39 minutes ago, Skobbejakkals said:

Possibly CNBM? Their South African page is just tough to navigate.

This page says that Kool Energy is one of their authorised brands:

https://www.cnbmoverseas.com/subPhotovoltaicIntegration/list.aspx

Yes i think so - there is a post on this thread from a purported technician indicating CNBM.

2 hours ago, ThinusB said:

My main concern is battery gets damage because system thinks it must continue charging even though it is full.  Will this happen?

As far as I can tell the display indicating charging and the display indicating < 100% are connected. They are a display issue only. 

In fact the system is always keeping the battery at its max voltage. Indeed if you plug it into a power meter you can see spikes into hundreds of W draw every hour for a few seconds at a time. Presumably it attempts to top up the already-charged batteries. (This is at 100% with no flashing charging indicator.) 

It's not going to damage the batteries as long as the internal max voltage is calibrated correctly... but you can only confirm that by opening it up and measuring. 

19 hours ago, nad_isa said:

Let me clarify - it 'seems' to be an issue with SOC/BMS as the manufacturer hasn't confirmed this (other than a random post on this thread). and the symptoms seem to point to that. 

A complete discharge seems to resolve the battery percentage displaying under 100% - not the root cause. And yes on the lithium units - haven't seen anyone complain on the gel variants.

we wont know until we actually get some proper feedback from OEM, not mustek or kool energy as they haven't a clue...

Hi

Now we have the solution can sort it our, just need to send back to your supplier to do the update.

7 minutes ago, Owen Zhang said:

Hi

Now we have the solution can sort it our, just need to send back to your supplier to do the update.

???

3 hours ago, Owen Zhang said:

Hi

Now we have the solution can sort it our, just need to send back to your supplier to do the update.

Owen, just for interest sake. What is the fix? Do you need to do a firmware update? Is it just a case of calibrating something? Or do you need to make a physical change to the unit?

10 hours ago, Owen Zhang said:

Hi

Now we have the solution can sort it our, just need to send back to your supplier to do the update.

This is great news. Why not post the update firmware binary and procedure here? You can distribute the work and hassle of actually patching the affected units... there do seem to be a lot of them. 

 

Edited February 23, 20233 yr by TTT

On 2023/02/22 at 9:05 PM, Skobbejakkals said:

Who is the OEM?

I would also love to know. 

This is as close as I've got -- the fourth image down looks identical to the mainboard in the SOL-I-BB-M1L and I assume the Kool 1 kWh as well. From Foshan Kemapower.

But no evidence they actually designed or manufacture the board, nevermind integrate the device. 

And I can't find any other version of this trolley so perhaps the overall design is for the SA market only. 

Checked mine this morning for the first time since last week when it was over 80%. It is now at 0% but still running as it should 😬

Aaaaand LS just kicked in. We are down from 8 to 12:30 so lets see how this goes.

Edited February 24, 20233 yr by trinomic

7 hours ago, trinomic said:

Aaaaand LS just kicked in. We are down from 8 to 12:30 so lets see how this goes.

How did it go? 

 

16 minutes ago, TTT said:

How did it go? 

 

It worked as normal, just disturbing seeing it at 0% all the time 😆

17 minutes ago, trinomic said:

It worked as normal, just disturbing seeing it at 0% all the time 😆

👍 That does sound worse than having no indicated SoC at all. I would do a full-cycle capacity check now and then regardless of this issue. As a side effect it should reset the SoC display. But it'll also give you confidence there's nothing actually wrong with the battery.

I was pleasantly surprised to discover almost exactly the rated 1280 Wh in mine, about 10 hours at 130 W. Should be double for the 2 kW unit. 

It'll be interesting to see how these batteries age.

 

On 2023/02/23 at 12:13 PM, Owen Zhang said:

Hi

Now we have the solution can sort it our, just need to send back to your supplier to do the update.

I’ve got a Mecer unit that I bought at Incredible Connection. Who do I send it back to?

On 2023/02/24 at 5:13 PM, Skobbejakkals said:

I’ve got a Mecer unit that I bought at Incredible Connection. Who do I send it back to?

Incredible and they will need to deal with mecer who will deal with CNBM? unless otherwise stated by incredible that you deal directly with mecer?

On 2023/02/24 at 3:39 PM, trinomic said:

It worked as normal, just disturbing seeing it at 0% all the time 😆

I'm inclined to recommend putting a piece of tape over the display. But really Mecer/CNBM need a fix for this so that the display becomes useful.

I've been using my Lithium unit all day long, just now realised it was never plugged in. The battery percentage read 0% when I checked just now, not sure how long for, but it was still running. Just had my macbook and an external monitor plugged in, been running well over 9 hours now. What is the point of having a BMS with a battery charge level indicator if it doesn't even work?

Edited February 27, 20233 yr by bravs22

Bought this today (02/03/2023)... read this thread this evening.. hopefully I am not struck with the same fate as the rest of you here..

Will keep updated on this, also send this thread to the supplier (Computer Mania - Cavendish Square, CPT)

Edited March 6, 20233 yr by Poid

I was informed this morning by my contact at Mustek that they have a fix for the units that entails a (new?) PC board and software update.

2 hours ago, GreenMan said:

I was informed this morning by my contact at Mustek that they have a fix for the units that entails a (new?) PC board and software update.

Ok so its a a manufacturing issue then. All fine if they manage to repair it, but how do we know that the batteries have not been already damaged by incorrect charging from the current boards? 

14 minutes ago, trinomic said:

Ok so its a a manufacturing issue then. All fine if they manage to repair it, but how do we know that the batteries have not been already damaged by incorrect charging from the current boards? 

Regardless of what various support people say, I am 99% sure there is no hardware damage or defect, just a charge monitoring & display issue in software. The fix may well be no more than to set new calibration coefficients in EEPROM via some hidden menu. (It would be great if an OEM rep would post the procedure here!) 

The underlying charge (and discharge) cutout is based on voltage regardless of displayed SoC. When it runs at "0%" this does not mean it's over-discharging the batteries. Conversely when it hits "100%" it has not necessarily finished charging. 

Unfortunately battery voltage isn't displayed anywhere. So you'll have to take my word for it unless you're willing to open your unit up and monitor it yourself. 

Edited March 3, 20233 yr by TTT

Ok but as far as we can all see the charging never stops, regardless of what percentage is displayed. For instance, the issue starts with it charging to 99%, but then it never stops charging once at 99% or less. 

21 minutes ago, trinomic said:

Ok but as far as we can all see the charging never stops, regardless of what percentage is displayed. For instance, the issue starts with it charging to 99%, but then it never stops charging once at 99% or less. 

Ignore the flashing indicator; if you monitor the power into the device you will see it does stop charging when it reaches charge termination voltage. 

This is probably why it stalls showing < 100% on the display in the first place: the battery reaches "full" and stops taking charge. Now the charge integrator no longer sees current flow, so it just stops incrementing, regardless of the % it counted to. 

In your laptop, at this point the SoC display would jump to 100% and you'd not notice it skipped a % or 5. Such a simple fix...

 

Edited March 3, 20233 yr by TTT

42 minutes ago, TTT said:

Regardless of what various support people say, I am 99% sure there is no hardware damage or defect, just a charge monitoring & display issue in software. The fix may well be no more than to set new calibration coefficients in EEPROM via some hidden menu. (It would be great if an OEM rep would post the procedure here!) 

I think this is likely. But put yourself in the shoes of the average buyer - that buyer will not have a lot of technical skills.

You buy this box to back up your essentials, and you just see the charge declining all the time. It's not unreasonable to be worried. Even if you can say to yourself "it's just a firmware glitch", you still don't reliably know how much charge you have in the batteries.

Not that there is much you can do about SOC anyway.

Did I mention the option of just putting a piece of tape over the display? Since you can't rely on that display, and since there is nothing you can do about SOC anyway, one might take the view that you shouldn't lose sleep over things you have no control over.

Edited March 3, 20233 yr by Bobster.
grammar & punctuation.

No issues sofar on my end... time will tell.
That said.. anyone added solar to one of these yet ?

Does anyone knwo this guy or were contacted by him re Kool Energy device?

 

 

I purchased an AJ solar 540W panel from Rubicon in December.  Cost R5 800 for cable, fasteners, connectors and panel.

I've got an off grid circuit that supplies all essential electrical items with my Mecer 1.2kw trolley.  The battery is fully charged at about 1pm from the panel, and discharges to about 20% overnight, so it works pretty well.