells and pack as a whole from what they are claiming is the cause of the issue(s) experienced by users.
Out of interest and this isn't a "plug" for DEYE inverters, but one of the options is a STOP on BMS error which I've seen many an installer disable because its considered a "nuisance" but what it does is when there is a BMS error it can  disconnect from the battery and isolate the inverter and loads and battery(s) from each other - as far as I'm concerned it should be a password protected option that cannot be unchecked and only in very special circumstances with an installers ID. I have mine on and with my "badly misbehaving" CFE batteries it does exactly that in mere milliseconds.
Then again I think half the batteries out there in SA would never work if that was a requirement because BMS issues seem to be a large problem from scouring this forum and we need to ask ourselves - what scarp is being dumped on our shores that wouldn't pass as safe in other countries?

Hi all - yes click-bait like topic for good reason.
Before I decided to write this particular post I also scoured this forum and noted that various users are having quite frankly unacceptable levels of SOC issues with all kinds of batteries even Pylontech and other "reputable" brands - so I'm starting to think that the majority (i.e. not all but 50-60%+) of the batteries and new makes and models that seem to land on our shores every other day, are simply not suitable for our unfortunate and insidiously unique power problems here in SA - I'm talking about frequent loadshedding, multiple times per day for 2-6 hours at a time, depending on where you are fortunate or unfortunate to be in our country.
Those that would like to follow previous long CFE discussions can view them  here  and I have a very long (sorry) but complete view of my installation, how I use it and the dreaded SOC drop from 40%-10% in 5 minutes or less or worse still 40% to 0% almost instantly here
For those that don't to go read them, a very summarised version is bullet pointed below which doesn't give you 100% context - so if you're going to ask questions or tell me I'm 'stupid' without referencing important info in the original post(s) - be warned - I'm called the TheMafiaMan for a reason...🤣
8kw DEYE inverter 2x CFE 5100s batteries setup as 30% restart 20% battery warning and 10-15% Shutdown. Final Battery setup will be 20kWh of storage via 2 more 5.12kWh batteries to be added in 2023 still. The system is protected by 200amp keto fuses and each board has surge protection as well - the house sits behind the inverter because A) I want clean pure sinewave power to all my plugs, lights and screens and B) fridges and appliances with inverter type motors are all better protected that way too. Your electronics will thank you. I charge the batteries @40amps so roughly 2kWh have experimented with 20amps and even 75amps - for my use case for now 40amps is my sweet spot giving my inverter head room to still run other higher draw loads when the batteries are charging. No solar currently, only used as a storage system to facilitate work from home and a "normal" quality of life (8.1kWh solar array is being commissioned) 6kva diesel Genset (dedicated generator room for Genset and fuel - already wired in with manual change over) just finishing off sound isolation, ventilation and then will automate change over with the dry contact and Gen feed-in on the DEYE Inverter Finally Eskom connection will capped off once solar is in and run in my own "Islanding" setup where I am my own "Utility provider". Let me start by pointing out that my supplier for all my equipment mentioned is Solar Advice - solar.co.za and that they have been only helpful, support providing and quick to execute where CFE keep dropping the ball - silver lining they will be sorting out my problem without fanfare - the way a reputable business should and I keep recommending them over and over.
From my side I agreed to go through not one but 2 firmware updates with the "overseas - team" at CFE, resulting in about 75% of my frustrating 2+ weeks of irritability.
Let's get on with it - two plus weeks of frustration, hair pulling and plenty, and I do mean plenty of potty mouth later - I now have the latest CFE-5100s firmware on both of my batters and the great news is...
I am at least 50% worse off than before, cannot make it through 2hrs of loadshedding with 10.24kWh of storage and less than 2kWh load, and those that are good at math that means? Yup 79-80% and then 3% 3-5min later, and then off. Unacceptable by any standards - I mean are there a few AAA batteries inside my two 5.12kWh LiFePo4 units.....???
But this doesn't really paint the whole picture so let’s start in Nov 2022
November 2022 system is commissioned and installed. Batteries are charged from +-56% to full over about 3hrs at 30amps or roughly 1.67kWh - for the Mathematically/Electrically inclined, 1602watt to be precise - DC wattage and AC wattage are not 1:1 parity 30amps at 53.4v is 1602watt - I was not charging my batteries at 6.6kw - if you think that, then this thread is not for you! load$hitting had not hit its full stage 6 stride at that time, so think mixes of stage 2/3, 4 and 6. Batteries were being used and run down to about 80-85% in stage 2 over 2 hours with mixed loads ranging from 1-2.5KWh and 55-60% in stage 4 or 6. We had no interruptions and not a single error or problems. We had a 12hrs long load$hitting event twice in the Dec/January and batteries hit 41% with a very OCD (me)controlled 350-450w/h load on these specific occasions – again no problems. Then we got into full stage 6 load$hitting 3 times a day - yep, I live in an area where we got 9-12hrs per day, day after day. Finally but irrelevant to the SOC issue like many other CFE and Raytech battery owners I had the 100%-90% cycle which I didn’t particularly have a problem with – go read the long post I made, to understand why – batteries should not sit at 100% for hours and days on end – I hope you have a fire extinguisher near – more info about that in my long ramble as well – go read it! This is when the problem reared itself for the first time between 40-38% left in the tanks and the inverter would either throw anything from a F56DC_VoltLow_Fault usually followed by but no exclusively F58BMS_Communuication_fault to even one or two F59AC_V_GridCurr_High Fault – for this discussion the most frequent by an overwhelming margin is the F56DC_VoltLow_Fault just as or about when the system hits 11/5% or 3% whichever the Chinese battery lotto gods deemed fit that day and then off.
The First update which required the inter-battery comm cable to be disconnected - took less than 3 min OTA (over the air) – each battery has a WiFi Module and independent battery monitoring software that can only seem to report voltage correctly as confirmed with a Voltmeter - but is useless at doing anything else.
I was instructed to cycle the batteries a few times between 10/15% and 100% and Monitor it.
The looping 100-90% discharge had changed to a 100-95% loop but again refer to my first long post (yes this current one will probably become known as the longest waffle on this forum – hopefully I’m a little entertaining at the very least) I still didn’t take issue with that.
1 week later the batteries now don’t cut out at 40% but now “gracefully” (intended sarcasm) go from 80-60% in 3min flat, then on to 50% at a leisurely pace and then when they hit 43% descend rapidly form there to 30/20/10/5/3% and then dead in 5-10min.
CFE stop responding in our happy little WhatsApp group containing expletives of me telling them everything from "they don’t know anything about BMS implementation, firmware and code writing" to how generally useless they are in responding to real issues – this goes on for the rest of the week.
They then announce how sorry they are ("Sorry Dear"??? I'm not anyone's darling/dear), that there WhatsApp wasn’t allowing them to log back in but that they had triumphantly a “new” firmware that would sort out all my trouble 😊
Disconnect comm between the two batteries again, never hear form them for another day but during the early evening get plunged into darkness because the batteries are flat and now to add to my annoyance charge from 0-100% in 45min going form 40-80% in 5min because can you guess why? They’re completely unbalanced – remember the inter-battery comm cable is disconnected waiting for the firmware update that never happened, and I now spend the next 2 days manually discharging each battery – via voltage control not BMS (by now it should be apparent to you that the BMS is $hit) and then charging each one individually, paralleling them again and reconnecting comms etc.
Firmware the 2nd finally happened on Tuesday this week – remember the one that will solve all my trouble😊 – batteries turn off after a successful OTA - Firmware update complete.
100-95% cycle now replaced by 100% and no cycling – hmm not too happy about that but I have other things to do, like work… and then Load$hitting that night 6pm - and 18min later plunged into darkness – 100% to flat - yes my troubles are truly over!
By now some of you probably have an idea as to what is the root cause of at least one of the problems – their BMS is beyond $hit – how do I know? Read on…
With torch in mouth while hurling profanity (I am quite talented you can tell) I disconnect everything to a safe point, reconnect only the master battery i.e., 1 of them and start everything up – switch to voltage monitoring mode to bypass the BM$hit (see what I did there) and apply a 4.2kWh load which runs for a whole 50min before the battery enters a fault mode and the solenoid disconnect trips – Thank god that actually works. Inverter shows voltage dropped below 47.9 (my own setting) and therefore the battery is at 5% or less.
Wash, Rinse, repeat – do the same with battery 2, the slave – and run for about 70min with a mix of 2/3.5 and 1.1-kWh loads during that time and then click - solenoid disconnect trips at 47.8v.
This all after the BM$hit declared that they where both flat to my poor DEYE inverter almost 2hours prior. By now I'm sure the inverter has developed or is developing schizophrenia.
Luckily by this time the power is back on and both batteries are at 1-2% each so I reconnect, re-parallel the batteries and connect the inter-battery comms and let the unit charge up in BMS mode (shocked I'm using the BMS again? There is a method to my madness) @40amp so 2.01kWh and monitor.
3hrs later we’re at 61% - great that is more or less correct, but then it all goes to $hit once again as 61-83% happens in about 10min and then 83-100% took 45min further – confirming my “rubbish BMShit” hypothesis in both directions conclusively. I did this 2 more times in both directions to confirm. Confirmed – in case you’re wondering - exactly repeatable.
I worked out on some spreadsheet – because I have time to kill like that – TheMafiaMan remember. At best, I can get about 6.5 maybe 7kWh of usable power out of my 10.24kWh storage but not without a massive, probably warranty voiding and time consuming workaround as you've seen above. Sorry, not good enough – I allow for 10% DoD as per the manufactures spec or maybe that should be claims. I paid like many people, a lot of money for storage, one of if not the most expensive single components in your system and I will not accept 60-70% and of that completely unreliable capacity – neither should anyone.
Anyone who has read this far – congratulations – but you must also by now agree, enough and no more. Which is exactly what I communicated to SolarAdvice – who have been privy to my WhatsApp “consult” with CFE and agree that I’ve exhausted all options.
I have options that I will be exercising and that is getting rid of CFE off my property once and for all – but this is basically a warning to all and sundry.
STAY AWAY from the CFE product – A properly working, reliable and trustworthy BMS in a LiPo, LiFePo4 and the like is non-negotiable.
You shouldn’t have to wonder if you can make it through 2hrs of loadshedding because the data you get from one of the most expensive items in your alternative power solution is “wonky” at best.
Unless you like dancing with fire – literally - and have a few chemical fire extinguishers on hand – you should have at least one with any large Lithium-xxxx-insert-your-particular-battery-chemistry-here anyway, but right now – for me, these represent a substantial electrical and fire risk to my property and the vehicles in my garage. I’m 100% not prepared to roll the dice on either side. Besides the fact that if you’ve followed my rant this far (thank you) this is not a workable use case and why I’ve had to postpone the Solar Array until I have reliably working storage solution.
As my intro eluded, this seems to be a far wider reaching issue cropping up on other battery systems too – so like others I’m left wondering what my options for a reliable battery brand are. One that can provide a battery system suitable for the SA market with our unfortunately unique power situation that actually works…
My Short list so far is 10-15kWh, 1C discharge rate and 10yr warranty
SolarMD’s 14.3kWh battery. Freedom Won 15/12 battery -  but not so sure I'm onboard with Local-is-lekker - Solar MD are supposedly also local but I know of a couple of installations    with both brands that are more than 12-18 months old and have had zero issues with the batteries, so I'll need to investigate some more -  there is at  least one horror story which seems like a 5 year old model with 470+ cycles that is basically dead and FW cannot offer replacement cells because they're EOL(end of life) according to the comment placed this guy purchased 5 x 30/24 units which he must have sold organs for    LG Chemistry – I don’t believe I will be able to source or afford it – at the moment rated worldwide as one of if not the best, but a 16kWh unit is almost the cost of a Tesla Powerwall think €9,377.00 sourced international with shipping and then add what ever bend-over-tax when it gets to SA and I'll most likely be at R220-240k+ and that’s without the Tesla’s already built-in inverter. You also need an installer with LG Chem Installer Certification and I've only found the 6.5kWhunit locally but no pricing from SegenSolar who to date have not responded to email or phone calls - I might try again. DEYE – I’m hearing good things, but they are also expensive – R38k-R43k for 6.14kWh (R6.1-7k per 1kw vs R5.2k I paid) - in Fairness if you pair it with a DEYE inverter they extend your inverter warranty to 10 yrs from 5yrs to match the 10yr battery warranty,  in essence you're paying for the 5yr extra warranty on your inverter so this is looking like an option but only if I can get a higher capacity single module between 10-15kWh will I consider this Sunsynk which is DEYE vice versa have a 15.97 LFP wall mount unit for about R96k so that is priced in my opinion more inline but I'm not sure if you get the same inverter warranty extension for a DEYE inverter because you do get an extra 5yrs on the Sunsynk invert... I’m not really interested in Hubble for personal reasons (but feel free to change my mind - also in the same boat with local is lekker - but I see that actual capacity seems to be questionable), anything with ESS in the name – I think CFE and few others are all the same 5.12kWh battery in fact wrongly or rightly so they’re unheard of in Europe, the US and Australia, both large markets for Batteries, which aren’t accepting inferior LiFePo4 and the like batteries onto their shores and we should be asking ourselves why.
The Only exception here is AlphaESS which SolarAdvice use to carry but no longer do and in hindsight while I was told the systems cannot be paralled to each other the 5kWh/10kWh Storage & Inverter Combo Smile5, is well documented and supported in Australia, Singapore and in some parts of Europe and the paralleling issue can easily be worked around by creating separate 5kW circuits and running separate subsystems - if I had to do it all over again which I cannot afford to do now, I would go this route because I have an honest Sparky and that means I would have split my solar array into 4x 2.025kw Arrays (2xMPPT per inverter) feeding 2 separate 5kw circuits with 20kWh of storage between the two and cost wise, would have come out about the same as my 8kw Inv. 20kWh(eventually) storage and 8.1kw Solar Array - However, I wouldn't attempt this type of setup with the majority of unscrupulous 'electricians/installers' I have had the displeasure of dealing with over the years.
Rant over - For now...
 
 
 

PS the BESS app shows all 16 of my cells in each pack to be at 3.32V most of the time
As of right now the master battery is 16 cells @3.32v my slave battery has 13 cells @ 3.32v and 3 @ 3.33v - even when I've had the weird drops and such the cells are all according to the app fine and within normal range - and I've never had  the actual pack go into a full on fault mode other than once for a low voltage level 3 fault when they where completely drained and we had no power for 12+hrs
Anyway I hope you fair better

Welcome @New
As you can see I've not had a great experience - your SOC cycling between 90-100 suggests 2 firmware version earlier than mine now after 2 updates - mine did that originally - purchased in Nov 2022 you can see in the post how to determine which batch and version battery you have but if you bought it in the last 3-6 months its the v3 most likely - mine is too.
My advice - don't update the firmware if you're not having any issues - I hope unlike me time doesn't paint a different picture - if you can get below a 20% SOC then you're already better off than I am, whenever my batteries hit 40% SOC they'd drop to 7/5/1% in 2-3 minutes.
Maybe as a caution, C rating doesn't stack as people think it does - I've seen multiple installers, resellers etc. say that 2 x 0.5C batteries gives you 1C. That is not correct. Assuming you have 1, 4 or 8 of the same battery rated at 0.5C your storage capacity is doubled, quadrupled etc. but in essence if you want to realise that stored energy as efficiently as possible then you would need to use it at 0.5C or even possibly 0.25C
Basic rule" C rate doesn't stack in Series
In parallel connection the C rating is wrongly attributed to stacking the load because you're "1/2 ing" the current between for example 2 batteries - think of it this way the faster you discharge them "Higher C rating" the less electricity you get out over time.
At it's simplest Its the electric car example - lets use a TESLA - freekin quick but if you thrash it in 01-100 launches and max performance pulls what happens - batteries overheat and your range i.e. usable storage disappears and becomes much less. fast = more power, more power = higher C rates 2C, 4C 8C etc.
I used to in a previous life fly large commercial load-bearing drones - we'd have large LIPO packs that you could pull/discharge at 25-40C for about 2-3min in specialty situations and then they'd unceremoniously die or you could fly reasonably at 8C and get 10-12min
If you where unlucky your drone would plummet out the sky or if you where a good pilot you'd monitor voltage and current like a naughty kid in a park and landed it just before it was about to expire - I was one of those pilots that was careful and I have only ever lost one drone - I "infamously" drowned a very large, very expensive drone 10yrs ago that had a faulty BMS and I ignored the V and C rates for 5-10 seconds - it landed itself in a large dam - police divers had to come fish it out. Needless to say my "employers" where not happy with me - however telemetry data proved I wasn't reckless and that the BMS went "offline" about 15seconds before the drone became "unstable" - the lesson applies though.
200AH batteries discharged at 2C will not nett you 200AH worth of energy.
CFEs own data is misleading - an older manual states 5000w/3000w nominal i.e. 0.6C, the sticker on the side says 100ah or 1C and newer docs mention neither other than 1C charge and discharge - they cannot seem to decide which one - I would have to advise based on my experience that you treat them as 0.5C for charging and discharging.
My beef with them is CFE sell there batteries as 1C charge and discharge product - It cannot in my case reliably do 1C between the 2x 5.12kWh batteries and in Lithium mode the batteries die in 17min or less - now whether the SOC is wrongly calculated, comms are faulty or my batteries are not charging fully or discharging, I don't know, but we cannot spend the type of money we do on these to tinker - If I wanted to do that I'd build my own battery packs.
My advice after 7+months - there is no need unless a once-in-a-blue-moon emergency to charge your batteries at 1C - 100AH, i'd recommend not acceding 0.5C or 50A and I found 40A is a nice middle ground leaving your inverter some headroom to run other loads when charging - again ideal on a 8kw invert but I'd drop that to 20-25A on a 5kw inverter.

As an ex-firmware developer you guys are really freaking me out. Please do not upgrade your firmware unless you really have to. There are so many things that could go wrong and the chances of bricking your system for no benefit is very high.

Welcome @New
As you can see I've not had a great experience - your SOC cycling between 90-100 suggests 2 firmware version earlier than mine now after 2 updates - mine did that originally - purchased in Nov 2022 you can see in the post how to determine which batch and version battery you have but if you bought it in the last 3-6 months its the v3 most likely - mine is too.
My advice - don't update the firmware if you're not having any issues - I hope unlike me time doesn't paint a different picture - if you can get below a 20% SOC then you're already better off than I am, whenever my batteries hit 40% SOC they'd drop to 7/5/1% in 2-3 minutes.
Maybe as a caution, C rating doesn't stack as people think it does - I've seen multiple installers, resellers etc. say that 2 x 0.5C batteries gives you 1C. That is not correct. Assuming you have 1, 4 or 8 of the same battery rated at 0.5C your storage capacity is doubled, quadrupled etc. but in essence if you want to realise that stored energy as efficiently as possible then you would need to use it at 0.5C or even possibly 0.25C
Basic rule" C rate doesn't stack in Series
In parallel connection the C rating is wrongly attributed to stacking the load because you're "1/2 ing" the current between for example 2 batteries - think of it this way the faster you discharge them "Higher C rating" the less electricity you get out over time.
At it's simplest Its the electric car example - lets use a TESLA - freekin quick but if you thrash it in 01-100 launches and max performance pulls what happens - batteries overheat and your range i.e. usable storage disappears and becomes much less. fast = more power, more power = higher C rates 2C, 4C 8C etc.
I used to in a previous life fly large commercial load-bearing drones - we'd have large LIPO packs that you could pull/discharge at 25-40C for about 2-3min in specialty situations and then they'd unceremoniously die or you could fly reasonably at 8C and get 10-12min
If you where unlucky your drone would plummet out the sky or if you where a good pilot you'd monitor voltage and current like a naughty kid in a park and landed it just before it was about to expire - I was one of those pilots that was careful and I have only ever lost one drone - I "infamously" drowned a very large, very expensive drone 10yrs ago that had a faulty BMS and I ignored the V and C rates for 5-10 seconds - it landed itself in a large dam - police divers had to come fish it out. Needless to say my "employers" where not happy with me - however telemetry data proved I wasn't reckless and that the BMS went "offline" about 15seconds before the drone became "unstable" - the lesson applies though.
200AH batteries discharged at 2C will not nett you 200AH worth of energy.
CFEs own data is misleading - an older manual states 5000w/3000w nominal i.e. 0.6C, the sticker on the side says 100ah or 1C and newer docs mention neither other than 1C charge and discharge - they cannot seem to decide which one - I would have to advise based on my experience that you treat them as 0.5C for charging and discharging.
My beef with them is CFE sell there batteries as 1C charge and discharge product - It cannot in my case reliably do 1C between the 2x 5.12kWh batteries and in Lithium mode the batteries die in 17min or less - now whether the SOC is wrongly calculated, comms are faulty or my batteries are not charging fully or discharging, I don't know, but we cannot spend the type of money we do on these to tinker - If I wanted to do that I'd build my own battery packs.
My advice after 7+months - there is no need unless a once-in-a-blue-moon emergency to charge your batteries at 1C - 100AH, i'd recommend not acceding 0.5C or 50A and I found 40A is a nice middle ground leaving your inverter some headroom to run other loads when charging - again ideal on a 8kw invert but I'd drop that to 20-25A on a 5kw inverter.

Welcome @New
As you can see I've not had a great experience - your SOC cycling between 90-100 suggests 2 firmware version earlier than mine now after 2 updates - mine did that originally - purchased in Nov 2022 you can see in the post how to determine which batch and version battery you have but if you bought it in the last 3-6 months its the v3 most likely - mine is too.
My advice - don't update the firmware if you're not having any issues - I hope unlike me time doesn't paint a different picture - if you can get below a 20% SOC then you're already better off than I am, whenever my batteries hit 40% SOC they'd drop to 7/5/1% in 2-3 minutes.
Maybe as a caution, C rating doesn't stack as people think it does - I've seen multiple installers, resellers etc. say that 2 x 0.5C batteries gives you 1C. That is not correct. Assuming you have 1, 4 or 8 of the same battery rated at 0.5C your storage capacity is doubled, quadrupled etc. but in essence if you want to realise that stored energy as efficiently as possible then you would need to use it at 0.5C or even possibly 0.25C
Basic rule" C rate doesn't stack in Series
In parallel connection the C rating is wrongly attributed to stacking the load because you're "1/2 ing" the current between for example 2 batteries - think of it this way the faster you discharge them "Higher C rating" the less electricity you get out over time.
At it's simplest Its the electric car example - lets use a TESLA - freekin quick but if you thrash it in 01-100 launches and max performance pulls what happens - batteries overheat and your range i.e. usable storage disappears and becomes much less. fast = more power, more power = higher C rates 2C, 4C 8C etc.
I used to in a previous life fly large commercial load-bearing drones - we'd have large LIPO packs that you could pull/discharge at 25-40C for about 2-3min in specialty situations and then they'd unceremoniously die or you could fly reasonably at 8C and get 10-12min
If you where unlucky your drone would plummet out the sky or if you where a good pilot you'd monitor voltage and current like a naughty kid in a park and landed it just before it was about to expire - I was one of those pilots that was careful and I have only ever lost one drone - I "infamously" drowned a very large, very expensive drone 10yrs ago that had a faulty BMS and I ignored the V and C rates for 5-10 seconds - it landed itself in a large dam - police divers had to come fish it out. Needless to say my "employers" where not happy with me - however telemetry data proved I wasn't reckless and that the BMS went "offline" about 15seconds before the drone became "unstable" - the lesson applies though.
200AH batteries discharged at 2C will not nett you 200AH worth of energy.
CFEs own data is misleading - an older manual states 5000w/3000w nominal i.e. 0.6C, the sticker on the side says 100ah or 1C and newer docs mention neither other than 1C charge and discharge - they cannot seem to decide which one - I would have to advise based on my experience that you treat them as 0.5C for charging and discharging.
My beef with them is CFE sell there batteries as 1C charge and discharge product - It cannot in my case reliably do 1C between the 2x 5.12kWh batteries and in Lithium mode the batteries die in 17min or less - now whether the SOC is wrongly calculated, comms are faulty or my batteries are not charging fully or discharging, I don't know, but we cannot spend the type of money we do on these to tinker - If I wanted to do that I'd build my own battery packs.
My advice after 7+months - there is no need unless a once-in-a-blue-moon emergency to charge your batteries at 1C - 100AH, i'd recommend not acceding 0.5C or 50A and I found 40A is a nice middle ground leaving your inverter some headroom to run other loads when charging - again ideal on a 8kw invert but I'd drop that to 20-25A on a 5kw inverter.

Hi all - yes click-bait like topic for good reason.
Before I decided to write this particular post I also scoured this forum and noted that various users are having quite frankly unacceptable levels of SOC issues with all kinds of batteries even Pylontech and other "reputable" brands - so I'm starting to think that the majority (i.e. not all but 50-60%+) of the batteries and new makes and models that seem to land on our shores every other day, are simply not suitable for our unfortunate and insidiously unique power problems here in SA - I'm talking about frequent loadshedding, multiple times per day for 2-6 hours at a time, depending on where you are fortunate or unfortunate to be in our country.
Those that would like to follow previous long CFE discussions can view them  here  and I have a very long (sorry) but complete view of my installation, how I use it and the dreaded SOC drop from 40%-10% in 5 minutes or less or worse still 40% to 0% almost instantly here
For those that don't to go read them, a very summarised version is bullet pointed below which doesn't give you 100% context - so if you're going to ask questions or tell me I'm 'stupid' without referencing important info in the original post(s) - be warned - I'm called the TheMafiaMan for a reason...🤣
8kw DEYE inverter 2x CFE 5100s batteries setup as 30% restart 20% battery warning and 10-15% Shutdown. Final Battery setup will be 20kWh of storage via 2 more 5.12kWh batteries to be added in 2023 still. The system is protected by 200amp keto fuses and each board has surge protection as well - the house sits behind the inverter because A) I want clean pure sinewave power to all my plugs, lights and screens and B) fridges and appliances with inverter type motors are all better protected that way too. Your electronics will thank you. I charge the batteries @40amps so roughly 2kWh have experimented with 20amps and even 75amps - for my use case for now 40amps is my sweet spot giving my inverter head room to still run other higher draw loads when the batteries are charging. No solar currently, only used as a storage system to facilitate work from home and a "normal" quality of life (8.1kWh solar array is being commissioned) 6kva diesel Genset (dedicated generator room for Genset and fuel - already wired in with manual change over) just finishing off sound isolation, ventilation and then will automate change over with the dry contact and Gen feed-in on the DEYE Inverter Finally Eskom connection will capped off once solar is in and run in my own "Islanding" setup where I am my own "Utility provider". Let me start by pointing out that my supplier for all my equipment mentioned is Solar Advice - solar.co.za and that they have been only helpful, support providing and quick to execute where CFE keep dropping the ball - silver lining they will be sorting out my problem without fanfare - the way a reputable business should and I keep recommending them over and over.
From my side I agreed to go through not one but 2 firmware updates with the "overseas - team" at CFE, resulting in about 75% of my frustrating 2+ weeks of irritability.
Let's get on with it - two plus weeks of frustration, hair pulling and plenty, and I do mean plenty of potty mouth later - I now have the latest CFE-5100s firmware on both of my batters and the great news is...
I am at least 50% worse off than before, cannot make it through 2hrs of loadshedding with 10.24kWh of storage and less than 2kWh load, and those that are good at math that means? Yup 79-80% and then 3% 3-5min later, and then off. Unacceptable by any standards - I mean are there a few AAA batteries inside my two 5.12kWh LiFePo4 units.....???
But this doesn't really paint the whole picture so let’s start in Nov 2022
November 2022 system is commissioned and installed. Batteries are charged from +-56% to full over about 3hrs at 30amps or roughly 1.67kWh - for the Mathematically/Electrically inclined, 1602watt to be precise - DC wattage and AC wattage are not 1:1 parity 30amps at 53.4v is 1602watt - I was not charging my batteries at 6.6kw - if you think that, then this thread is not for you! load$hitting had not hit its full stage 6 stride at that time, so think mixes of stage 2/3, 4 and 6. Batteries were being used and run down to about 80-85% in stage 2 over 2 hours with mixed loads ranging from 1-2.5KWh and 55-60% in stage 4 or 6. We had no interruptions and not a single error or problems. We had a 12hrs long load$hitting event twice in the Dec/January and batteries hit 41% with a very OCD (me)controlled 350-450w/h load on these specific occasions – again no problems. Then we got into full stage 6 load$hitting 3 times a day - yep, I live in an area where we got 9-12hrs per day, day after day. Finally but irrelevant to the SOC issue like many other CFE and Raytech battery owners I had the 100%-90% cycle which I didn’t particularly have a problem with – go read the long post I made, to understand why – batteries should not sit at 100% for hours and days on end – I hope you have a fire extinguisher near – more info about that in my long ramble as well – go read it! This is when the problem reared itself for the first time between 40-38% left in the tanks and the inverter would either throw anything from a F56DC_VoltLow_Fault usually followed by but no exclusively F58BMS_Communuication_fault to even one or two F59AC_V_GridCurr_High Fault – for this discussion the most frequent by an overwhelming margin is the F56DC_VoltLow_Fault just as or about when the system hits 11/5% or 3% whichever the Chinese battery lotto gods deemed fit that day and then off.
The First update which required the inter-battery comm cable to be disconnected - took less than 3 min OTA (over the air) – each battery has a WiFi Module and independent battery monitoring software that can only seem to report voltage correctly as confirmed with a Voltmeter - but is useless at doing anything else.
I was instructed to cycle the batteries a few times between 10/15% and 100% and Monitor it.
The looping 100-90% discharge had changed to a 100-95% loop but again refer to my first long post (yes this current one will probably become known as the longest waffle on this forum – hopefully I’m a little entertaining at the very least) I still didn’t take issue with that.
1 week later the batteries now don’t cut out at 40% but now “gracefully” (intended sarcasm) go from 80-60% in 3min flat, then on to 50% at a leisurely pace and then when they hit 43% descend rapidly form there to 30/20/10/5/3% and then dead in 5-10min.
CFE stop responding in our happy little WhatsApp group containing expletives of me telling them everything from "they don’t know anything about BMS implementation, firmware and code writing" to how generally useless they are in responding to real issues – this goes on for the rest of the week.
They then announce how sorry they are ("Sorry Dear"??? I'm not anyone's darling/dear), that there WhatsApp wasn’t allowing them to log back in but that they had triumphantly a “new” firmware that would sort out all my trouble 😊
Disconnect comm between the two batteries again, never hear form them for another day but during the early evening get plunged into darkness because the batteries are flat and now to add to my annoyance charge from 0-100% in 45min going form 40-80% in 5min because can you guess why? They’re completely unbalanced – remember the inter-battery comm cable is disconnected waiting for the firmware update that never happened, and I now spend the next 2 days manually discharging each battery – via voltage control not BMS (by now it should be apparent to you that the BMS is $hit) and then charging each one individually, paralleling them again and reconnecting comms etc.
Firmware the 2nd finally happened on Tuesday this week – remember the one that will solve all my trouble😊 – batteries turn off after a successful OTA - Firmware update complete.
100-95% cycle now replaced by 100% and no cycling – hmm not too happy about that but I have other things to do, like work… and then Load$hitting that night 6pm - and 18min later plunged into darkness – 100% to flat - yes my troubles are truly over!
By now some of you probably have an idea as to what is the root cause of at least one of the problems – their BMS is beyond $hit – how do I know? Read on…
With torch in mouth while hurling profanity (I am quite talented you can tell) I disconnect everything to a safe point, reconnect only the master battery i.e., 1 of them and start everything up – switch to voltage monitoring mode to bypass the BM$hit (see what I did there) and apply a 4.2kWh load which runs for a whole 50min before the battery enters a fault mode and the solenoid disconnect trips – Thank god that actually works. Inverter shows voltage dropped below 47.9 (my own setting) and therefore the battery is at 5% or less.
Wash, Rinse, repeat – do the same with battery 2, the slave – and run for about 70min with a mix of 2/3.5 and 1.1-kWh loads during that time and then click - solenoid disconnect trips at 47.8v.
This all after the BM$hit declared that they where both flat to my poor DEYE inverter almost 2hours prior. By now I'm sure the inverter has developed or is developing schizophrenia.
Luckily by this time the power is back on and both batteries are at 1-2% each so I reconnect, re-parallel the batteries and connect the inter-battery comms and let the unit charge up in BMS mode (shocked I'm using the BMS again? There is a method to my madness) @40amp so 2.01kWh and monitor.
3hrs later we’re at 61% - great that is more or less correct, but then it all goes to $hit once again as 61-83% happens in about 10min and then 83-100% took 45min further – confirming my “rubbish BMShit” hypothesis in both directions conclusively. I did this 2 more times in both directions to confirm. Confirmed – in case you’re wondering - exactly repeatable.
I worked out on some spreadsheet – because I have time to kill like that – TheMafiaMan remember. At best, I can get about 6.5 maybe 7kWh of usable power out of my 10.24kWh storage but not without a massive, probably warranty voiding and time consuming workaround as you've seen above. Sorry, not good enough – I allow for 10% DoD as per the manufactures spec or maybe that should be claims. I paid like many people, a lot of money for storage, one of if not the most expensive single components in your system and I will not accept 60-70% and of that completely unreliable capacity – neither should anyone.
Anyone who has read this far – congratulations – but you must also by now agree, enough and no more. Which is exactly what I communicated to SolarAdvice – who have been privy to my WhatsApp “consult” with CFE and agree that I’ve exhausted all options.
I have options that I will be exercising and that is getting rid of CFE off my property once and for all – but this is basically a warning to all and sundry.
STAY AWAY from the CFE product – A properly working, reliable and trustworthy BMS in a LiPo, LiFePo4 and the like is non-negotiable.
You shouldn’t have to wonder if you can make it through 2hrs of loadshedding because the data you get from one of the most expensive items in your alternative power solution is “wonky” at best.
Unless you like dancing with fire – literally - and have a few chemical fire extinguishers on hand – you should have at least one with any large Lithium-xxxx-insert-your-particular-battery-chemistry-here anyway, but right now – for me, these represent a substantial electrical and fire risk to my property and the vehicles in my garage. I’m 100% not prepared to roll the dice on either side. Besides the fact that if you’ve followed my rant this far (thank you) this is not a workable use case and why I’ve had to postpone the Solar Array until I have reliably working storage solution.
As my intro eluded, this seems to be a far wider reaching issue cropping up on other battery systems too – so like others I’m left wondering what my options for a reliable battery brand are. One that can provide a battery system suitable for the SA market with our unfortunately unique power situation that actually works…
My Short list so far is 10-15kWh, 1C discharge rate and 10yr warranty
SolarMD’s 14.3kWh battery. Freedom Won 15/12 battery -  but not so sure I'm onboard with Local-is-lekker - Solar MD are supposedly also local but I know of a couple of installations    with both brands that are more than 12-18 months old and have had zero issues with the batteries, so I'll need to investigate some more -  there is at  least one horror story which seems like a 5 year old model with 470+ cycles that is basically dead and FW cannot offer replacement cells because they're EOL(end of life) according to the comment placed this guy purchased 5 x 30/24 units which he must have sold organs for    LG Chemistry – I don’t believe I will be able to source or afford it – at the moment rated worldwide as one of if not the best, but a 16kWh unit is almost the cost of a Tesla Powerwall think €9,377.00 sourced international with shipping and then add what ever bend-over-tax when it gets to SA and I'll most likely be at R220-240k+ and that’s without the Tesla’s already built-in inverter. You also need an installer with LG Chem Installer Certification and I've only found the 6.5kWhunit locally but no pricing from SegenSolar who to date have not responded to email or phone calls - I might try again. DEYE – I’m hearing good things, but they are also expensive – R38k-R43k for 6.14kWh (R6.1-7k per 1kw vs R5.2k I paid) - in Fairness if you pair it with a DEYE inverter they extend your inverter warranty to 10 yrs from 5yrs to match the 10yr battery warranty,  in essence you're paying for the 5yr extra warranty on your inverter so this is looking like an option but only if I can get a higher capacity single module between 10-15kWh will I consider this Sunsynk which is DEYE vice versa have a 15.97 LFP wall mount unit for about R96k so that is priced in my opinion more inline but I'm not sure if you get the same inverter warranty extension for a DEYE inverter because you do get an extra 5yrs on the Sunsynk invert... I’m not really interested in Hubble for personal reasons (but feel free to change my mind - also in the same boat with local is lekker - but I see that actual capacity seems to be questionable), anything with ESS in the name – I think CFE and few others are all the same 5.12kWh battery in fact wrongly or rightly so they’re unheard of in Europe, the US and Australia, both large markets for Batteries, which aren’t accepting inferior LiFePo4 and the like batteries onto their shores and we should be asking ourselves why.
The Only exception here is AlphaESS which SolarAdvice use to carry but no longer do and in hindsight while I was told the systems cannot be paralled to each other the 5kWh/10kWh Storage & Inverter Combo Smile5, is well documented and supported in Australia, Singapore and in some parts of Europe and the paralleling issue can easily be worked around by creating separate 5kW circuits and running separate subsystems - if I had to do it all over again which I cannot afford to do now, I would go this route because I have an honest Sparky and that means I would have split my solar array into 4x 2.025kw Arrays (2xMPPT per inverter) feeding 2 separate 5kw circuits with 20kWh of storage between the two and cost wise, would have come out about the same as my 8kw Inv. 20kWh(eventually) storage and 8.1kw Solar Array - However, I wouldn't attempt this type of setup with the majority of unscrupulous 'electricians/installers' I have had the displeasure of dealing with over the years.
Rant over - For now...
 
 
 

HI @HendrikBigChief tried this morning as a last ditch effort to put the system into V mode as you suggested - it would seem since the latest firmware update I cannot do this any longer as the batteries once booted up, inverter restarted and connected back to the batteries - immediately trip into a fault mode when the inverter initiates the connection - so SOL.
Thanks - I know you where try to resolve my problems and at least see what the batteries where doing but as noted I'm returning them - the question now remains what to get and if my supplier can supply something they don't normally stock  - will have to see
SolarMDs 14.3kWh battery seems to at least according to their spec sheet have the most honest representation of what/how the battery will perform - and if I can make some modifications to my loads and not exceed 4kwh loads at any one time then I can follow their recommended 13kWh useable storage @0.3C or +-3.9Kw load
I'll post back here what happens next...thanks.

Sure - I’m going to collect the data for you and I’ll post it up with what you suggested

Hi all - yes click-bait like topic for good reason.
Before I decided to write this particular post I also scoured this forum and noted that various users are having quite frankly unacceptable levels of SOC issues with all kinds of batteries even Pylontech and other "reputable" brands - so I'm starting to think that the majority (i.e. not all but 50-60%+) of the batteries and new makes and models that seem to land on our shores every other day, are simply not suitable for our unfortunate and insidiously unique power problems here in SA - I'm talking about frequent loadshedding, multiple times per day for 2-6 hours at a time, depending on where you are fortunate or unfortunate to be in our country.
Those that would like to follow previous long CFE discussions can view them  here  and I have a very long (sorry) but complete view of my installation, how I use it and the dreaded SOC drop from 40%-10% in 5 minutes or less or worse still 40% to 0% almost instantly here
For those that don't to go read them, a very summarised version is bullet pointed below which doesn't give you 100% context - so if you're going to ask questions or tell me I'm 'stupid' without referencing important info in the original post(s) - be warned - I'm called the TheMafiaMan for a reason...🤣
8kw DEYE inverter 2x CFE 5100s batteries setup as 30% restart 20% battery warning and 10-15% Shutdown. Final Battery setup will be 20kWh of storage via 2 more 5.12kWh batteries to be added in 2023 still. The system is protected by 200amp keto fuses and each board has surge protection as well - the house sits behind the inverter because A) I want clean pure sinewave power to all my plugs, lights and screens and B) fridges and appliances with inverter type motors are all better protected that way too. Your electronics will thank you. I charge the batteries @40amps so roughly 2kWh have experimented with 20amps and even 75amps - for my use case for now 40amps is my sweet spot giving my inverter head room to still run other higher draw loads when the batteries are charging. No solar currently, only used as a storage system to facilitate work from home and a "normal" quality of life (8.1kWh solar array is being commissioned) 6kva diesel Genset (dedicated generator room for Genset and fuel - already wired in with manual change over) just finishing off sound isolation, ventilation and then will automate change over with the dry contact and Gen feed-in on the DEYE Inverter Finally Eskom connection will capped off once solar is in and run in my own "Islanding" setup where I am my own "Utility provider". Let me start by pointing out that my supplier for all my equipment mentioned is Solar Advice - solar.co.za and that they have been only helpful, support providing and quick to execute where CFE keep dropping the ball - silver lining they will be sorting out my problem without fanfare - the way a reputable business should and I keep recommending them over and over.
From my side I agreed to go through not one but 2 firmware updates with the "overseas - team" at CFE, resulting in about 75% of my frustrating 2+ weeks of irritability.
Let's get on with it - two plus weeks of frustration, hair pulling and plenty, and I do mean plenty of potty mouth later - I now have the latest CFE-5100s firmware on both of my batters and the great news is...
I am at least 50% worse off than before, cannot make it through 2hrs of loadshedding with 10.24kWh of storage and less than 2kWh load, and those that are good at math that means? Yup 79-80% and then 3% 3-5min later, and then off. Unacceptable by any standards - I mean are there a few AAA batteries inside my two 5.12kWh LiFePo4 units.....???
But this doesn't really paint the whole picture so let’s start in Nov 2022
November 2022 system is commissioned and installed. Batteries are charged from +-56% to full over about 3hrs at 30amps or roughly 1.67kWh - for the Mathematically/Electrically inclined, 1602watt to be precise - DC wattage and AC wattage are not 1:1 parity 30amps at 53.4v is 1602watt - I was not charging my batteries at 6.6kw - if you think that, then this thread is not for you! load$hitting had not hit its full stage 6 stride at that time, so think mixes of stage 2/3, 4 and 6. Batteries were being used and run down to about 80-85% in stage 2 over 2 hours with mixed loads ranging from 1-2.5KWh and 55-60% in stage 4 or 6. We had no interruptions and not a single error or problems. We had a 12hrs long load$hitting event twice in the Dec/January and batteries hit 41% with a very OCD (me)controlled 350-450w/h load on these specific occasions – again no problems. Then we got into full stage 6 load$hitting 3 times a day - yep, I live in an area where we got 9-12hrs per day, day after day. Finally but irrelevant to the SOC issue like many other CFE and Raytech battery owners I had the 100%-90% cycle which I didn’t particularly have a problem with – go read the long post I made, to understand why – batteries should not sit at 100% for hours and days on end – I hope you have a fire extinguisher near – more info about that in my long ramble as well – go read it! This is when the problem reared itself for the first time between 40-38% left in the tanks and the inverter would either throw anything from a F56DC_VoltLow_Fault usually followed by but no exclusively F58BMS_Communuication_fault to even one or two F59AC_V_GridCurr_High Fault – for this discussion the most frequent by an overwhelming margin is the F56DC_VoltLow_Fault just as or about when the system hits 11/5% or 3% whichever the Chinese battery lotto gods deemed fit that day and then off.
The First update which required the inter-battery comm cable to be disconnected - took less than 3 min OTA (over the air) – each battery has a WiFi Module and independent battery monitoring software that can only seem to report voltage correctly as confirmed with a Voltmeter - but is useless at doing anything else.
I was instructed to cycle the batteries a few times between 10/15% and 100% and Monitor it.
The looping 100-90% discharge had changed to a 100-95% loop but again refer to my first long post (yes this current one will probably become known as the longest waffle on this forum – hopefully I’m a little entertaining at the very least) I still didn’t take issue with that.
1 week later the batteries now don’t cut out at 40% but now “gracefully” (intended sarcasm) go from 80-60% in 3min flat, then on to 50% at a leisurely pace and then when they hit 43% descend rapidly form there to 30/20/10/5/3% and then dead in 5-10min.
CFE stop responding in our happy little WhatsApp group containing expletives of me telling them everything from "they don’t know anything about BMS implementation, firmware and code writing" to how generally useless they are in responding to real issues – this goes on for the rest of the week.
They then announce how sorry they are ("Sorry Dear"??? I'm not anyone's darling/dear), that there WhatsApp wasn’t allowing them to log back in but that they had triumphantly a “new” firmware that would sort out all my trouble 😊
Disconnect comm between the two batteries again, never hear form them for another day but during the early evening get plunged into darkness because the batteries are flat and now to add to my annoyance charge from 0-100% in 45min going form 40-80% in 5min because can you guess why? They’re completely unbalanced – remember the inter-battery comm cable is disconnected waiting for the firmware update that never happened, and I now spend the next 2 days manually discharging each battery – via voltage control not BMS (by now it should be apparent to you that the BMS is $hit) and then charging each one individually, paralleling them again and reconnecting comms etc.
Firmware the 2nd finally happened on Tuesday this week – remember the one that will solve all my trouble😊 – batteries turn off after a successful OTA - Firmware update complete.
100-95% cycle now replaced by 100% and no cycling – hmm not too happy about that but I have other things to do, like work… and then Load$hitting that night 6pm - and 18min later plunged into darkness – 100% to flat - yes my troubles are truly over!
By now some of you probably have an idea as to what is the root cause of at least one of the problems – their BMS is beyond $hit – how do I know? Read on…
With torch in mouth while hurling profanity (I am quite talented you can tell) I disconnect everything to a safe point, reconnect only the master battery i.e., 1 of them and start everything up – switch to voltage monitoring mode to bypass the BM$hit (see what I did there) and apply a 4.2kWh load which runs for a whole 50min before the battery enters a fault mode and the solenoid disconnect trips – Thank god that actually works. Inverter shows voltage dropped below 47.9 (my own setting) and therefore the battery is at 5% or less.
Wash, Rinse, repeat – do the same with battery 2, the slave – and run for about 70min with a mix of 2/3.5 and 1.1-kWh loads during that time and then click - solenoid disconnect trips at 47.8v.
This all after the BM$hit declared that they where both flat to my poor DEYE inverter almost 2hours prior. By now I'm sure the inverter has developed or is developing schizophrenia.
Luckily by this time the power is back on and both batteries are at 1-2% each so I reconnect, re-parallel the batteries and connect the inter-battery comms and let the unit charge up in BMS mode (shocked I'm using the BMS again? There is a method to my madness) @40amp so 2.01kWh and monitor.
3hrs later we’re at 61% - great that is more or less correct, but then it all goes to $hit once again as 61-83% happens in about 10min and then 83-100% took 45min further – confirming my “rubbish BMShit” hypothesis in both directions conclusively. I did this 2 more times in both directions to confirm. Confirmed – in case you’re wondering - exactly repeatable.
I worked out on some spreadsheet – because I have time to kill like that – TheMafiaMan remember. At best, I can get about 6.5 maybe 7kWh of usable power out of my 10.24kWh storage but not without a massive, probably warranty voiding and time consuming workaround as you've seen above. Sorry, not good enough – I allow for 10% DoD as per the manufactures spec or maybe that should be claims. I paid like many people, a lot of money for storage, one of if not the most expensive single components in your system and I will not accept 60-70% and of that completely unreliable capacity – neither should anyone.
Anyone who has read this far – congratulations – but you must also by now agree, enough and no more. Which is exactly what I communicated to SolarAdvice – who have been privy to my WhatsApp “consult” with CFE and agree that I’ve exhausted all options.
I have options that I will be exercising and that is getting rid of CFE off my property once and for all – but this is basically a warning to all and sundry.
STAY AWAY from the CFE product – A properly working, reliable and trustworthy BMS in a LiPo, LiFePo4 and the like is non-negotiable.
You shouldn’t have to wonder if you can make it through 2hrs of loadshedding because the data you get from one of the most expensive items in your alternative power solution is “wonky” at best.
Unless you like dancing with fire – literally - and have a few chemical fire extinguishers on hand – you should have at least one with any large Lithium-xxxx-insert-your-particular-battery-chemistry-here anyway, but right now – for me, these represent a substantial electrical and fire risk to my property and the vehicles in my garage. I’m 100% not prepared to roll the dice on either side. Besides the fact that if you’ve followed my rant this far (thank you) this is not a workable use case and why I’ve had to postpone the Solar Array until I have reliably working storage solution.
As my intro eluded, this seems to be a far wider reaching issue cropping up on other battery systems too – so like others I’m left wondering what my options for a reliable battery brand are. One that can provide a battery system suitable for the SA market with our unfortunately unique power situation that actually works…
My Short list so far is 10-15kWh, 1C discharge rate and 10yr warranty
SolarMD’s 14.3kWh battery. Freedom Won 15/12 battery -  but not so sure I'm onboard with Local-is-lekker - Solar MD are supposedly also local but I know of a couple of installations    with both brands that are more than 12-18 months old and have had zero issues with the batteries, so I'll need to investigate some more -  there is at  least one horror story which seems like a 5 year old model with 470+ cycles that is basically dead and FW cannot offer replacement cells because they're EOL(end of life) according to the comment placed this guy purchased 5 x 30/24 units which he must have sold organs for    LG Chemistry – I don’t believe I will be able to source or afford it – at the moment rated worldwide as one of if not the best, but a 16kWh unit is almost the cost of a Tesla Powerwall think €9,377.00 sourced international with shipping and then add what ever bend-over-tax when it gets to SA and I'll most likely be at R220-240k+ and that’s without the Tesla’s already built-in inverter. You also need an installer with LG Chem Installer Certification and I've only found the 6.5kWhunit locally but no pricing from SegenSolar who to date have not responded to email or phone calls - I might try again. DEYE – I’m hearing good things, but they are also expensive – R38k-R43k for 6.14kWh (R6.1-7k per 1kw vs R5.2k I paid) - in Fairness if you pair it with a DEYE inverter they extend your inverter warranty to 10 yrs from 5yrs to match the 10yr battery warranty,  in essence you're paying for the 5yr extra warranty on your inverter so this is looking like an option but only if I can get a higher capacity single module between 10-15kWh will I consider this Sunsynk which is DEYE vice versa have a 15.97 LFP wall mount unit for about R96k so that is priced in my opinion more inline but I'm not sure if you get the same inverter warranty extension for a DEYE inverter because you do get an extra 5yrs on the Sunsynk invert... I’m not really interested in Hubble for personal reasons (but feel free to change my mind - also in the same boat with local is lekker - but I see that actual capacity seems to be questionable), anything with ESS in the name – I think CFE and few others are all the same 5.12kWh battery in fact wrongly or rightly so they’re unheard of in Europe, the US and Australia, both large markets for Batteries, which aren’t accepting inferior LiFePo4 and the like batteries onto their shores and we should be asking ourselves why.
The Only exception here is AlphaESS which SolarAdvice use to carry but no longer do and in hindsight while I was told the systems cannot be paralled to each other the 5kWh/10kWh Storage & Inverter Combo Smile5, is well documented and supported in Australia, Singapore and in some parts of Europe and the paralleling issue can easily be worked around by creating separate 5kW circuits and running separate subsystems - if I had to do it all over again which I cannot afford to do now, I would go this route because I have an honest Sparky and that means I would have split my solar array into 4x 2.025kw Arrays (2xMPPT per inverter) feeding 2 separate 5kw circuits with 20kWh of storage between the two and cost wise, would have come out about the same as my 8kw Inv. 20kWh(eventually) storage and 8.1kw Solar Array - However, I wouldn't attempt this type of setup with the majority of unscrupulous 'electricians/installers' I have had the displeasure of dealing with over the years.
Rant over - For now...
 
 
 

It should be figure 2. It's to do with the cable lengths to each individual battery from the inverter. This way they are all the same so batteries should charge and discharge more evenly.

Sorry, I only have one...

Hey there have to agree that redundancy is much more important than less cables - cables can be tidied up -  as noted for redundancy, swap out or expansion, all are valuable to consider - the only time one larger battery becomes a consideration is when there is an unavoidable space consideration and one large battery is your only option, but then buy big and well known which equals very expensive - think LG Chem.

I totally agree it can be very hard re warranties, but their are 2 sides to every story. The thread we are talking about, as I said, really doesn't give enough information. The logs don't go back far enough. The problem is their from day one, of the logs shown. We can see over voltage of the pack, over voltage of individual cells, under voltage of individual cells and the SOC (0%) well below what the battery was designed for (minimum of 20% when originally sold). I don't think it's for the cell voltages that Pylontech have rejected it for, it's the overall over voltage of the pack. The pack shouldn't be reaching those voltages if the CAN is connected and working. The logs show this over voltage is not just spikes it is constant, their is a failure somewhere and it's been going on for a while, how long, we don't know as we can't see the logs. I suspect it's only the eventual failure of a cell that shows the system hasn't been working from the start. It could be said that 54v isn't really over voltage for LiPo cells but it is over voltage for the Pylontech as they designed it and it shouldn't have exceeded what the BMS asks for. (I only have C batteries so perhaps someone could confirm what  the max voltage they have seen the BMS request on the non C batteries).
Re the passive BMS this is a reference to the balancing mechanism which can either be 'passive' or 'active' it's not a reference to the protection features. Pylontech have obviously had problems with over voltage on their batteries hence the notice I attached in the other tread. When I bought mine I remember seeing clear warning messages about the initial set up and making sure the batteries didn't go over voltage. These are not like Lead acid which are forgiving.
Re being outdated. This tech is changing at a very fast pace and for the likes of HV the potential dangers are much higher and it's a much newer development. Lithium batteries have only just become common over the last few years in the settings they are now being deployed in.
I agree it is every man / woman / person for themselves. I do think their are a lot of installers, including professional ones, that really don't know what they are doing. I had a professional PV install back in 2012 and it's been an absolute nightmare.  It's been removed from the roof twice and refitted and even then they couldn't do it right, they really didn't have a clue. It's frightening when they come out with comments like 'we've always done it that way'. In the end I suggested and accepted a cash payment from the insurance company to sort it out myself. Another example is we can see installs where only one battery pack has been installed that clearly won't be up to the job, but they will still sell them and install them.
I fell out with Segen (UK) myself when I bought batteries from them. They made a mistake over shipment, corrected it but then refused to give me the discount I was entitled to. They just weren't bothered so I said I'd never use them again and I haven't. It actually worked better for me, as the next supplier I used gave me even better prices than Segen had.

100% agree the mounting flexibility means nothing if the BMS/BAT is unreliable just unfortunate for me as i have dedicated space and will not be able to expand over time as i wanted to - this morning I did another test to qualm my paranoia with my two batteries and well this image shows it best

100%-7% on a 5.27kw constant load in 25min then back from 7% to 100% with a 40amp charge in 55min...flaky as all hell - and I'm running my DEYE in BMS Battery mode. As you can see the latest update I got from CFE now pins the batteries at 100% - I think after 1hr or possibly some other defined factor I'm not privy too, it does stop taking a charge and then discharges at about 30-40watt - not sure what the nominal discharge rate would be sitting idle.
I'll know on Monday if the Sunsynk batteries are from DEYE and if the inverter warranty extension applies - I think it won't but best to check my facts...even if it doesn't I might consider spending the extra to get the higher capacity but I'd prefer slightly smaller capacity and multiple batteries for redundancy if there was a failure of a pack etc. I'll let you know what i find out.

Wow Wow - Pylontech commenting that the BMS is "passive"? really.
I rest my case / hat / cape  what ever you prefer - as someone noted we're into the first 5yr window of battery/inverter warranties and the alarming overtone is that warranties seem to not be worth the paper they're printed on and of course the importers and dealer are dare I say it as unscrupulous as always - any excuse to not honor a warranty.
I personally just on the comments thus far wont look at Pylontech - there is an alarming read between the lines situation brewing - the battery swelling issue is not new and has been happening for years with various 2000 and 3000 series models probably more than most people know/admit/report
The bottom line is this - international standards which lets be honest seem to mean little in SA dictate that LiFePO4 and other/simlar Li-chemistry are required to have a  BMS, Battery Management System, a mandatory component for LiFePO4 batteries. LiFePO4 or all lithium battery cells are sensitive to over-voltage, under-voltage, and over-current. If a LiFePO4 battery is kept under one of the above conditions for a long time, it can easily cause capacity degradation, battery damage, or even the risk of fire. There was an EU/EE statement I read once that was much like the above and added ..."should invoke (I love that word) a hard disconnect from the inverter to circumvent the damage and or fire and or exhausting of chemical gases or other unsatisfactory expulsions at all costs" I've butchered it a bit most likely, but I know some manufactures actually employ a solenoid/engergised disconnect that physically breaks the incoming charge or out going load if an inverter doesn't respond in xx millisecond of a fault being registered.
If Pylontech want to assert that they have a Passive BMS then I think they should be "passive aggressively" banned from selling their product here unless they can demonstrate that their BMS does what its actually supposed to do - protect the internal cells and pack as a whole from what they are claiming is the cause of the issue(s) experienced by users.
Out of interest and this isn't a "plug" for DEYE inverters, but one of the options is a STOP on BMS error which I've seen many an installer disable because its considered a "nuisance" but what it does is when there is a BMS error it can  disconnect from the battery and isolate the inverter and loads and battery(s) from each other - as far as I'm concerned it should be a password protected option that cannot be unchecked and only in very special circumstances with an installers ID. I have mine on and with my "badly misbehaving" CFE batteries it does exactly that in mere milliseconds.
Then again I think half the batteries out there in SA would never work if that was a requirement because BMS issues seem to be a large problem from scouring this forum and we need to ask ourselves - what scarp is being dumped on our shores that wouldn't pass as safe in other countries?

Hi @Raj35
I have been working in the film and television industry for longer than I care to admit and I can tell you quality Lithium batteries are worth every penny. Right now I'm sitting with 7 camera batteries, 4 X genuine Sony batteries and 3 X generic. All 3 generic are swollen in just 3 years. 
Perhaps we as consumers need to take a much closer look at the quality of the lithium that goes into the battery as well as the ins and outs of the warranty provided.

Slighty off topic, but while we are questioning the integrity of BMSes, DIY builders please note that a standalone active balancer can and will destroy cells when it experience certain fault modes. I have seen 3 x 280Ah LFP cells damages as a result of balancer partial short circuit.  The partial short circuit depletes the cell over a period of time, many hours later its 0V . In this case, yes, the bms can see the huge delta and go in protection, but it cannot protect the downstream havoc. 
It must be noted that the balancer lies outside the protection region of the bms, as it is connected downstream from the BMS, towards the cells. 
EDIT: What would have helped was if we had a monitoring system that also reads protection status from bms. A number of push notifications in succession  could have saved the day for England. Even a loud buzzer.  Thats why I rate the work @Sc00bs and other are doing for HomeAssistant etc.