I am new to this forum and I have some electronic background but find myself on unfamiliar ground here. I had a system installed in my home about a year ago consisting of nine solar panels, 5 KVA inverter and a battery bank of 200Ah. As I have come to understand is that the inverter used is a generic inverter from Voltronic sold under the Mecer name in South Africa. I have programmed the inverter to best suit my needs and my electricity bill was cut by 50%. I have since removed my sun-geyser, aircon, stove from the system as they consume too much power and now everything is working well most of the time. I have a few questions regarding the inverter as this was not explained to me by the company that installed the system.

1. When the inverter overloads, the alarms start beeping and will keep on beeping even if the load is removed. How do you kill the alarms and how do you manually reset the inverter?

2. Is it normal for the overload alarm to trigger if the inverter is on bypass - ie the load connected to the utility?

3. I have connected the inverter to my pc with the watchpower software via the RS232 port. I see there is also a USB port as used on some printers - what is the purpose of this port?

I would appreciate some comments on these issues. 

4. I saw very nice monitoring software from Solarmon on the internet. I understand this is no longer available. Does anybody maybe have a copy of this software?

Edited December 12, 20187 yr by Benji

12 hours ago, Benji said:

Does anybody maybe have a copy of this software?

Piracy mmm .... only joking. 

I don't think it would be a problem to just give it out ... 

Edmund wrote Solarmon. We then joined forced and created SolWEB together, small Windows reader and web interface.

SolWEB ran for quite a while, but was never marketed.

In the end both packages was canned because all the parties involved with development and testing ... are now using Victron ESS.

People who may still have a compiled version, off the top of my head are:

@Mark or @PaulF007 or maybe even @edmundp if he is still around.

Like I said, I don't think it will be a problem to dish it out ... I don't have a copy, only the source code, as the install was quite cool, it included the small MS SQL DB.

... there is NO support whatsoever. ;-)

 

 

9 minutes ago, The Terrible Triplett said:

In the end both packages was canned because all the parties involved with development and testing ... are now using Victron ESS.

Do you remember the software wars?

I was working on an open platform at the time called "blue lantern"... and then I dropped it and also moved to Venus :-)

2 minutes ago, plonkster said:

Do you remember the software wars?

Jip, I do. :-) 

Was a storm in a teacup. Had some fun though, in the "debates" raging all over, the attempt at ridiculous legal threats. :-) 

 

Must say, since I move over to VenusGX ... I have not looked back once ... CoCT forcing my hand. 

Hybrids just works so much easier. Plug and forget, and the savings on Eskom is near instant, every watt that the panels can give fro the first moment in the mornings, till last moment at night, goes into the home. Pennies make the pounds they say.

 

Genade , this feels like ages ago , I had to go and dig deep to find some some of the files. 
As said by TTT no support and I dont even know if any of these two files actually works. But here you go.

Here is the Two Links :

AICC 1

AICC _ Debug

If , and that is a big if , I remember correctly you just run the .EXE  file and then do the config in the Application. - Good luck !

So I wonder... now that there is a new version out, and it costs a bit more... why not open source the old one? :-P

I'm an old open source guy... I think as much as possible should be open and only the really business-critical stuff should be closed :-) You can still charge money for it, because there are always less-skilled people willing to pay you for your efforts and time :-)

33 minutes ago, plonkster said:

So I wonder... now that there is a new version out, and it costs a bit more... why not open source the old one?

Are you asking for the ICC, Solarmon or SolWEB code?

37 minutes ago, The Terrible Triplett said:

Are you asking for the ICC, Solarmon or SolWEB code?

No I am wondering about ICC. I noticed there is a new version of it out, and that it costs quite a bit more than I remember the old one costing (60USD now).

But I actually know what the answer is... because sometimes a new version means a new code base... and sometimes it's more of a ceremonial thing (eg Linux kernel 4.x wasn't substantially different from 3.x).

On another note, I still find it sad that after all this time and with all these inverters installed everywhere (like weeds growing in the cracks of my paving!)... there is still no open source product for it. Meanwhile on our end of the pond, 90%+ of the software is open :-)

48 minutes ago, plonkster said:

No I am wondering ...

You do know that you are standing on a ledge, and it is razor sharp ... the previous "war" all but forgotten ... 

 

50 minutes ago, plonkster said:

... there is still no open source product for it.

I can perfectly understand it.

The developers that can are not that interested to give their time for free, the few that can and want to, needs to put food on the table.

On "our end of the pond" Victron is paying for the full time development taking place AND then gives 90%+ of that out as opensource.

Hold on ... Victron adds their full time developer costs onto their baseline prices of all their products to pay for the full time development. :-) 

Fact that they give so much out as opensource, is seriously commendable.

 

My story was that I started it for Morningstar, BMV's, Victron MPPT's and to read Victron inverters, Phoenix in particular, as I had a very unique setup.
Then we added Goodwe and Zonhan.
Voltronic obviously came over from Solarmon.
Having a device independent reader, with data on the web, it made sense.
And sell it via Powerforum Store ... to help support the forum costs, with exclusive forum prices for forumites, the forum becoming the support channel.

 

Unbeknownst to me at the time we followed the same idea as Victron (VGX), small local reader (Windows based), send the data to the web. Actually, now that I think of it, most of the main manufactures are doing that. Makes it so much simpler, one central point to focus on, versus decentralized = less support.

At the time a lot of worries was about cost of data, cost of the software ... hindsight, should have ignored all that. Anyone who pays good money for a solar system, then wants software to control it to the n'th degree, wants their data easily accessible from anywhere, who then complains about a few cents extra for data sending / hosting, the once off cost of a i.e. small cheap tablet ... or ICC, once off $60 (R861.46) for software ... 

When Edmund went all out Victron (I helped him with all the parts and helped him sell his entire system to another forumite who just started out, who now is also Victron) ... we saw VenuxGX ... ESS ... so when the penny dropped that this is heading towards me supporting software for a product that I don't and never will use i.e Voltronic, having sold my Morningstar by then with all reservations above and / or the +-R1k per annum per reader that ensures our continued interest, I decided to walk away.

 

But @plonkster, you gave me an idea.

Let me put a challenge out there, for the open source guys!
If anyone wants to talk to me to take SolWEB over, finish it / improve it, make it open source or whatever ...  drop me a PM.
Note the reader is Windows based. Take the reader logic and make it work on a RPi ... or keep in table / Windows based.
Data and logic in MS SQL ... move that over to MySQL?
Then dish it out for free ... generic Windows device reader / RPi that sends data to a web server where all the processing happens.
Send data from the SQL DB direct to users Emon / PVOutput. 
Or use the reader without SQL, send data to Emon / PVOutput only.

Reader has Axpert controls in, to switch the inverter based on SOC and / or set times, SOC always the catchall.
Maybe add Victron's opensource code, merge it with SolWEB, for the non-VGX / ESS users out there.

 

Any takers to take it and make it Open Source?
All I would want in return, if it stays free opensource, credits to who started it.
Or if someone wants to make it into a commercial venture ... lets have a chat.

6 hours ago, plonkster said:

No I am wondering about ICC. I noticed there is a new version of it out, and that it costs quite a bit more than I remember the old one costing (60USD now).

But I actually know what the answer is... because sometimes a new version means a new code base... and sometimes it's more of a ceremonial thing (eg Linux kernel 4.x wasn't substantially different from 3.x).

On another note, I still find it sad that after all this time and with all these inverters installed everywhere (like weeds growing in the cracks of my paving!)... there is still no open source product for it. Meanwhile on our end of the pond, 90%+ of the software is open 🙂

I think it is not necessary an open source in this kind of products because it is easy to find the RS232 or RS485 protocol and do whatever you want. Actually, I didn´t know what ICC was...

6 hours ago, The Terrible Triplett said:

The developers that can are not that interested to give their time for free, the few that can and want to, needs to put food on the table.

I'm not really thinking of any particular one person (or small team) giving up their time for free. A lot of open source relies simply on scratching an itch. I write something and I stick it up on github. Someone else forks it and improves it (and maybe sends back a pull request, so I can merge his changes into my repo). And so it continues and the project eventually becomes more featureful without any person really spending any more time than that which is required to scratch his own personal itch.

Perhaps the issue is simply that there isn't yet enough of an overlap between experienced developers and solar enthusiasts. Which is why someone like myself scratches an itch hoping that someone else will fork it and fix the little idiosyncrasies... and it doesn't happen because you kinda need to know a lot about the lay of the land.

So yes... I concede. Maybe this is still too specialised to really be open source.

I agree, somebody had a post of a website on this forum listing a site that allow you to build your own software or dashboard as they call it. He showed a picture but did not share what he has done sofar. I had a go at it but it seems my head is too flat. If I remember correctly  its Emoncms 

1 hour ago, Benji said:

If I remember correctly  its Emoncms

Correct. It is open source and written in PHP. You can install it on any Linux machine (and with lots of effort on Windows too). I believe there are also docker images for it (if you know how to work with docker).

You still need a bit of data-collection code that runs on a computer somewhere that takes the data from your inverter/solar chargers and sends it TO emoncms. Emon is merely a platform for graphing energy data (a bit like graphite or grafana+influxdb, or rrdb even).

On 2018/12/14 at 10:53 AM, The Terrible Triplett said:

You do know that you are standing on a ledge, and it is razor sharp ... the previous "war" all but forgotten ... 

 

I can perfectly understand it.

The developers that can are not that interested to give their time for free, the few that can and want to, needs to put food on the table.

On "our end of the pond" Victron is paying for the full time development taking place AND then gives 90%+ of that out as opensource.

Hold on ... Victron adds their full time developer costs onto their baseline prices of all their products to pay for the full time development. 🙂

Fact that they give so much out as opensource, is seriously commendable.

 

My story was that I started it for Morningstar, BMV's, Victron MPPT's and to read Victron inverters, Phoenix in particular, as I had a very unique setup.
Then we added Goodwe and Zonhan.
Voltronic obviously came over from Solarmon.
Having a device independent reader, with data on the web, it made sense.
And sell it via Powerforum Store ... to help support the forum costs, with exclusive forum prices for forumites, the forum becoming the support channel.

 

Unbeknownst to me at the time we followed the same idea as Victron (VGX), small local reader (Windows based), send the data to the web. Actually, now that I think of it, most of the main manufactures are doing that. Makes it so much simpler, one central point to focus on, versus decentralized = less support.

At the time a lot of worries was about cost of data, cost of the software ... hindsight, should have ignored all that. Anyone who pays good money for a solar system, then wants software to control it to the n'th degree, wants their data easily accessible from anywhere, who then complains about a few cents extra for data sending / hosting, the once off cost of a i.e. small cheap tablet ... or ICC, once off $60 (R861.46) for software ... 

When Edmund went all out Victron (I helped him with all the parts and helped him sell his entire system to another forumite who just started out, who now is also Victron) ... we saw VenuxGX ... ESS ... so when the penny dropped that this is heading towards me supporting software for a product that I don't and never will use i.e Voltronic, having sold my Morningstar by then with all reservations above and / or the +-R1k per annum per reader that ensures our continued interest, I decided to walk away.

 

But @plonkster, you gave me an idea.

Let me put a challenge out there, for the open source guys!
If anyone wants to talk to me to take SolWEB over, finish it / improve it, make it open source or whatever ...  drop me a PM.
Note the reader is Windows based. Take the reader logic and make it work on a RPi ... or keep in table / Windows based.
Data and logic in MS SQL ... move that over to MySQL?
Then dish it out for free ... generic Windows device reader / RPi that sends data to a web server where all the processing happens.
Send data from the SQL DB direct to users Emon / PVOutput. 
Or use the reader without SQL, send data to Emon / PVOutput only.

Reader has Axpert controls in, to switch the inverter based on SOC and / or set times, SOC always the catchall.
Maybe add Victron's opensource code, merge it with SolWEB, for the non-VGX / ESS users out there.

 

Any takers to take it and make it Open Source?
All I would want in return, if it stays free opensource, credits to who started it.
Or if someone wants to make it into a commercial venture ... lets have a chat.

I have sent you a PM

On 2018/12/14 at 5:17 PM, plonkster said:

I'm not really thinking of any particular one person (or small team) giving up their time for free. A lot of open source relies simply on scratching an itch. I write something and I stick it up on github. Someone else forks it and improves it (and maybe sends back a pull request, so I can merge his changes into my repo). And so it continues and the project eventually becomes more featureful without any person really spending any more time than that which is required to scratch his own personal itch.

Perhaps the issue is simply that there isn't yet enough of an overlap between experienced developers and solar enthusiasts. Which is why someone like myself scratches an itch hoping that someone else will fork it and fix the little idiosyncrasies... and it doesn't happen because you kinda need to know a lot about the lay of the land.

So yes... I concede. Maybe this is still too specialised to really be open source.

Agreed.

And sometimes those open source apps attract a lot of attention and the devs make money through custom work, or donations, or support, etc.

If I had any Victron stuff, I could have used your app, and perhaps improve it where I can