September 10, 20232 yr Good day I have a Kodak OG-7.2 with a Akkutech 5kWh battery and 6x 550W CS panels that is about to be switched on. I did the installation myself, but I'm not going to throw the switch without the supplier as wingman. I was impressed that Kodak offered WiFi connectivity out of the box, but now that I want to install the app (WatchPower), I see the app ratings, and they're a disaster. Almost nobody has anything positive to say about it, and crucially, it sucks at keeping statistics. My system should be 100% self-sufficient, but living with solar is a learning curve, and without stats, the curve is so much steeper. So, my question: Is there any third-party interface and monitoring system that I can plug into the inverter? Enapter's ENP-RS232-MPP module is one of the recommendations I see on the Web, but the app has a handful of reviews, and they don't inspire confidence either. I see one or two suggestions for Phocoslink and Dessmonitor too. Unpaid is preferable to paid, but if push comes to shove I'm willing to pay to avoid fiddling and programming.
September 11, 20232 yr Author I'm now talking to Solar Assist (https://solar-assistant.io/). It's a paid solution, but ja, as long as it works I'm willing to pay. Is this a good solution?
September 11, 20232 yr I'm now talking to Solar Assist (https://solar-assistant.io/). It's a paid solution, but ja, as long as it works I'm willing to pay. Is this a good solution? You'll find much of the forum is using it
September 11, 20232 yr Depending on how much time you want to spend setting stuff up, I plan to use: https://github.com/ned-kelly/docker-voltronic-homeassistant More info: https://community.home-assistant.io/t/programmatically-read-data-from-your-solar-inverter-voltronic-axpert-mppsolar-pip-voltacon-effekta-etc-and-interface-with-home-assistant-via-mqtt-works-with-rs232-usb/119053 I have HomeAssistantOS set up on a RaspberryPi4, and use it for a lot of my data logging (temperature, humidity, Renogy 12V battery, and soon Kodak 7.2OG). If you are not familiar, you can also set Home Assistant up on almost any PC, but does require a little bit of technical knowledge (using your command-line). The reason I have not got it set up yet for the Kodak is my inverter has gone back to Segen for repairs, and the backup inverter I was given does not have WiFi.
September 11, 20232 yr Author Thanks guys. Shaun, I loved fiddling and developing and blowing things up, but now I'm very simply out of time, which is why I'd now rather pay than fiddle. But thanks for the info.
September 25, 20232 yr Author I ended up pulling the trigger on Solar Assistant. What a pleasure this is! Compared to WatchPower, well, there's no comparison. I can see each time my fridge switches on, or the percolator is running. Magic stuff. Edited September 25, 20232 yr by tigger_na Spelling
September 28, 20232 yr Just started with Solar Assistant. The best thing for monitoring and making changes on the fly. still learning, but made such a difference in figuring out what is what
October 23, 20232 yr 3 hours ago, chrisc said: Its only for a Raspberry Pi. Is there an app for an iPhone? The app runs on a pi that connects to your inverter. You can access the web browser based portal either locally on your internal network or via the internet using a phone, laptop etc, if you so choose. I suggest reading up on the site and looking at the videos on YouTube to understand it better
October 24, 20232 yr On 2023/09/25 at 8:27 PM, tigger_na said: I ended up pulling the trigger on Solar Assistant. What a pleasure this is! Compared to WatchPower, well, there's no comparison. I can see each time my fridge switches on, or the percolator is running. Magic stuff. Morning! Few months of using Solar Assistant. Still happy? Can you please tell me a bit about your installation? What Pi model do you use? Where do you plug it in, on the inverter? Was there any hick-up's? OH! and do you use the state of charge from the batteries to control the inverter? (this is my main motivator). Can't do this with watchpower
December 8, 20232 yr Morning peoples Yesterday i did some digging and found out that Voltronic (the manufacturers of rebranded inverters like Mecer, Kodak, RCT and more) released an upgrade to WatchPower/SolarPower named Energy-Mate. Voltronic Power News. Available on Google Store. It is still buggy (spelling errors etc.), but it is MUCH better with usable graphs. It uses the same login details as WatchPower so your whole history is retained. You don't have intelligent DB control, but you can manage inverter settings and have decent feedback Edited December 8, 20232 yr by GerritW74
December 9, 20232 yr 22 hours ago, GerritW74 said: Morning peoples Yesterday i did some digging and found out that Voltronic (the manufacturers of rebranded inverters like Mecer, Kodak, RCT and more) released an upgrade to WatchPower/SolarPower named Energy-Mate. Voltronic Power News. Available on Google Store. It is still buggy (spelling errors etc.), but it is MUCH better with usable graphs. It uses the same login details as WatchPower so your whole history is retained. You don't have intelligent DB control, but you can manage inverter settings and have decent feedback howzit. very interesting. damn shame my inverter does not have a wifi module... only reading mine on RS232 and watchpower at the moment 😞 hopefully they will integrate this with it in the future... or I just need to get Solar Assistant
December 13, 20232 yr I built my own system with Home Assistant. Raspberry Pi connected to inverter, polls data and forwards that via MQTT to MQTT Broker. I then ingest that inside Node-Red (Running on Home Assistant) and then have some logic sub flows to do things, such as switch back to grid mode if battery is at/below x% If the geyser is on, and the battery is at x%, which the geyser off etc. I also have all the data points shipped off to InfluxDB and then use Grafana to setup dashboards for analysing all the data over a time frame. Oh and it's accessible from anywhere in the world the Home Assistance instance. And for a massive cost of R0.00 per month
December 13, 20232 yr 17 minutes ago, grant.cpt said: cost of R0.00 per month Open source an R0 is always the best 🥰
June 30, 20242 yr On 2023/12/08 at 7:41 AM, GerritW74 said: Morning peoples Yesterday i did some digging and found out that Voltronic (the manufacturers of rebranded inverters like Mecer, Kodak, RCT and more) released an upgrade to WatchPower/SolarPower named Energy-Mate. Voltronic Power News. Available on Google Store. It is still buggy (spelling errors etc.), but it is MUCH better with usable graphs. It uses the same login details as WatchPower so your whole history is retained. You don't have intelligent DB control, but you can manage inverter settings and have decent feedback I tried it today with an Axpert Max-ii 8kW and Pylontech Batteries. I was not really impressed. The feedback per day/month/year is better, but the main screen is not as clear as the old WatchPower. I find the new graphics too cluttered. The old one shows you the SOC at a glance.The new version will show voltage and SOC together in a little crammed window. I basically still prefer the old WatchPower over the new one.
October 12, 20241 yr My personal opinion (running kodak inverter and batteries),+ i had a spare raspberryPi around. Is that solar assistant was well worth the money. Everything is well documented and had zero issues getting it going. As a open source user it was difficult paying for software but well worth it.
December 18, 20241 yr hello smtp account andthe process was completed but what can iadd in this field please
January 1, 20251 yr Is there a trick to get Energy-Mate working on an iPhone? Loaded the app Created an account Added the W0026508559611 which is the number the Kodak inverter has for its SSID (standing next to the inverter) The message then states "Datalog disconnected" Did I skip a step perhaps?
January 1, 20251 yr 3 hours ago, chrisc said: Is there a trick to get Energy-Mate working on an iPhone? Loaded the app Created an account Added the W0026508559611 which is the number the Kodak inverter has for its SSID (standing next to the inverter) The message then states "Datalog disconnected" Did I skip a step perhaps? 1. Ensure you have iOS 9.0 and above on your iphone. 2. The PN number is a 14-digit number located at the bottom side of the inverter. Edited January 1, 20251 yr by TaliaB
January 2, 20251 yr The phone is an iPhone 14 and is using iOS 18.0.1 The PN number is that quoted above. It is on the sticker and is the same as the inverter's wifi SSID
January 5, 20251 yr Segen Solar said the inverter must be connected to the internet. How is this achieved please? Been going round in circles for months
January 8, 20251 yr On 2025/01/05 at 3:19 PM, chrisc said: Segen Solar said the inverter must be connected to the internet. How is this achieved please? Been going round in circles for months If I remember correctly from setting up Watchpower, first you connect to the inverter with the app, set the correct WiFi credentials so the inverter can connect to the internet, then it will work. It's incredibly buggy and I remember it taking multiple tries and two different phones to get it to work
January 19, 20251 yr After more than a year fiddling about with an iPhone and different apps, its time to give up Is there a tutorial to show how to use a Raspberry Pi to do the monitoring? Thank you
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