Nic Holmes

Thanks for the follow up. I am in the process of employing the services of an electrician with experience in the Axpert King inverters, I cannot figure out where all these neutrals go for the circuits I need, so time to pay someone to fix it correctly and get a new CoC!!

So... Finally I managed to get to the main DB and well, this is a total disaster! 1. The inverter is connected downstream of the ELD, both Neutral and Live, Both input to Inverter and Output from Inverter! 2. EVERYTHING in the house is connected downstream of the ELD.... 3. Cannot make heads or tail of the wiring!!

I think I have just clicked as to what the issue is... Live is taken to the inverter from before the Earth Leakage in the main DB, but if I recall, Neutral is connected to the Neutral bus on the output of the Earth Leakage unit in the Main DB, this same Neutral bus is then also connected to the Inverter AC output on the return feed. I shall have to open up the main DB and have a good look at how it is connected.... I must highlight, the original connection was done by a sparky, I simply replaced the Inverter and found a "new problem"

I will try that later today and feedback. If that is the case and there are mixed up neutrals, any idea how to rectify it? Thinking about it... If I turn the changeover switch to the off position (ie Neutral from Inverter & Live from inverter isolated from house DB) it does not trip the ELD when input power to the Inverter is removed.... I think this answers it!

Ah.... No its not, only on Live out!! So, I think you might be onto something.

I have just run this test. Turned the output 25A breaker off, tripped the incoming 25A breaker to the inverter to put it into inverting mode and well.. ELD still trips...

The purpose on the ELD in the Inverter AC DB was to feed the two plug circuits wired to the right of it. (2x10A) but it was also tripping and bypassed. The Main ELD lives in another DB, and the two neutrals come from the same neutral bus within the main DB so whether its house out or house in, if you check for continuity between them they tied together anyway.

I'm totally confused. I am a light current engineer and this floating earth/bonded story just doesn't compute in my brain My next question that arises then, is if you can't have an earth leakage breaker on the output of the inverter how do you make your plug circuits that are fed from the inverter safe? as fault that trips the earth leakage will only put the inverter into battery mode and still supply power onto that circuit.

Yeah I agree... And the more I trace wires the more mess I'm making and the more confused I find myself. So what you are saying is that I can take the power to the inverter after the main EL and not before it like it is currently wired? then following my schematic should be fine?

Previous inverter that was installed

Excuse the disaster that is the Inverter AC DB, its a wiring mess that has resulted from trying to trace through this issue and will be tidied up once the fault is found and rectified. Attached is the data plate from the inverter, plus DB pics. Below is a schematic of the wiring.

Hi guys, I'm hoping someone here has either seen this before or can see what I am missing! So I had an RCT Axpert 3kVA 24V inverter installed for years, close to 6. But it became apparent that the 600W MPPT PV input just was not sufficient to make it viable as a long term Load shedding and power outage savior. Also it could only take the standard lead acid batteries - which I was replacing every 2 years and this just seemed counter productive. So fast forward to a month ago, I decided it was time to upgrade the system. I purchased a Kodak OG3.24 Inverter, 4 x 540W JA Solar Mono panels, and a lithium battery. I simply disconnected the RCT from the power and PV breaker boxes respectively, and replaced it on the wall with the Kodak and reconnected the AC and DC wiring. Now, when the power goes out the Earth Leakage trips, and the only way to reset the EL is to switch off the inverter, reset the EL and turn on the inverter again. I have run through the wiring over and over, and I just cannot figure out where there would exist a potential difference between live and neutral to cause this to happen. AC from Main DB leaves before the EL to AC Inverter DB where it goes into a change over switch, a 25A input breaker and then into the inverter. AC from Inverter goes to a 25A output breaker, into the change over switch and back to the main AC DB where is feeds all the lighting circuits and one plug circuit (Which is not on EL - and need to be rectified I know) If the change over switch is in the bypass position (i.e. incoming AC from main DB goes straight back to Main DB but also still goes to inverter AC in) and the AC breaker to the inverter is turned off the EL does not trip... What boggles my brain is that the inverter is totally independent of the EL in the Main DB yet cause it to trip as soon as the input power to the inverter is removed (25A input breaker turned off or load shedding/power failure)... And this never happened when the RCT Axpert was in place... Pointers of what to look for before I phone a sparky to come inspect everything??

The unfortunate part of all of this is that it seems like I need to throw more money at it to find out why its not functioning the way I believe it should be. Especially when compared to a similar installation next door... I do suspect there is a fault with my Axpert, but how to determine that exactly without spending nearly as much as a new unit I dont know... Currently I have set the unit to run off Utilities constantly and only use the solar to keep the batteries charged for the even of a power failure - as I really cannot afford to trash another set of batteries! Does anyone know if there are firmware upgrades for the 3KV units?

Yes - apologies that was a typo. When a single battery was connected to a 12V inverter (Trailboss) a 200W load lasted 7 hours before a turned off the system with a battery voltage reading 11.2V which recovered to a voltage 12.5V after a few minutes. Even at 20% discharge they really should last longer than 30min on 150W load though?

I have just run the inverter off batteries again now, after the earlier test was concluded and the batteries were left to be charged by remaining solar for the afternoon and then the Axpert charger. 150W load, 6A discharge current from the batteries and 32min later the low battery alarm was beeping...