JayMardern

Long shot: but I wonder if we're looking at self-consumption here? The inverters and batteries must each be drawing some power continuously... So then what happens if you untick 'Grid Charge' in the time-of-use (System Work Mode) screen for a test timeslot (perhaps try it using the current timeslot) and drop the Batt % down a little bit to allow the battery discharge? Does this force the system to use battery rather than grid, hence moving self-consumption to the battery (which would ideally be coming from Solar) instead of Eskom? Can you give it a try?

Lithum-based batteries will usually balance for a while after hitting 100% (my own battery pulls about 0.1C - 0.2C for up to 30 minutes) Check again in 30 minutes and let us now?

This is the logical answer. But because it's not complicated enough already, different firmware versions will use different maximums of current per MPPT. More on this in the thread here but 18A is the figure that seems to apply to all firmware so provided your plaque says 18A or more under 'PV Input Current', you're good to go and you shouldn't get any clipping if targeting 18A. A relevant quote: You're welcome. Yeah their documentation (especially older stuff) is meh. Whilst the portal goes down every few weeks (and when it does, it's almost always on a Sunday morning - but normally for much shorter than yesterday), it's still pretty useful to me the rest of the time; my daily production graph lives on my spare monitor all day long. (And while it was down at least the screen on the inverter itself gives the graphs and summaries). But for guys buying Solar Assistant boxes (that don't need the free Sunsynk app and portal), I'd probably lean towards Deye for the same hardware at a slightly lower price (along with quicker support turn-around times on hardware repairs). Have been sufficiently satisfied with my own purchase (a 5kW Sunsynk) that I have another one sitting next to me in its box waiting to be paralleled.

Was also unable to refresh the whole morning until early this afternoon. Not the first Sunday I’ve picked up downtime; but normally it’s much shorter. Had to review todays stats on the inverter screen instead - felt like I was back in 2015 for a minute there! Looks like it’s fine now, though.

Yeah this sounds like the specs for the 6kW model (I don’t think that’s sold in SA?) The 6k-sg02lp1 Spec sheet here: https://www.teci.co.za/wp/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/Sunsynk-3k-to-8k-Datasheet.pdf @Thunderdolt could you double check your model number?

Correct, if the grid goes down the settings in the ‘System Mode’ screen (including SOC) will get ignored and instead the inverter will allow the battery to discharge down to the SOC specified in the ‘Battery Setup’ screen’s Shutdown tab instead. So you can choose to have one minimum SOC when there’s grid (in System Mode), and another minimum SOC when there’s no grid (in Battery Setup).

Yeah normally this would be my recommendation too as they're fantastic portable power stations - probably one of the best all-rounders on the market (I've had nothing but positive experience from them myself) - but they're comparatively pretty expensive. Which unfortunately is a bit of a concern for the OP:

Post in this thread and see if an owner can help you with how the inverter handles non-essentials: https://powerforum.co.za/topic/20491-solis-s6-pro-hybrid-inverter-review/ I see there’s also a bit of discussion about the Smart Port there too.

Supply-side yes, but demand is definitely changing: These items items are an additional 20-30kWh (!) or more depending on the pumps' size; on an already marginal supply this 100% needs to be considered for this desire to be feasible: As for the installation issues - the faulty inverter, sub-optimal battery charging and weird microwave behaviour sound like the installer needs to be called back in, they shouldn't have left it like this!

For Smart Port you’d treat it as a relay-separated extension of the backed-up portion - and move select larger-load DB circuits to that port from your board; similar to how you’ve already wired the Backed-Up circuits. Get an electrician to handle it. Because it contributes to the maximum load the inverter can handle (eg. 6kW for the S6 Pro 6kW), it makes sense to be a bit selective of what goes on there to keep Backed-Up-Load + Smart Port under the limit at all times.

100% agree but IMO there's no way of planning/designing for success/efficiency unless there's a clear answer to this:

@bobmabena Is the only concern battery life? If so, what about just swapping the existing batteries for Lithiums? (Does the Mecer model support this?)

@Buyeye raises a pretty valid point here: Does it rain at all where you live? Have you considered winter production being lower than summer? Your array size will likely generate 55-65kWh per day in summer in perfect sunshine, but in winter it's going to drop significantly due to the shorter days (my own experience in Johannesburg indicates you can expect around 40-50kwh per day in winter for your array, on average). Which means even assuming you have no solar usage during the day (unlikely!), you're going to have a hard time fully charging soon-to-be-4 batteries (which need 40kWh alone plus charging losses). And if you add additional pumps (which are massive power hogs - my pool pump eats 8kwh per day by itself), these margins are going to be even tighter. Likewise on a rainy day, you can expect production to plummet up to 80%. Is your idea to keep some battery capacity on standby so that you don't need to worry about the burden of fully charging them from empty? Do you have an idea as to your household's daytime vs nighttime usage? Solar energy is free but it's not always abundant and never fully predictable; so it always makes to minimize your demand as much as possible so that you're not relying on the utility whenever the weather doesn't behave. And then when the weather does fail you, an oversized array helps you cover your use as best as possible to minimize your utility costs. Keeping usage low also prevents massive bills in the event that the array is ever partly out of service (like the faulty-inverter scenario you describe) or during extended periods of lousy whether. Our daily household consumption used to be 60kwh a day; in preparation for solar (before putting up a single panel) we dropped it down to 45kWh and sized our array accordingly; solar ended up covering about 25-30 of those kWh per day in the summer. I've only now just pulled the trigger on doubling up the entire system (for a maximum of 60kWh per day whilst maintaining a 5.5-year return on investment period) with the intention of having more than I need on a sunny summer day (and perhaps feeding back the balance to grid in future) and exactly the right amount on a winter or cloudy day; with only rain forcing me back to grid. It makes sense to have more than you need (rather than trying to cut it fine with high demand) - to cater for mother nature being a somewhat cruel mistress sometimes!

This is fixed! As of this morning the notifications now appear in the list - and I can clear the badge with one click using the 'Read All' button.

I'm encountering a (admittedly minor) bug since this update, whereby the red 'notification' counter/badge now shows a figure (it's 3 at present but yesterday it was 2) - but when reviewing the Notifications, the list is empty (so it shouldn't display the badge): Any ideas? I leave the web portal open all day long on my spare monitor so this is triggering my OCD; this doesn't affect the app. (Wouldn't be a true Sunsynk release without at least one bug, right?) Still, I'm really enjoying the new notification since it allows me to remotely change my consumption profile (by turning off smart plugs remotely) to save battery in case of an extended outage, if the grid doesn't get restored when expected - without having to go all the way into the app to check that it's back. Very nice.

Thanks for the share! CoJ must've missed the memo on how people don't like filling in hundreds of pages of forms - especially if it's so that they can be ripped off in selling back electricity at a third the price they pay for it! ( I guess this is also why there's a market for third parties to handle the process - which itself is a sign that the process is too complicated). I do also feel like there'd be a much stronger consumer push if the feed-in rates were a bit better.

Do we see many revoked CoC's in the near future? 🤨

Properly planning, avoiding too much oversizing, taking advantage of SARS rebates and installing in stages means you can get away with a return on investment of under 6 years if done carefully; which is excellent going even if you compare to typical financial instruments like bank fixed deposits. (And this particular financial instrument defeats load shedding - whilst paying for itself!) The drop in pricing also means that homeowners that have installed systems already should be looking at upgrades:

Did they provide anything worth sharing?

Excellent! Yeah that sounds like it's probably the BMS firmware that resolved it. Good that you're in business!

@spotity Did the above sort you out?

They've finally sorted this out. As of this morning (under iOS at least), I'm now getting re-connect notifications. Didn't do an app update so presumably this is a server-side change. Maybe some Android members can confirm if they get the same. The push notification simply says "[Plant Name] Restored - Connect to Grid." Tested it twice; it takes about 2-3 minutes to come through after restoration. (This in addition to the "[Plant Name] Disconnect - Disconnected from the Grid" notification that was already working.) Better late than never, but this was incredibly late. Useful feature, though.

One other possibility: some breakers trip by dropping only very slightly. So they look like they’re still up - but they’re not. Resetting then requires dropping completely and re-raising it.

Geez you're right, a bit of Takealot Tax there, huh! How about an option at 20% of that? Yes please: https://www.creative-cables.co.za/plugs-and-sockets/20364-spina-europea-creative-plug-2-poli-10a.html https://www.stepbuildingsupplies.co.za/products/white-10a-2-pin-male-euro-plug I'd imagine Builders or any electrical store would have stock (at reasonable pricing) as well

Yeah I suggested this because I figured the prepaid comms system doesn't use Earth as, similar to yours, my Earth is conductive on the plug itself (it's not a plastic dummy pin), but on the hand-held, the socket it goes into has a 2-pin figure-8 (C7/C8) connector. (This also means in my case I could just swap my cable from the supplied 3-pin to a standard figure-8 (C7/C8) 2-pin cable since the cable isn't hard-wired), You could pick up a 2-pin plug from Takealot: https://www.takealot.com/2-pin-round-plug/PLID72109866 I ran my handheld unit (an Empire Hexing unit) through my kill-a-watt whilst letting it connect and after 20 minutes it had topped out at just 3.3 watts.