Hi Everyone

I am new to this forum and do not know if this was discussed before, but I need some suggestions.

I have a luxpower sna 5000 inverter which I would like to share the load between solar and grid during the day and every now and again it trips my prepaid meter when adding grid to the solar supply(Some backfeed happening). My municipality wants to charge me 10K+ for a bi directional unit which does not make sense as I do not want to send power back to the grid. I went and bought a ct clamp(which I only found out afterwards that my model cannot accommodate), so this is also not an option.

If anyone has some suggestions or solutions I would appreciate it. I really do not want to spend the money for a new unit and currently I do not save on my electricity bill as my intention was in the beginning of this solar journey 🙂 

Edited July 17, 20232 yr by AJR

what do you see on the maintenance screen for this setting:

5 minutes ago, mzezman said:

what do you see on the maintenance screen for this setting:

Exactly the same as your screenshot, I just have to keep the "take load jointly" on disable because when mine are on enable, it trips the prepaid meter.

Yeah you shouldn't have to et a bidirectional meter - especially if you don't intend to back feed. Is your conlog the one that needs to be plugged in or the one that uses a battery for the CIU?

3 minutes ago, mzezman said:

Yeah you shouldn't have to et a bidirectional meter - especially if you don't intend to back feed. Is your conlog the one that needs to be plugged in or the one that uses a battery for the CIU?

It's the unit that's directly connected to the main power feed. Does not plug into a wall socket as many of the other units.

3 minutes ago, AJR said:

It's the unit that's directly connected to the main power feed. Does not plug into a wall socket as many of the other units.

oh ok and the unit you use to recharge uses batteries i assume?

I'll dig around and double check that there isn't a setting you need to change 

Hi did you come right with your problem? I am having the same issue. Any help would be appreciated. Thanks

5 hours ago, Chris Stapies said:

Hi did you come right with your problem? I am having the same issue. Any help would be appreciated. Thanks

Hi Chris

Still digging, there is just no support from luxpower. So I am looking for advice from installers.

Will let you know if I find any solution to this problem.

Hi All,

Had the same issue, Conlog IP54 (the one that runs on batteries) and Luxpower SNA5000.

What fixed it for me was the installers setting the export wattage value to minus 100 watts, we tried -10, -40 etc but the only time it stopped tripping was when we set it to - 100.

Basically telling the inverter to always pull 100 watts from the grid.

The Conlog meter (in the street box) is very sensitive to back feeding into the grid so it trips the relay, even with export set to off, a few watts is all it takes to trip it apparently.

Only disadvantage now is you are permanently pulling 100 Watts from the grid even if everything in the house is off, but its better than it tripping every minute.

On 2023/07/17 at 2:32 PM, AJR said:

Hi Everyone

I am new to this forum and do not know if this was discussed before, but I need some suggestions.

I have a luxpower sna 5000 inverter which I would like to share the load between solar and grid during the day and every now and again it trips my prepaid meter when adding grid to the solar supply(Some backfeed happening). My municipality wants to charge me 10K+ for a bi directional unit which does not make sense as I do not want to send power back to the grid. I went and bought a ct clamp(which I only found out afterwards that my model cannot accommodate), so this is also not an option.

If anyone has some suggestions or solutions I would appreciate it. I really do not want to spend the money for a new unit and currently I do not save on my electricity bill as my intention was in the beginning of this solar journey 🙂 

What error message do you see on the Conlog when the power trips. I have the same issue I logged it with Conlog and the sent me this:

 

Switch it off and try bridging Neutral and Earth on the output of the inverter. Let me know if it fixes the problem.

I had the problem 2 years ago and fixed it contacting STSS who provide electricity maintenance in our complex. They sent me a letter authorising Conlog to issue me with reverse tokens, which i sent to Conlog and they gave me tokens to allow for that meter to not trip when my systems feeds back that little. Even though the inverter is set to not feed back, it will send a little, even 1watt causes frequency distortion and thats what causes the tripping.

Good day all. I also have the same problem with this same prepaid meter tripping... Any advice please will be appreciate. Wessel 0828216958 

On 2023/08/24 at 4:08 PM, RTG said:

What fixed it for me was the installers setting the export wattage value to minus 100 watts, we tried -10, -40 etc but the only time it stopped tripping was when we set it to - 100.

Please clarify, is this a setting in the prepaid meter or is it a setting on the LuxPower inverter? I have a similar problem but don't seem to have that setting on the inverter and don't know if the prepaid meter has such a setting.

hello all, I hope someone can assist with a similar issue - it just started a week ago. About four month after I moved to pre paid from post paid and JHB City Power installed a "Hexing meter". The strange thing is that it trips and restart only between 02h00 and 05h00, not during the day. I reported to JHB CP and still awaiting for the call out. I have now switch totally to inverter power to avoid the frustration of the tripping. I also have a LUX 5000 sna and the same settings as above. Hope someone has a solution - TIA.

10 hours ago, chubs said:

hello all, I hope someone can assist with a similar issue - it just started a week ago. About four month after I moved to pre paid from post paid and JHB City Power installed a "Hexing meter". The strange thing is that it trips and restart only between 02h00 and 05h00, not during the day. I reported to JHB CP and still awaiting for the call out. I have now switch totally to inverter power to avoid the frustration of the tripping. I also have a LUX 5000 sna and the same settings as above. Hope someone has a solution - TIA.

The trip is most likely being caused by your inverter trying to feed back into the grid. In most cases (in my experience), the meter will tolerate a low feed back current (say 0.5 A) - though it may also record this as energy used by you. The tripping is a mechanism built into them lest somebody try to run the meter backwards. 

It's most likely a default setting on your inverter that needs changing. Check with the installer as he has likely seen this before. 

The time window is very specific. Does your inverter have time based rules?

11 hours ago, chubs said:

hello all, I hope someone can assist with a similar issue - it just started a week ago. About four month after I moved to pre paid from post paid and JHB City Power installed a "Hexing meter". The strange thing is that it trips and restart only between 02h00 and 05h00, not during the day. I reported to JHB CP and still awaiting for the call out. I have now switch totally to inverter power to avoid the frustration of the tripping. I also have a LUX 5000 sna and the same settings as above. Hope someone has a solution - TIA.

Unrelated to what you're relating here, but important. There is an update that needs to be done on all pre-paid meters  before Nov 24. This is to do with the TID (Token identifier) software that these meters use. If the update is not performed then from 24th your meter will not accept new tokens. It is possible that City Power performed the update, but make sure.

When you buy, the receipt that you have should have lots of infortmation, including the Key Revision Number or KRN. Look for that. If you have KRN = 2 then the meter does not need upgrading, if you have KRN = 1 then go to City Power and take the meter number (the number you use to buy tokens). Don't take any hardware.

On 2024/05/15 at 9:36 PM, Pasipamire said:

I had the problem 2 years ago and fixed it contacting STSS who provide electricity maintenance in our complex. They sent me a letter authorising Conlog to issue me with reverse tokens, which i sent to Conlog and they gave me tokens to allow for that meter to not trip when my systems feeds back that little. Even though the inverter is set to not feed back, it will send a little, even 1watt causes frequency distortion and thats what causes the tripping.