Hi Everyone,

Trying to setup a Deye 8kW inverter, but somehow the settings are a bit confusing. What I have: 8kW Deye with a bout 4kw of PV panels. DB split in essentials (on output of inverter) and non-essentials (wired before inverter,fed from Eskom). The CT coil is installed on eskom line where it enters the property. So nothing funny or out of the ordinary. What I want to achieve is to have the excess PV feed to the non-essentials. If PV is not enough, it must add some Eskom power. I had it on "Zero export to CT" and untick "sell solar". Everything worked great, and non-essentials was using the excess PV, until there was some clouds and then the non-essentials was fed from the battery. I know I am missing some kind of setting somewhere. CT is installed correctly as per manual. Please help

Do you have Time-of-Use activated? Post an image of your timer settings on the "System Work Mode" page 2.

Activate it, and then make sure that each time slot has the battery percentage set to 100%.

Does the inverter change to the desired behaviour?

I have Time-of-use activated, but set to 45%. The lowest I want batteries to go. If I set it to 100%, then the grid charges it to 100%, which I don't want.

 

2 hours ago, GreenFields said:

Does the inverter change to the desired behaviour?

Sorry, I don't understand - What behaviour?

54 minutes ago, JacquesVDM said:

I have Time-of-use activated, but set to 45%. The lowest I want batteries to go. If I set it to 100%, then the grid charges it to 100%, which I don't want.

 

Sorry, I don't understand - What behaviour?

My understanding is that during the day you want the solar panels to recharge the battery, and supply solar power to the non-essential loads, but if a cloud passes over, you want the grid to pick up the slack and not the battery.

You can set this up by doing the following:

1. Define your time period in which you want the solar to charge the battery. Let's say from when the sun is up at 8am until 4pm when it's about to set.

2. Corresponding to this time-of-use period you can un-tick the grid-charge box so that you only charge from solar.

3. Select "Zero Export to CT" so that your solar power will supply power to the essential as well as non-essential loads.

4. For this time period, set your desired minimum battery level to 100%. In that way, at any SOC level where the battery is not full, the inverter will not switch to battery, it will defer to the grid. Except during loadshedding when the grid is gone.

5. You can set different time of use percentages during the evening, say if you want to drain your battery when there's no PV, down to whatever SOC level you choose, and at whatever kilowatts limit of battery power output you want, from the stored solar power.

Hope this makes sense, and I hope it helps.

 

Thank you very much Greenfields. It makes 100% sense what you suggests. Now the question is: if I untick Grid during the day period and there is no solar (rainy), the batteries will not charge from Grid. I will do some more tests tomorrow. 

9 minutes ago, JacquesVDM said:

Thank you very much Greenfields. It makes 100% sense what you suggests. Now the question is: if I untick Grid during the day period and there is no solar (rainy), the batteries will not charge from Grid. I will do some more tests tomorrow. 

You could mitigate poorer weather by setting battery priority over load, or else it makes sense to schedule a backup charge top-up slot from grid late afternoon around 4pm or 5pm.

I had a look at how the system responded by changing the various settings.

 

On 2023/01/23 at 7:51 PM, GreenFields said:

1. Define your time period in which you want the solar to charge the battery. Let's say from when the sun is up at 8am until 4pm when it's about to set.

Agree / makes sense

On 2023/01/23 at 7:51 PM, GreenFields said:

2. Corresponding to this time-of-use period you can un-tick the grid-charge box so that you only charge from solar.

Agree / makes sense

On 2023/01/23 at 7:51 PM, GreenFields said:

3. Select "Zero Export to CT" so that your solar power will supply power to the essential as well as non-essential loads.

Agree / makes sense

On 2023/01/23 at 7:51 PM, GreenFields said:

4. For this time period, set your desired minimum battery level to 100%. In that way, at any SOC level where the battery is not full, the inverter will not switch to battery, it will defer to the grid. Except during loadshedding when the grid is gone.

This setting is conflicting to what I want to achieve. I don't want it to use grid when not on 100%. I want to set it to say 50% and only when it goes below 50% it must use grid. HOWEVER, when the battery is full at 100%, it must utilize solar for non-essentials.

On 2023/01/23 at 7:51 PM, GreenFields said:

5. You can set different time of use percentages during the evening, say if you want to drain your battery when there's no PV, down to whatever SOC level you choose, and at whatever kilowatts limit of battery power output you want, from the stored solar power.

Agree / makes sense. But then it must also not use battery for non-essentials, although I have the setting on 50%. ( it uses battery down to the 50% setting)

 

The next thing I'll try is to untick "Time of use" and see what it does. Why cant it just use Grid for non-essentials and if there is "excess" solar, offset the Grid amount with that? Nothing else, just that.

 

7 minutes ago, JacquesVDM said:

This setting is conflicting to what I want to achieve. I don't want it to use grid when not on 100%. I want to set it to say 50% and only when it goes below 50% it must use grid. HOWEVER, when the battery is full at 100%, it must utilize solar for non-essentials.

Then it is as simple as setting your minimum desired battery level to 50%. Below 50% it will switch to drawing power for loads not from the battery but from solar or grid (but it will only charge the battery from solar, not charge from grid). Above 50% it will continue to use solar first, and then the battery, and then grid.

13 minutes ago, JacquesVDM said:

Agree / makes sense. But then it must also not use battery for non-essentials, although I have the setting on 50%. ( it uses battery down to the 50% setting)

With the inverter alone I do not know how to resolve this issue. I've understood that with a Home Automation Assistant it is possible to change the System Work Mode setting from "Zero Export to CT" to "Zero Export to Load" based on the time of day. But someone else will have to support you with that, or you must investigate that yourself, I don't use it.

Thank you Greenfields for your inputs. Like the idea to do it via Home assistant or some automation system. 

Edited February 3, 20233 yr by JacquesVDM
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2 hours ago, JacquesVDM said:

Agree / makes sense. But then it must also not use battery for non-essentials, although I have the setting on 50%. ( it uses battery down to the 50% setting)

Otherwise as a cheap workaround for now you could just limit the system power at night to something around what your baseload is.

Say for example you've got typically 500w baseload, and you've got two 5kWh batteries, that you want to discharge to 50%, it would take around 10 hours.

Even if you're cooking up a storm for dinner from 6-8pm when you start discharging, the battery will only contribute 500W to that power usage if that's what you specify in that time slot.

 

Edited February 3, 20233 yr by GreenFields

On 2023/01/23 at 3:12 PM, JacquesVDM said:

Hi Everyone,

Trying to setup a Deye 8kW inverter, but somehow the settings are a bit confusing. What I have: 8kW Deye with a bout 4kw of PV panels. DB split in essentials (on output of inverter) and non-essentials (wired before inverter,fed from Eskom). The CT coil is installed on eskom line where it enters the property. So nothing funny or out of the ordinary. What I want to achieve is to have the excess PV feed to the non-essentials. If PV is not enough, it must add some Eskom power. I had it on "Zero export to CT" and untick "sell solar". Everything worked great, and non-essentials was using the excess PV, until there was some clouds and then the non-essentials was fed from the battery. I know I am missing some kind of setting somewhere. CT is installed correctly as per manual. Please help

Hi Jacques, I'm experiencing exactly the same issue with my Deye 8kw inverter. Have you found a solution for this?

No workaround yet. Just ticked "zero export to load" and now I don't power non-essentials with PV and also don't drain batteries with the non-essentials. 

Jacques as i understand your setup I have the same ideas

During day set your battery level to say 50% .which means the battery will assist solar when cloudy...

However your battery will automatically be charged by solar if not to overcast

 

It's only when there is no solar that u need to set the battery levels higher to charge batteries and then run them down to early morning so they get recharged

 

 

 

 

 

Hi All.

Question on a similar topic. What do I need to do to ensure that during the day excess solar goes to non essentials and if this is not enough then Eskom tops up. And then in the evenings, non essentials don't drain my battery? Is the latter ensures by default?

1 hour ago, Dadoo123 said:

Hi All.

Question on a similar topic. What do I need to do to ensure that during the day excess solar goes to non essentials and if this is not enough then Eskom tops up. And then in the evenings, non essentials don't drain my battery? Is the latter ensures by default?

If your ct clamp is at the correct point at the 1st incoming grid point on your circuits then you can simply export to loads and zero export to grid and for safety set a 20 or 50 watt trickle feed.
I have mine set like this and it works great.

2 hours ago, Dadoo123 said:

Hi All.

Question on a similar topic. What do I need to do to ensure that during the day excess solar goes to non essentials and if this is not enough then Eskom tops up. And then in the evenings, non essentials don't drain my battery? Is the latter ensures by default?

In principle you need to set up the time-of-use screen to control the desired battery percentage, and the maximum power taken from battery, for the time slot in question, according to your specific needs. If you can describe your solar setup and loads more fully, maybe one could suggest settings to try out.

Thanks. Perhaps taking a step back....the installer placed the CT close to the inverter on the line going from the inverter to the main dB I think. Or perhaps from the main dB to the inverter. Is this incorrect or can it work like this?

5 hours ago, Dadoo123 said:

Thanks. Perhaps taking a step back....the installer placed the CT close to the inverter on the line going from the inverter to the main dB I think. Or perhaps from the main dB to the inverter. Is this incorrect or can it work like this?

This sounds incorrect, unless all your loads , essential and non-essential, run through the inverter.

You typically want your CT coil installed close to the meter, basically between the grid and your household loads, on the main feed coming in to the house, before splitting off to any loads. Check the diagrams in the manual. If this is wrong, you won't be able to control the inverter's settings correctly.

@Dadoo123

Please post picture of CT where it is installed.