Hello,


after one year of usage my MPI 10k seems to be defective.

 

Without grid connection it runs fine, but when I connect to the grid then the external fuse (Siemens 3x B16A) goes off.

at minute 0.50

 

- I double and triple checked all the wire connections including grounding and external circuit breaker
- I changed the fuse to a slower "C" rated model
- grid voltage is stable round about 230 volts


I changed the three phase wires in all possible combinations to avoid wrong connection
B / G / S fuse off S lights up in Siemens fuse
G / B / S Error 09 line phase loss
G / S / B fuse off B lights up in Siemens fuse
B / S / G Error 09 line phase loss
S / B / G fuse off G lights up in Siemens fuse
S / G / B Error 09 line phase loss

B = brown phase wire = phase 1
G = grey phase wire = phase 2
S = black phase wire = phase 3


Do you have some idea what's wrong or what could be defective?

Thanks and regards

Stefan

@Coulombmay be able to assist.

16 minutes ago, zsde said:

Coulomb may be able to assist.

No, sorry. I don't know the Infinis; they have some similarities with the Axperts but not enough for me to be of help. Sorry.

ok thanks.

 

The AXPerts are identical to the MPP Solar PiP, right?

Yes. MppSolar are one of the earliest resellers. The MPI and other Hybrid models branded MppSolar are the same as the Infinisolar models made by Voltronic Power. And of course other resellers have other names for them. 

I now got in contact with MPP solar to tell the problem and now we will see, how their support and warranty works.

I will tell you here about the progress

I had contact via mail with MPP-Solar. 

They told me to make some tests and I made a video of this and send it to MPP-Solar.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w4C5Q8QVvm4

 

After analyzing the video they suggest that the mainboard is defective. 

It is sad for me that the inverter dies after 11 month of usage only, but much more sad that they now say I have to pay for the spare parts although the failure is within the warranty.

 

At this point I am very disappointed of MPP-Solar and I don't know if I should recommend inverters from Voltronic any more when other people are asking me 😞

 

But I still hope we can find a solution - and I will keep you up to date

after several discussions MPP solar is willing to provide a new mainboard for free but with shipping costs of USD 110.

They do not accept it is within warranty time but a one-time goodwill.

I think it is because I write the process of warranty transaction of MPP Solar public at this forum (and others too)

 

With this clarified I took the service / disassembly manual and searched for the mentioned mainboard of the MPI 10k

-> Download of the service manual as pdf

it is the left pcb with the big coils and heatsinks on it

 

I took pictures of all cables I had to remove so I can assemble the inverter later on the right way

 

here it is

 

at the back side I found an area with a damaged / non-existant resistor and some white dust around. The service manual says this is the "INV/REC module" for the "S-Phase". I guess the IGBT above is damaged and produces the short at the 230V AC side which is causing my problems with the falling circuit protection

 

 

I wrote MPP-Solar back with this new knowledge and pictures, let's see what's going next.

 

 

btw. speaking of warranty:  

I wonder, why MPP Solar only gives 1 Year of warranty to the end-user because Voltronic, the original manufacturer gives 2 years warranty to their reseller. This means that with a failure between 1 and 2 years Voltronic replaces the defective part for free to MPP Solar but they cash up the customer.

 

So I've done a little research which reseller gives how much warranty time:

• Voltronic    2 years (I asked them via mail)
• FSP        5 / 3 years
• MPP Solar    1 year
• EASun        1 year (down at the footer of their website)
• Infinisolar    2 years (see Italian website)

The new mainboard for my MPI 10k arrived

positive:  shipping war very quick and took only 1 week from Taiwan to Germany

negative:  110 USD shipping costs have to paid from me

 

Here it is. Seems that it's a new revision with a slightly different pcb layout

 

 

I 'm going to insert the new mainbord these days and hope, that my MPI 10k will run again after this repair

Last weekend I changed the mainboard and yesterday I startet the inverter.

But as I turned the solar-input switch at the bottom of the inverter to "on" I heard a sizzle at the same second and a little smoke came out of the right upper side of the inverter.

Now the inverter goes in an endless reboot loop and shows "error 03" which means "dc bus voltage soft-start is time-out"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eRCGIXGHVo8

here is the error log from solarpower software

Now I sent the video to MPP-Solar support with the question, at which area I should search for the damage.

At my first view to the (new) mainboard I couldn't find any damages, but I guess the failure comes somewhere from the solar-input side because the smoke was there after I turned the solar-switch.

Do you have any ideas?

Now I am curious what the MPP-Solar support may answer.

Hi Stefan, I have the same inverter but the 5K version 1 phase version. I have experienced the same problem several times. It works fine when the grid is off but when the grid goes back on you hear clicking from relays while synchronizing and when it connects the fuse between grid and inverter goes. Sometimes it behaves like it should and sometimes it doesn't. At first I thought I made a mistake within the settings or something and I tried other settings after which it started again. But when I tried to reproduce the failure I did not succeed. Weird behavior!

Anyway the inverter works fine for 2,5 years now so no further complaints and hoping it doesn't kill itself.

Now your inverter, it looks like they just sent you a wrong pcb. Did you try to replace the old mainboard to check if everything is still functioning as it did before?

Greetings, Rik

On 2022/04/21 at 4:28 PM, Stefanseiner said:

But as I turned the solar-input switch at the bottom of the inverter to "on" I heard a sizzle at the same second and a little smoke came out...

It occurred to me just now that perhaps the switch is faulty. If the switch is passing significant current, and the contacts are pitted or dirty or otherwise bad, then arcing might occur at the switch, causing the current to fluctuate wildly, and wild current fluctuations with inductors everywhere spells Trouble with a capital T. The arcing could possibly be the source of the sizzle sound.

But usually the on-off switches for things like these are just digital inputs to a processor, or just inputs to some analogue circuit that takes nearly zero current. Often the switches have capacitors across them to "wet" the contacts and keep them clean, and also as a crude de-bouncing technique.

Perhaps worth investigating what that switch connects to.