Had this inverter for 3 years.  There are 3 Shoto 5.1kWH batteries and a total of 8 PV panels.  6 are connected to PV-1 and 2 to PV-2

Some peculiar (to me) anomalies are:

01 - Sbu - no problem there

16 - CSO.  The program states that this option will first use solar to charge the battery, and in the absence, will use utility.  I would expect this to occur at night, but it does not.  The batteries just discharge

There are status lights next to the display

1 is never on (load supplied by utility)

2 is on when the sun is shining (load supplied by PV)

3 comes on now and then (load supplied by battery)

4 (AC on).  This always flashes

5 (charge)   Comes on during the day

 

Now the PV inputs

On a sunny day, I can see 1.3kW coming into PV-1

On PV-2, there are 2 x 330 watt panel in series, facing north.  At about 12h00 the inverter reports 21 watts from these panels.  I would have expected at least 100 - 150 watts. 

Should there rather be 4 panels in series here?  Is this the mistake?

 

Thank you

 

9 minutes ago, chrisc said:

Had this inverter for 3 years.  There are 3 Shoto 5.1kWH batteries and a total of 8 PV panels.  6 are connected to PV-1 and 2 to PV-2

Some peculiar (to me) anomalies are:

01 - Sbu - no problem there

16 - CSO.  The program states that this option will first use solar to charge the battery, and in the absence, will use utility.  I would expect this to occur at night, but it does not.  The batteries just discharge

There are status lights next to the display

1 is never on (load supplied by utility)

2 is on when the sun is shining (load supplied by PV)

3 comes on now and then (load supplied by battery)

4 (AC on).  This always flashes

5 (charge)   Comes on during the day

 

Now the PV inputs

On a sunny day, I can see 1.3kW coming into PV-1

On PV-2, there are 2 x 330 watt panel in series, facing north.  At about 12h00 the inverter reports 21 watts from these panels.  I would have expected at least 100 - 150 watts. 

Should there rather be 4 panels in series here?  Is this the mistake?

 

Thank you

 

Cannot say why CSO does not work as expected. Have you got the right settings in order to activate grid charge when no PV. 

Your MPPT2 should not even produce any power as 2 in series is very far below the level of starting it. 4 should be the minimum and then you will see it working.

As a quick test you can disconnect the current string on MPPT2 and connect the MPPT1 panels to it and then MPPT2 should generated as they are now doing on MPPT1. Revert back and fit those 2 extra panels. If all 8 panels are in the same direction and the same spec you could also use 4 panels per string to have 4 on each MPPT. This will however cause the PV to start a bit later in the day and stop earlier due to the lower voltage of a string of 4 vs the 6 presently. 

1 hour ago, chrisc said:

On PV-2, there are 2 x 330 watt panel in series, facing north.  At about 12h00 the inverter reports 21 watts from these panels.  I would have expected at least 100 - 150 watts. 

Should there rather be 4 panels in series here?  Is this the mistake?

 

Yes you are below the startup voltage of 80v. The 330w panels is normally Voc of 37v and Vmp of 31v so i would leave pv1 as is and add another 2 panels to pv2 then your vmp would be around 124v that should rectify your issue on pv2.

 

3 hours ago, Scorp007 said:

Cannot say why CSO does not work as expected. Have you got the right settings in order to activate grid charge when no PV.  

Is there another setting besides CSO on Charge Source options to switch on utility charging?

I also tried SNU which is Solar + Utility, but that made no difference.

Does the inverter need to be restarted when a programming alteration is made?

In my experience, the only way to get the grid (ACin) to charge the batteries is with the Output Source Priority set to `Utility first`: Setting 1 to `USB`

 

I always thought this a "bug", but the manual does mention Line vs Battery mode:

 

I very much dislike this, being off-grid, because, whenever I use a generator, the only option is "use generator or use batteries". And, the max charging current does not automatically adjust based on the load. So, very often my generator is overloaded because it is a 5kVA connected to 2x 7.2kW kodaks.

 

Hope this helps

Thanks for this information, first clear explanation I have read

I really wanted to use as little utility power as possible, hence having 3 batteries

There is another facility that I thought of.  I'll try it and see if the batteries SOC indicators alter at the end of the period

I chose 03 to 07 for this USB timer

 

 

Edited December 19, 20241 yr by chrisc

6 hours ago, chrisc said:

Is there another setting besides CSO on Charge Source options to switch on utility charging?

I also tried SNU which is Solar + Utility, but that made no difference.

Does the inverter need to be restarted when a programming alteration is made?

Just make sure you don't have a setting for Util under the charge types. The older Axpert did have 4 settings to use. Solar and Util I guess will only use Util if there is no PV coming in. 

Done today - moved 2 panels to connect in series with the existing 2.  Now see 121 volts and 855 watts (these 4 panels face west and work better after 14h00)

Programmed Output Source priority and also Charge Source Priority to come on at 02h00 and off at 06h00.  House load is minimal during those times, typically 120 watts and 2 x 90 watt fridge/freezers come on now and then

On this inverter, there are only 3 Charge Source Priority options - see ShaunH's post above

Understanding the various settings is vital, so thanks very much for pointing these out.