Hi everyone,

Inverter: SunSynk 8kW
Battery: Solar MD 14.3kWh

Hoping someone can guide me in the right direction. A company assisted us with a solar installation about a year ago, they did a fantastic job but I can't seem to get hold of them currently so I suspect they might have closed down.

They did wire up my small-ish generator when they did the installation. I honestly can't remember if we tested it back then but yesterday was the first time we ran into the scenario where eskom was off most of the day, and I needed to charge the batteries using my generator. After starting up the generator it seemed that the batteries were not being charged.

I believe the wiring is set up correctly so probably just a configuration issue. Should the setting under "Battery Setup" > "Batt charge" tab > "Gen Charge" be checked for this to work correctly and is there perhaps anything else I need to configure? My knowledge anything electrical is extremely limited so any guidance would be appreciated.

Depends on the connectivity,is the generator wired in to Aux or a Changeover and thus through your inverter's Grid input (as if it's Grid)?

Edited April 4, 20231 yr by PsyWulf

@PsyWulf Thanks for asking, I believe it's wired to Aux.

I don't have a changeover switch where I can flip the Inverter's input between eskom\generator.

Are you using the 'use timer' function as well, where you can set the SoC based on the time of the day etc

A transfer switch of sort is a must.

And forget about charging at 40a. Determine the max amps your gennie puts out and charge at 1/2 of that. My 6kw gennie battles to do 13a. Your rig needs a lot of amps for charging. I don’t know if you can set it up for charging batteries from a gennie.

Otherwise it will just trip on overload.  I don’t know if the gennie can be allocated just for charging - seems pointless to me. It must be able to supply your house as well. Then you can carry on when the inverter is down.

I also have a 8kw Synsynk with a seperate generator. But I only set it up to run my house. If one is really serious about this you probably need a 16kw generator.
 

Edited April 4, 20231 yr by Johandup

45 minutes ago, StefanZA said:

@PsyWulf Thanks for asking, I believe it's wired to Aux.

I don't have a changeover switch where I can flip the Inverter's input between eskom\generator.

Alright,if Aux you do need to enable the Gen Charge yes

 

You also need to set the System Mode (Time of Use) to use the Generator and limit it to X watts ( 75% of Generator max),this should feed your load and charge your batteries

And make sure Aux is on Gen Input

https://www.manualslib.com/manual/2057769/Sunsynk-Hybrid-Parity.html?page=46

 

(Also confirm the SOC on/off Voltages are set to the range you want the generator to be charging them at as it will override anything else)

(Also limit the Batt Charge to a sensible Max amps your generator could generate)

Edited April 4, 20231 yr by PsyWulf

1 hour ago, abd7 said:

Are you using the 'use timer' function as well, where you can set the SoC based on the time of the day etc

Hi, Yes I'm using that and I've checked the "GEN" checkboxes on those ("GRID" was already checked).

 

1 hour ago, Johandup said:

A transfer switch of sort is a must.

And forget about charging at 40a. Determine the max amps your gennie puts out and charge at 1/2 of that. My 6kw gennie battles to do 13a. Your rig needs a lot of amps for charging. I don’t know if you can set it up for charging batteries from a gennie.

Otherwise it will just trip on overload.  I don’t know if the gennie can be allocated just for charging - seems pointless to me. It must be able to supply your house as well. Then you can carry on when the inverter is down.

I also have a 8kw Synsynk with a seperate generator. But I only set it up to run my house. If one is really serious about this you probably need a 16kw generator.
 

Thanks! I'll read up a bit on my specific generator's model to determine the amps. When eskom is offline we do switch off everything which draws significant power (geyser, stove, aircons, etc). So basically just keeping the fridges, some led lights and TV on at that stage. I'm sure my generator should be able to handle that + hopefully charge the batteries a little bit.

 

53 minutes ago, PsyWulf said:

Alright,if Aux you do need to enable the Gen Charge yes

You also need to set the System Mode (Time of Use) to use the Generator and limit it to X watts ( 75% of Generator max),this should feed your load and charge your batteries

And make sure Aux is on Gen Input

https://www.manualslib.com/manual/2057769/Sunsynk-Hybrid-Parity.html?page=46

(Also confirm the SOC on/off Voltages are set to the range you want the generator to be charging them at as it will override anything else)

(Also limit the Batt Charge to a sensible Max amps your generator could generate)

Awesome, thanks for the videos + info. Lots of information which I'm not familiar with but this helped a lot, will read up a bit more. Thanks everyone!

8 hours ago, StefanZA said:

Hi everyone,

Inverter: SunSynk 8kW
Battery: Solar MD 14.3kWh

Hoping someone can guide me in the right direction. A company assisted us with a solar installation about a year ago, they did a fantastic job but I can't seem to get hold of them currently so I suspect they might have closed down.

They did wire up my small-ish generator when they did the installation. I honestly can't remember if we tested it back then but yesterday was the first time we ran into the scenario where eskom was off most of the day, and I needed to charge the batteries using my generator. After starting up the generator it seemed that the batteries were not being charged.

I believe the wiring is set up correctly so probably just a configuration issue. Should the setting under "Battery Setup" > "Batt charge" tab > "Gen Charge" be checked for this to work correctly and is there perhaps anything else I need to configure? My knowledge anything electrical is extremely limited so any guidance would be appreciated.

Enable the "Gen Charge" with a tick, like "Grid Charge" is ticked.

You will then notice the left hand "Amps" 40A is no longer greyed out. Change this down to 10A, or your generator might complain if there are high house loads.

10A = about 500W charging the battery, 40A = about 2000W into the battery. Note with Lithium batteries, calculation between 48V to 53V, therefore use 50V for calculation.

If you push the battery charging to hard, the inverter will disengage now and again, as fridges and freezers switch on/off, and the generator battles to maintain a good frequency. If this happens too often (annoys you) drop the Amps a little lower.

@ScanlanGP Posted this some time ago, is a pretty good step by step on how he got his generator to work 

 

Finally got the generator to work properly.

Hopefully this will help some else. 

Here is what I had to do

1. Connect the generator to the AUX port

2. Connect the AUX port earth to the earth on the GRID port. I do not have the generator connected to a earth spike. 

3. Connect earth and neutral together on the generator 

4. On AUX menu, tick Gen Input and tick Gen peak shaving and set the shaving value to 80% of your generator capacity. Then set Gen Load OFF to 95% and Gen Load ON to 80% (choose your own values that work for you) 

5. On System menu, work mode 2, tick Zero Export, AND Limit to load. My generator would disconnect if Limit to load was not ticked. 

6. On System menu, work mode 1, make sure the SOC for the time slot you are running your generator in, is set to 100% and tick GEN box to charge from generator. 

7. On Battery menu, make sure the Charge Amps on Batt Type is the same as the Amps in the first block on the second screen Batt Charge. Also important is to make sure the charge amps is not set too high. Consider the power drawn from the generator to charge the batteries PLUS the power required to run the load and inverter. 

8. Tick Gen Charge, Gen Signal and Signal Island mode on Battery menu under Batt charge. 

My setup is so much easier with a transfer switch from the mains to the generator. I have a choice on where to send the generator output then. 
If I need to charge the batteries from generator (= very expensive) I'll need to reduce the battery charging amps. 
I've changed my Sunsynk setup to grid charge the batteries to 99% soc at 17h00 (dependant on usage and cloud cover - it also helps to use eskom and not batteries with evening meal preparation). Also to 30% soc at 02h00. Got rid of nuisance trips when the family is visiting. It uses about 3kwh per night. I must admit that I'll miss eskom when they go on stop. 
QED

You need to tune your generator frequency to be at 50 hertz. Otherwise your inverter is picking up higher frequency from generator than the inverter range