We experienced our first power outage since I installed my modest system three weeks ago. (8 kW Deye hybrid, 1 pylon UP 5000, 6 x 400 W panels) I was unaware of the outage and the household carried on as normal... until the lights went out. All kinds af beeps and red lights on the inverter. We must have exeeded the battery's max discharge and caused a shutdown.  I knew from the outset that I am lean on battery, and was planning to increase that soon in the new year.  In the mean time I planned to reduce load during load shedding.

Question is, how can I become aware that the grid is down?  With scheduled loadshedding it's easy, but a grid failure can come any time.  I was thinking of a relay connected to grid, and on failure it could trigger a battery operated buzzer or klaxon or something.  

Any ideas or experiences?

1 hour ago, hannesvn said:

I was thinking of a relay connected to grid, and on failure it could trigger a battery operated buzzer or klaxon or something.  

This will work, and you can power the buzzer from the inverter output. Also install a switch to switch the buzzer off, or it will sound the whole time Eskom is off.

Others use an indicator light instead of a buzzer, and place it in the kitchen and family rooms which are most frequented.

When Eskom is ON, the light is OFF, and when Eskom fails, the light is ON.

I use the green "Credit Status" LED on my prepaid meter for this purpose. It is wired to the back of the stove (non essential), so when there is no light there is no municipal feed.

 

Gave it some more thought. If I use a relay with a NO nd NC output, I could connect those outputs to my buzzer via a 2-way switch. That way I can silence the buzzer, and at the same time arm it for the next change in status.

Can I combine neutral from the grid and from the inverter? Earth leakage issues?

keep your inverter neutrals and grid neutrals completely separate, also install a separate earth leakage trip for your inverter and test it works, could save a life and your inverter

definitely do not combine them, and also it wont work.

Edited December 28, 20213 yr by Nitrious

On 2021/12/27 at 12:49 PM, hannesvn said:

Any ideas or experiences?

I wired one of those green panel LED lights directly onto the Eskom income line and placed it in the kitchen above the fridge as it is the most central location. I am in the kitchen every 10 minutes to fill up my glass😁. Once Eskom goes down, the green LED goes out.

Depending on how into home automation you are, you could use Home Assistant to send yourself a push notification to your (or several) phone(s).

Currently I have 2 ways to detect a grid outage - grid voltage drops to 0 on my inverter (the inverter is integrated into Home Assistant), or my CBI ASC for my geyser becomes unavailable (it is not connected to the inverter). I am sure there are other signals to detect a grid outage. Once the signal triggers an automation, you can pretty much do anything. Right now I just send myself a push notification to my phone, but could flash lights in the house, make a light a certain colour, play a sound on a smart speaker, or any combination of these.

21 hours ago, Don said:

I wired one of those green panel LED lights directly onto the Eskom income line and placed it in the kitchen above the fridge as it is the most central location. I am in the kitchen every 10 minutes to fill up my glass😁. Once Eskom goes down, the green LED goes out.

Indicator light in the kitchen +1, otherwise we wouldn't know either and often don't. There's been many nights when load shedding was detected because someone noticed the neighbors lights off in passing.

having said that the batteries can go through the night as well, early days it was the nazi power routine, but these days its live and let live.

Edited December 29, 20213 yr by Nitrious

I use the oven time for this - if no eskom the timer switches off and everyone know not to use the microwave after sunset. It works like a charm. 

Stove is gas

Kettle i use the stove. I had to hide the electric kettle in the garage. 

No ironing at night

Everything else runs as normal and it lasts me through out the night.

On 2021/12/28 at 1:06 PM, Don said:

I am in the kitchen every 10 minutes to fill up my glass😁.

I suspect the toilet would also have been a good location for the LED, since I presume you release those liquids as often 🙂, unless you're irrigating the garden instead 🙂

My wife is the alarm... 🤣

 

 

On 2021/12/27 at 12:49 PM, hannesvn said:

We experienced our first power outage since I installed my modest system three weeks ago. (8 kW Deye hybrid, 1 pylon UP 5000, 6 x 400 W panels) I was unaware of the outage and the household carried on as normal... until the lights went out. All kinds af beeps and red lights on the inverter. We must have exeeded the battery's max discharge and caused a shutdown.  I knew from the outset that I am lean on battery, and was planning to increase that soon in the new year.  In the mean time I planned to reduce load during load shedding.

Question is, how can I become aware that the grid is down?  With scheduled loadshedding it's easy, but a grid failure can come any time.  I was thinking of a relay connected to grid, and on failure it could trigger a battery operated buzzer or klaxon or something.  

Any ideas or experiences?

1) Implement inverter monitoring and send yourself an alert.
Solar-Assistant coming soon:

• Configurable alerts/email notifications.

You could integrate SA to Home-Assistant/Node Red and send a message from HA/NR.

2) Get a Magneto Rechargeable Emergency LED (~R220 at builders) and connect it to the Grid Circuit.
It comes on when there is a Grid power failure.

As a bonus you get light when there is a power failure.

Edited March 30, 20222 yr by system32

I have got 2 display lights in a box which shows Volt/Amp/Freq, one for every power supply. I want to install a small 230v relay with NC (normally closed) and NO (normally open) contacts fed by the mains inside that box.

There will be a toggle switch (spdt) to switch the buzzer supply between the NO or NC contact. That relay then switches a 230v buzzer fed from the inverter supply. As soon as the mains fall away, the relay NC contact closes and buzzer sounds. You then switch the toggle switch over, the buzzer silences, as soon as the mains restores the relay closes the NO contact and the buzzer sounds again. You then switch the toggle back to the other side, the buzzer silences till the grid fails again. 

HI All 

Reviving this thread again to see if any of you boff's out there have some cool ideas.

Anyone else got any other automation ideas to indicate to the family when there is load shedding so that they don't run any appliances that they shouldn't. Especially early in the morning? We spend most of our time in the lounge/kitchen. Running wires isn't an option as we have exposed trusses in the kitchen and it's "blocked"

41 minutes ago, McAllstar said:

HI All 

Reviving this thread again to see if any of you boff's out there have some cool ideas.

Anyone else got any other automation ideas to indicate to the family when there is load shedding so that they don't run any appliances that they shouldn't. Especially early in the morning? We spend most of our time in the lounge/kitchen. Running wires isn't an option as we have exposed trusses in the kitchen and it's "blocked"

What components do you have for automations? Smart speakers?

Smart speakers, Shelly smart switches, home assistant 

On 2021/12/28 at 9:29 AM, hannesvn said:

Can I combine neutral from the grid and from the inverter? Earth leakage issues?

I am just aware of some 5kW Sunsynk/Deyes requiring a bridge piece from earth to neutral. Otherwise the earth leakage doesn't work with the mains off.

 

On 2021/12/27 at 12:49 PM, hannesvn said:

We experienced our first power outage since I installed my modest system three weeks ago. (8 kW Deye hybrid, 1 pylon UP 5000, 6 x 400 W panels) I was unaware of the outage and the household carried on as normal... until the lights went out. All kinds af beeps and red lights on the inverter. We must have exeeded the battery's max discharge and caused a shutdown.  I knew from the outset that I am lean on battery, and was planning to increase that soon in the new year.  In the mean time I planned to reduce load during load shedding.

Question is, how can I become aware that the grid is down?  With scheduled loadshedding it's easy, but a grid failure can come any time.  I was thinking of a relay connected to grid, and on failure it could trigger a battery operated buzzer or klaxon or something.  

Any ideas or experiences?

Your could wire your nice-to-have loads from the Aux/Gen terminal (additional earth leakage) and only leave your true essentials on the inverter. In this way you will only loose your nice-to-haves if you don't manage your battery.

16 hours ago, McAllstar said:

Smart speakers, Shelly smart switches, home assistant 

are your inverter and home assistant connected? if so then read the grid frequency / voltage then fire off a notification in HA. If not then you could have a device on non-essentials connected with a shelly - if the shelly loses power then the assumption is the grid is down and fire off a notification

Thanks a mil. I managed to get a Connex smart bulb and I use that to show that load-shedding is in progress. So it switches on when LS kicks in and off when it’s over. 

I have a generator that is large enough to power the entire home, if not running 4 stove plates, a kettle, toaster, microwave at the same time, but it is connected to the mains and runs everything fine, I have a red light that tells me when municipal power is restored, but to go check it every 5 minutes is a pain, and often the 10pm load shedding is 20 minutes and sometimes the full hour.

In an effort to not waste petrol, I land up going and checking every 20 minutes.

Can I connect the red light to a speaker that beeps when municipal power is back and then after I turn off the generator and flip the changeover switch from generator to municipal it silences? Maybe a speaker that only sounds for 30 seconds and then auto turns off, that would even be better.

On 2023/06/13 at 10:44 PM, PaulS said:

I have a generator that is large enough to power the entire home, if not running 4 stove plates, a kettle, toaster, microwave at the same time, but it is connected to the mains and runs everything fine, I have a red light that tells me when municipal power is restored, but to go check it every 5 minutes is a pain, and often the 10pm load shedding is 20 minutes and sometimes the full hour.

In an effort to not waste petrol, I land up going and checking every 20 minutes.

Can I connect the red light to a speaker that beeps when municipal power is back and then after I turn off the generator and flip the changeover switch from generator to municipal it silences? Maybe a speaker that only sounds for 30 seconds and then auto turns off, that would even be better.

Hi we had a buzzer wired directly to Eskom which we manually switched on when starting our gennie and when load shedding was over it alerted us, we then switched off the buzzer when turning off the gennie

I see you get change over switches with all this built in using a relay...

Just saw this thread , how far we have moved in 18 months.

Now I get a notification on my phone app from my Sunsync inverter that says ;" Disconnected from the grid."

On 2023/06/13 at 10:44 PM, PaulS said:

I have a generator that is large enough to power the entire home, if not running 4 stove plates, a kettle, toaster, microwave at the same time, but it is connected to the mains and runs everything fine, I have a red light that tells me when municipal power is restored, but to go check it every 5 minutes is a pain, and often the 10pm load shedding is 20 minutes and sometimes the full hour.

In an effort to not waste petrol, I land up going and checking every 20 minutes.

Can I connect the red light to a speaker that beeps when municipal power is back and then after I turn off the generator and flip the changeover switch from generator to municipal it silences? Maybe a speaker that only sounds for 30 seconds and then auto turns off, that would even be better.

If you use a panel light, you can use a 230v ac panel buzzer light.

NB it is best to have 1A breaker on the supply to the light/buzzer to protect the wiring. 

https://britelighting.co.za/products/panel-mount-buzzer-230v-ac?variant=40352226476184&currency=ZAR&utm_medium=product_sync&utm_source=google&utm_content=sag_organic&utm_campaign=sag_organic&gclid=Cj0KCQjwtO-kBhDIARIsAL6LorfFUNGBo-v4GBj7ZAegOIVVYQuXpvqUJAoQHWZdr6KpILjtTyLPCJEaAjUPEALw_wcB