MartinCoetzee

As a side project, I developed a semi-realtime dashboard using some open source components and some custom software that I wrote.
My current setup is the following:
I have a 8kW sunsynk inverter and 10kWh revov batteries.
have a program running on a raspberry pi 2 that polls the wifi (solarman) dongle on my 8kw inverter. It writes the inverter data to json files every 30 seconds. I then have another program that uploads the json payloads to a google cloud server (on their free tier) running grafana and influxdb. I have most of the google cloud stuff on a docker image, so I can move it quickly to another server if I see the server isn't handling the loads. I then created the following custom dashboard in grafana:

I'm still trying to pin down what information is useful, so it's still a bit of a work in progress. I have to see what other battery info there is on the inverter, but for now I'm just interested in the soc & voltages.
My next steps are to connect my pi to the can port (rs485 is occupied) and try and get the same info, but I'm not sure how that's gonna work. The rs485 port is unfortunately connected to the batteries, so I can't go that route.
 

These are the minimums that the inverter looks at in order for it to decide whether to use battery power or grid power to supplement available PV to power the loads (so during load shedding these minimums are not applicable as there is no grid power). 
In my example, from 09:00 to 12:00 the inverter will not use battery power if the actual SoC is less than 85%.  So if actual SoC is 70% at 09:30, it will power loads with excess PV (whats left over from what the battery is pulling from PV to charge) + grid. If actual SoC is 90% at 11:00, it will use PV + battery, but it will stop discharging the battery when it is down to 85%.  From 12:00 to 17:00 it will use PV + grid. After 17:00 it will start using the battery, but at 85% it will use grid power, etc.
As for your question, please see the picture below. The value you enter at 06:00 will depend on your preferences. If you put 100%, you will just use PV + grid from 06:00 to 17:00, and only use your battery in the 23:00 to 06:00 period.  If you put 30% at 06:00, your battery will still charge from PV up to 100%, but throughout the day it might be discharged and re-charged a little bit multiple times if your loads are higher than available PV. If the minimum is too low in the afternoon you have to consider that you might be caught out by loadshedding, for example if you have big loads in the late afternoon on a cloudy day, you could sit at 30% SoC at 16:55 (thinking that you'll grid charge after 17:00). Then Eskom might move up a stage and you have unplanned load shedding without sunlight and with only 30% battery. That's why my minimums are quite high for the early evening.

Also make sure that 'Time of Use' is ticked, and underneath that all of the days are ticked.

You can manage the minimum battery levels with the 'Time Of Use' settings under Grid Setup. I have included pictures of mine as an example. PV will be used first, and it will utilise the battery as long as the current state of charge is higher than the set minimum for that time of the day.  When it hits the minimum it will use grid power. You can also use this screen to set charging from the grid (if you have a couple of cloudy days and solar is not enough to fully charge). Note that these percentages don't limit charging from PV (so even if it is set to 80%, it will attempt to charge the battery to 100% from PV as long as there is sunlight). It does however limit charging from the grid (so if it is set to 80% at 21:00 with grid charge ticked, it will only charge to 80%).
 
My 'Grid Sell' is unticked, so it does not export power to the grid. 'HM Load & Zero Export' is ticked, which means it pushes power back into the non-essential loads that are not on backup (in my case this is the geyser and stove).  It does this via the grid input (it is bi-directional), and you need to have the CT clamp fitted to use this option. It will attempt to zero grid usage by using PV and battery to push into the 'home load'. So if you use this option and you have very low minimum battery levels set, you could run your batteries flat by using your stove for example. I have my geyser timer set to turn on at 12:00, at which time my minimum battery level is 100% - so the inverter will push all excess PV into the geyser without using the battery.
 
If 'LD Load & Zero Export' is ticked, it will only power the backed up loads and not push any power back into the non backed up circuits.
 
I understand that the newest firmware looks slightly different, but it should be quite similar.

I am looking for lights fittings with built in batteries that can charge of the existing wiring and then stay on a few hrs during load shedding. Any one sourced anything thats ok quality ?

First off, I want to recommend installing an EM24 meter instead of an ET340. While both are supported, the ET340 does energy accounting incorrectly. I will explain lower down.
Secondly, yes this is a supported use case. The total power over all three phases is taken into account, and then ESS tries to cancel it out in exactly the same manner as it always does. The result of this is that the Multi on L1 will feed energy into L1 in an attempt to cancel out what is used in total over all three. This obviously assumes that you are billed for the total across all three.
As an example, if you have 500W on each phase, the Multi on L1 will feed in 1500W of energy, 500W of which is used by the loads on L1, and the other 1000W flows backwards into the grid but is cancelled out by the 500W+500W on L2 and L3 to get to an overall zero.
Caveat: The Multi must be on L1. If it isn't on L1 (from the perspective of the supply company), then you have to pretend that it is and mentally renumber the others so that the phase rotation remains correct.
Second caveat: Supplier must bill you for the total over all three. Otherwise you must turn off phase compensation.
Now for the reason you want the EM24. Keep in mind that these meters have separate counters for imported and exported energy. Now consider an example where I import 1kw on L1, and export 500W on both L2 and L3. The total over all three phases is then zero. If I do this for an hour, the energy counter on L1 will be at 1kwh imported and 0kwh exported, while the energy counters on L2 and L3 will show 0.5kwh exported and 0kwh imported, and the total energy counter on an EM24 meter will show zero for both the import and the export.
If you perform the same test on an ET340, the individual counters show the same values, but the total energy counter will show 1kwh imported and 1kwh exported. While this is technically true on some level, you could have derived the same answer from adding the individual registers. For systems that does phase compensation, this causes the main energy chart on VRM to be... well... wrong.

Hi Martin
I can only provide some guidelines according to SANS and a little bit of logic/experience, and if you want to have proper (sometimes overdone) safety (in my terminology, read invertor as any solar charging circuit):
Each solar string should have a cutoff before merging into a feed to invertor. This should be a DC fuse & switch, or a DC circuit breaker before a junction that merges the supply into an array that feeds the invertor. At the invertor, or as close as feasible, you need to have a similar arrangement (obviously at max voltage/current expected from PV) to isolate the feed from the invertor. There is a specification in the SANS code regarding a single string of PV panels, so if you exceed the voltage/current, you may need to provide additional protections on your PV array between panels. Apologies, I don't remember what those values are. The obvious electrical considerations need to be taken into account for your incoming AC supply (breakers, fuses, etc), and duplicating the same on your outgoing supply from your invertor. Pay attention to Earthing (note I don't use the word Grounding here) and ensure that the Earth on each side of the invertor matches the Earth on the incoming supply (especially in regards to each phase). Test this in all stages that the invertor can get to (Grid-Tie, Offline, Online, Hybrid - Whatever it can do), seen a lot of and experienced plenty of shocks and damaged kit due to changeovers, so do test this and look for spikes.  
Grounding - This is a very touchy subject, and some items I disagree with SANS, but you can comply with both my ideas and SANS at the same time with a bit of thought.. Ground fricking everything possible with the shortest possible route and with the biggest cable available (my thinking). Your route to ground should be direct and as short as possible. This is where SANS and I disagree, but is still compliant if you properly ground your array, but up to you to decide: I personally don't believe in linking your array ground supply to your incoming supply (I can provide arguments in separate messages), and if far away from your array then even your invertor should be separately grounded. Depending on where you live, the shortest possible route to ground (any valid ground) can save a lot of equipment in a strike. And here is some of my reason for disagreeing with SANS: providing an extra path for high power (eg: lightning, inducted) energy to flow is going to damage something. Copper, even if temporary before breaking, is still an easier path than Ground! Hope this at least answers some thoughts. If you need further detail, I work closely with a Senior Electrical Engineer who works multiple MW Solar projects and would be happy to pose the same question to him, although we would need to discuss offline.

I can supply this. 2 Left in Stock. (R1770 excluding Transport +- R100) 

Those are the only ones supported by Victron, but there are a few more that works great on the Input side of a Victron that come standard with Sunspec  and then for others you will need a second Carlo to measure its production and to be able to see them in the ESS.    The challenge comes in when you want to connect the Unsupported PV inverters to the Output of the Victron. There is ways to make them work, but its quite frustrating. I wont attempt the deeper technical explanation on that, that the resident Engineer must handle. 

Who has a friend with friends...
Would be magic to have this available for our part of Africa.
https://www.google.com/get/sunroof#p=0

Here is my suggestion. If enough people ask for it, then maybe it will happen. But you have to ask for it using an official platform, like the Victron community site. Otherwise it's just anecdotal evidence. I hear the request every now and then, but I know literally of less than 5 people who want it...
Second, it's not easy to do. You may think that it is, but the main obstacle is this: The Multi has no DC current measurement (and it's not unique in this sense, many other inverters also don't have it). DC current is estimated from the AC values. In theory the DC power is the AC input power minus the AC output power, multiplied by an efficiency factor (0.9 is assumed), and then the result is divided by the DC voltage and that gets you the DC current. For values above 2A, it's not too far off, but especially under 1A  it's practically noise.
Now imagine someone ask for a max BATTERY discharge of 0A. In other words, he wants to use his PV, but the battery should not discharge at all. Now imagine that due to our inability to estimate the DC current, we "accidentally" discharge the battery slowly.
And this will simply be the case in any system where the PV is DC-tied and you don't have accurate DC measurements.
Now compare the number of people asking for the feature with the number of people who will complain that it doesn't work correctly.
It is far better to let people solve this using their own software platforms... UNLESS enough people ask for it.

My installation started in June 2019, but the actual process started in February 2019.
The installation:
Victron Multipuls II 48/5000 1xVictron MPPT 150/85 1x Victron Color Control GX 2 x US3000 Pylontech Li-Ion Batteries 16 x 330w Tier 1 Solar Panels 1 x ET112 Energy Meter 2 x Timers for my geysers 1 x "new" Non-essential DB



I chose Victron mostly of what I read here on the forum, and also because I felt the Invertor is the best "value" for money compared to the more expensive "German" makes and cheaper "Chinese" makes and it is extensible if you need it to be. There is probably other makes I could have chosen, but I felt most comfortable with Victron, if that makes any sense.
I started by getting quotes, but I did ask for the same specs, otherwise you cannot compare apples with apples. Also I am not really a DIY type person so I chose to get a installer, but finding one is not so easy. I got some references and eventual decided on cost vs experience, I chose cost 😉, which brought it's own challenges but it was my choice. They had some issues in getting the install 100% but I never felt that they would abandon me, during the process, but my patience was tested a few times.
My aim was/is to, reduce my Electricity cost a month as well as have a backup in the evenings "if/when" we get load shedding again. Yes I know it is still cheaper to use Eskom compared to solar with batteries, but I am willing to pay for that. Where I stay, we pay a sliding scale of 0-600kWh at a cheaper rate, then from 601kWh and up we pay a more expensive rate. So the aim is to try and stay below 600kWh a month. My avg consumption over a 12 month period last year was 890 kWh, with a max of 1330kWh in July. I am also allowed to feedback to the Grid where I stay as an added benefit.
Which brings me to the community here, after asking a question in the "Starting In Solar? Feel free to introduce yourself" section, after struggling with the installer for almost two weeks in getting the finer details correctly setup. @Jaco de Jongh pm me to assist, and offered to come to my house, in getting the install working 100% at not cost! He even phoned @plonkster on a questioned I had regarding battery usage. I just want to again say thank you, to BOTH of them, in assisting in getting it working and explaining it to me in a manner of how it actual works and what I "thought" it is suppose to work like.

 

Some important learning usage as a newbie:
First thing that I learned is that when your geyser is on and connected on your non-essential load DB, but the Grid is still available, ie no power failure, then it will still use the battery power to operate, if no/some PV (solar) power is available.
Let me explain: Say for instance it is 17:00 in the afternoon,  your PV generation is generating 500w but you have set your Geyser to switch also on at 17:00 to warm the water for two hours to be able to to bath/shower your children etc, and your battery is fully charged from your PV system, your usage will then go to say 3500w for your house , it will first draw 500w from the PV, then it will draw the remaining 3000w form your battery and or Grid, which could means it could draw 2000W from your battery and 1000w from your grid, which in theory can drain your battery very quickly, by 4 kWh, in two hours, then at 19:30 you have a power failure, then you have barely any power left to use. To overcome that you can setup schedule charging in ESS, on your CCGX, which will allow not to use the battery unless there is a power failure. For it to be effective you also need to set the SOC, to a lower value than your current SOC.
I hope this explanation makes sense. (Welcome to correct me if I am wrong)
What I have done is to setup schedule charging to not allow for the battery to discharge when my geyser is switch on and then also late afternoon early evening when you use the microwave and or oven for cooking etc. I fully start using the batteries at 20:45 at night, and so far I have been running my whole house until 05:00 weekdays, 06:00 weekends, in the mornings on battery power, with some reserve left on my battery of about 40%, and then it uses that for the geyser to switch on at 05:00 on weekdays and at 06:00 on weekends. This whole process has taken me about a month to figure out what works best for our household. You would say a month?, yes, because in the beginning the whole household, needs to adjust to using solar and if you have teenagers in your house... then well you have to have, patience...😃
 

The rule is apparently that if the system is floating, then you must fuse both sides. If one side is grounded, then you fuse only the ungrounded side. For most inverter setups this would mean you have to fuse both sides. I personally have only the positive side fused, but that is because my layout is such that a ground fault is really not expected.
The reason, which I admit I don't fully understand yet, is when you have multiple earth faults (ie current jumps across to another conductor, eg the chassis of a vehicle, and back onto the same conductor or the opposite side), then the fuse on that side might be rendered useless or some current might bypass it and cause it to not blow. The fuse on the other side then protects you. Since this can happen on either side, you need to fuse both sides.
For my PV cables, which leave the house and go into a harsher territory, hence faults are more probable, both sides are fused.
Edit: Here is a quote from another site about a DC control system:
 

Manufacturers sometimes change the chip without changing the USB id. Work around it in the (windows only) drivers.

It all depends on the chip inside that thing. The new things are so thin, they don't even have firmware on the dongle, it has to be loaded onto the dongle by the driver! So the firmware has to be on the CCGX, and as you might imagine, you can't ship firmware/drivers for every imaginable device, and many of the cheap ones are pretty much windows only.
The one Victron sells is one known to work, but it's pretty much the same as many on the market... it just saves you the trouble of figuring it out for yourself. Internally it is some kind of realtek chip. Usually the rtl8192 is the one to aim for. There is also an 8188 one... that one is much more painful to work with.
It's unfortunately impossible to tell you which one you've got. If you have a Linux computer, you can plug it in and then type "lsusb" in a terminal to see what it really is, but on windows it's all cleverly hidden in the name of user friendliness. 🙂

PS. There are smaller ones. I have also found it successful to make a tough metal bracket as a wrap around the cabinet + high grade locks. 
Sincerely
Jay

https://scoop.co.za/scoop-25u-800mm-deep-ip65-outdoor-cabinet-with-4-fans.html

Introduction
This forum has helped me a LOT with information, tips and tricks, and eventually with my decision making process. A massive "thanks" to everybody that contributes (questions and answers!)
So I figured I'd share my experience with the first days with my newly commissioned solar system, in the hopes that it might add a bit to the pool of knowledge, and help some other newbie in the future.
The System
3KVA Victron MultiPlus II 48/3000/35-32 VenusGX running ESS 1 x SmartSolar MPPT 150/85 990W array (3 x JaSolar 330W Poly) 1 x BYD 2.56 Lithium-Ion Batteries 1 x Carlo Gavazzi ET112 Energy Meter Notes
It was officially switched on 17 June 2019.
Based on the sage advice of members on this forum, and my own thinking,the system is as small as I could make it, and still have something usable. 
The plan is to extend, based on gathered data - and of course as finances allow.
The current planned ending spot is:
total of 9 330W JA panels at least one additional BYD 2.56 unit This was not a DIY job - fiddling near mains with any piece of metal (like a screwdriver) freaks me the HECK out. Also I'm one of those feckless "software types", so there's that 😛
Generally I'm happy with the installer's services, but then again, maybe I just don't know better
We have a 80amp municipal breaker, and new Conlog pre-paid meter, courtesy of Tshwane.
Production, consumption and storage
Short version
Best (single) day: 5.03kWh produced.  At peak, I have seen 900W from the panels, but generally 750W is what I see as "good" currently. We consume about 20kWh per day (looking to bring that down a touch still) House "idle" consumption is between 150 to 450 Watts (these are the 24/7 loads) We have "spiky" loads that peak anywhere from 1.2kW to 5kW (as measured by the GC energy meter) Battery can handle the "idle" consumption for about 6 hours (i.e. between 00:00 and 06:00) I'm trying to find a good "staggered" setup of loads during sunlight hours to keep the panels busy during peak sunlight hours - it is a challenge! Longer version
I'm lazy now - if there are questions, I'll gladly try to provide details
Snags and things
Victron VRM and Venus remote console
Make sure you have access.
Learn it. Love it.
Read the manual before changing things!
Remote Console can be laggy at times. Have patience.
Or build a new interface based on MQTT...
ESS
Initially the installer set the "Limit inverter power" setting to "safe" limit to product the battery. This made sense to me - don't hit the battery with massive spike loads, maximize battery life. Good. Only problem is, as far as ESS is concerned, this "limits DC to AC" conversion. Period. So that includes MPPT supplied DC.  So the nett effect was that MPPT supplied power to loads was also capped. Not so good.
My eventual work-a-round was to drop the "Limit inverter power" setting, and then set up "Charging Schedules".  The main intent of these schedules is to charge from mains (well, AC to be precise), but the nice side effect is that while the schedule is in effect, the battery is NOT discharged. BUT, MPPT power can still flow freely to the batteries, AND flow unthrottled to loads.
Set the "Stop on SOC" value of the schedule to some low value (even below the minimum allowed SOC), and it won't charge from the grid.
The schedules keep the batteries away from loads, until 00:00. Then the house gets fed from battery, until 06:00 - then the schedules kick in again.
You can also set the "Limit charge power" setting to limit AC to DC flow (i.e. how fast you charge from mains). UNLESS you have DVCC turned on...
DVCC
Ok, so initially this was NOT turned on. Based on what I read the last two days, it looked like it sorta probably SHOULD be turned on (with the BYD bats). Asked the installer...he said "yes go ahead turn on".
So I did that - can't really say I see much difference, except that the "Limit charge power" vanished. And I did not notice - so today I charged the battery with mains power to 95%. Oh well - ultimately does not matter I suppose, since it was a "good" direct PV usage day, so PV was not wasted.
So what was added is a "Limit charge current" setting. As far as I understand it, this is a "global" limit on how much amps is allowed to flow to the batteries - but SHOULD not cap the wattage supplied to power loads from MPPT.  I will see tomorrow how that plays out.
Conlog prepaid meter
I was actually pretty worried about this thing tripping when those "accidental" grid feed-ins happened (when big loads turn off).
To prevent this, we had a grid set point of 150W at first.
No trouble presented it self, and eventually dropped that to 70W.
I have now observed short periods of "accidental grid feed-in"  of upwards of 250W (electric stove element that turns on and off during use).
Fingers crossed - nothing tripped or blew up to date.
Conclusion (for now)
Educate your self, ask questions, verify answers (you now, "trust, but verify" ). Read the manuals! You will need to figure out how to stagger your loads during the daylight hours, in order to optimize your production, usage and storage Data - you want it. Whatever system (or components) you eventually install - make data capture and analysis a priority! I learned quite a bit from watching the remote console display (and switching things on and off!). Looking at the PV yield and consumption graphs (VRM), is helping me setup up sane "charge schedule" settings. It is also helping me to conclude that "yes, I really actually DO need more panels". I mean, I *knew* that, but know I have STATS to back me up! Data for the win! Apologies for the lack of photos currently - I'll upload some if anybody asks
 

When combined with a Victron inverter, you need only one contactor. The NRS097 requirement is that you must have two relays in series and that a single failure must not break the system (ie there must be some redundancy). The Multi already has one such relay and LOM-detection (loss of mains). Adding the Ziehl with just one relay is sufficient to tick the second box.

Just a few things to remember when installing a Ziehl 
You will need the following:  AND One or two 63A contactors  
 
Install using the following connection diagram.    Please remember to bridge L1 - L2 - L3 when single phase are used.  Return wires (Feedback from Contactors) are not required in SA. I have used 48VDC to power the unit, but you can can chose to use the grid voltage. I have used grid voltage to switch the contactors.  I have Chosen 63Amp Din rail mount DB contactors (Schneider)   
Putting the unit into programming mode: Switch the supply on.  Look at the following picture.  The unit comes with the seal not in place.  If the Led between the 2 locks are Red, slightly lift the key cover and turn it 180 degree. While turning you will see a Small blue pin like switch behind the key cover.  Use the key cover and press down firmly on the blue pin for 2 seconds.  The Led should turn to Green now.   Once the LED is Green you can continue with the configuration.   
Configuration: There are 2 Programs to chose from PRG5 is used for 230Volt Phase to Neutral, 1 or 3 Phase PRG6 is used for 400Volt phase to phase systems with no Neutral.  Press the UP arrow 1 time to display "InFo." Press the RIGHT button 5 times to display "PR 1" Press the UP button till you reach "PR 5" or "PR 6"  Press the RIGHT button 1 time to display "no" Press the DOWN button 1 time to display "YES" Press the Right button. The Device will reset and start with the new program.  Every time a new program is selected, all the settings revert to the default settings.  Changing Settings:  ONLY after you selected the relevant program for your installation, you should continue to the settings.  Press the UP button 2 times to get to the first Menu on the Settings LIst.  Use the Right Button to Scroll through the 5 settings of each Parameter. Use the UP and Down buttons to change the setting to mach the settings on the list.  Once done with all 5 settings, use the UP button to scroll to the next Parameter on the list.   The settings for South Africa are as follows.  Once you done, remove and re-apply the power, the unit will go through a 60 Second "self check" that might be followed by another count down.  Once that is complete and all conditions are within spec, the Contactors should energize.  Once you are satisfied with the settings, press the blue pin till the LED turns red.  Apply the seal, but dont crimp it till you are sure no one wants to check your settings.    

If you ever have a broken one or one you can part with free or close to free, let me know. I have a half-broken 40A one and it might be fun to have another broken one to use as a donor 🙂

@anotherbrownbear would be the man to talk to aboud VSDs.

I am a registered electrcian so that part i can do, my main question was really if any one is running 3 phase pumps of VSD drives.

First let me thank admin for a great website as well as all the guys giving so much input and advice for new comers like myself. I have read many posts with regards to CoCT legislations and decided it would be best to go Off-Grid. This way I am not limited to 3Kw array and would not need the services of an Engineer. My garage and granny flat roof space is limited to accept about 16 solar panels. I therefore decided to go with the 405W panels which is 2.1 X 1 meter in size. They are also 48V so my conductor size would be smaller. The remaining 8 solar panels would be mounted on the house roof which is east facing. I would then have a total of 24 X 405-Watt panels giving me a total of 9.72kWatt.

This made me go for the Victron Quattro 48/10 000 inverter. In the near future I might install a generator for when I need to charge the batteries. Reading the various websites, I opted for the Victron 250/100 MPPT controller which boast an efficiency of 99%. The online excel file opted I use 4 PV panels in series and 3 parallel string.
 
I'm still not sure if I should use the CCGX or the Venus Victron controller. Any thoughts here please? I was planning on having the Color controller where it is always visible in the kitchen. While the inverter, batteries and solar controllers are all connected inside the garage. Lastly there is a 24kW lithium battery bank with 460A capacity.
My first task would be to split my existing DB and also have a Non-Essential group of consumers. I decided to still have the municipal power connected if in the future I would sell the property. I’m hoping CoCT would relax their laws then it might be possible to use the other AC input in the Quattro unit and go Hybrid. Any help and advice to this plan would be appreciated.