Hi All, first time posting.

Hope everyone is safe and well!

I have a Goodwe ES Inverter (4.6kw) installed with 2 x Pylontech US3000 Batteries and 16 x 365w Panels on my roof.

From what I can see the MPPT in the Inverter is able to charge my batteries at 3kw.

I have discovered that even though I am generating 5kw of PV on my batteries are only charging at 1.14kw. My load on my house at the time I checked was 580w. The reason I know I was generating 5kw of PV is because I had turned my geyser on (3.3kw), Washing Machine (2kw) and Tumble Dryer (2kw). By doing this the load on my house was roughly 7kw, 5kw was coming from the roof and the remainder was coming from Eskom.

When I turned all the appliances off, the Inverter adjusted and my batteries were only charging at 1.14kw. To test further I changed the Inverter's work mode to "Economic" which allows for the batteries to charge from Eskom. When I did this my batteries were charging at 3kw.

I have checked the Advanced settings and I can see that the charge rate is set at 74A and the discharge at 73.1A - I am not able to change these settings as they are pre-defined.

Is the above normal?

Any advice would be great!

Appreciated

Have you checked this thread?

Back then I speculated that maybe that's just how big the buck/boost stage is for charging, but iirc it turns out there is a setting somewhere for it. @Bobster and @Fuenkli are the guys to talk to.

Thank you @plonkster I have just read through the thread and I see @Bobster mentioned his batteries are in self-defined mode. That is probably the change that needs to happen as mine are using the settings that comes with the PV Master app for the Pylontech batteries. I have also reached out to the guy that installed my solar and he is going to talk to David (Goodwe South Africa contact). Let's see what he says.

Thank you @plonkster

8 hours ago, Alex Gerber said:

batteries were only charging at 1.14kw

the inverter has a maximum charge capability of 100A. In your case the battery BMS tells the inverter to limit this to 74A. As long as the batteries are allowed to communicate with the inverter it will not let you change it. The reason why the batteries were only charging at 1.14kW could be because the SOC was already to high for the batteries to allow the maximum 74A charge current. 

Edited July 16, 20206 yr by Fuenkli

8 hours ago, Alex Gerber said:

I see @Bobster mentioned his batteries are in self-defined mode

if i remember correctly he only did this until he managed to set up the communication link between the inverter and the Revov's. If your batteries are able to talk to the inverter i would not advice to manage them in self define mode.  

Thank you @Fuenkli! My batteries are connected via the BMS. Makes sense what you are saying.

Thank you all for the advice and input. Really appreciated!

@plonkster @Fuenkli @Bobster Hi All, I have spoken to David (Goodwe SA Support) - when the batteries temp falls below 15 degrees the charging Amps drops by more than half for the protection of the batteries. Today when the degrees on my batteries went up to 20 degrees the charging Amps increased to 74 Amps. This explains why the charging is different.  Thank you for assisting with the replies and advice.

3 hours ago, Alex Gerber said:

below 15 degrees

Wow... that's rather early to back off. Victron batteries only raise the stop-charge flag at 5°C...

 

On 2020/07/16 at 5:25 PM, Fuenkli said:

if i remember correctly he only did this until he managed to set up the communication link between the inverter and the Revov's. If your batteries are able to talk to the inverter i would not advice to manage them in self define mode.  

Sorry for the tardiness in replying. @Fuenkli has it right. Initially the setup was Revovs running without a communication link and using the self define option. The change that was eventually made was the installation of a new BMU (unbranded, but it looks just like the BYD BMU) and a comms cable. The battery pack is now defined as B-Box 10.

Since @Alex Gerber has Pylontechs, this should not be necessary.

On 2020/07/18 at 12:28 AM, plonkster said:

Wow... that's rather early to back off. Victron batteries only raise the stop-charge flag at 5°C...

 

We are not talking "stop charge" but rather charging rate reduction...