Partially commissioned the system this past weekend. Firstly all the software updates, that kept me busy as there were a lot of em. Friday was left with a number of things still to be wired and sorted. By Sunday evening most of those things were squared away, including the software updates, well most of em anyways.

At least there were no neutrals to split in any of the House DBs, yay. All my loads are essential!   We started with half the house, the easy half hehe, top floor, the same as where the inverters and battery banks are.

This is the 60+ year old:

 

This is the rust that was left before painting....

 

After paint and DIN rail install with neutrals and earth on opposite sides. The isolated red wire is my old geyser feed, it will soon become the feed for the ground floor DB. And the eagle eyed, yes a cable joint as this one was way to short, crimped and sleeved.

 

And finally everything else, properly bootlace etc. Yes the left hand cables are 16mm to carry the ~16-24kW. When we do the bottom DB, its feed will be tapped right at the 16mm cable feed in to the main breaker to its own main breaker and RCD.

Back to the partial commissioning, and no smoke escaped and nothing tripped on the DBs. But alas, the Quattro inverter kept tripping as soon as the BYD battery bank reached 100% SoC. One of two alarms, battery voltage exceeded or the other one was on the Fronius. Then both inverters would trip. So the software updates started. One item I postponed the configuration of was the ESS install.

After software updates were mostly all done, we switched on again with no Utility grid input and no Fronius string inverter, only the MPPT charge controller. So I let the MPPT charge the battery bank to 100% with no issues. As expected, the ESS or rather lack thereof, was the issue. But it was getting dark and we were tired, so next day tasks were left.

First time switched on, no Fronius

 

Feeding the beast DC, Battery banks x 3 feeds to busbars done

Starting to wire Quattro DC from busbars

 

DC done

 

Mostly wrapped up, I am happy 😁

Still need to heat shrink all them lugs. We did not have big enough heat string for those 70mm cables.

Early this AM, about 08:20, added my geyser at 100% power to the load. Mostly carried by the Fronius with a little added by the Quattro from the battery. The flows are clear in this picture, from the PV charger (MPPT on DC bus) direct to battery and Fronius direct to load.

 

On 2021/09/01 at 11:08 AM, Sarel said:

This arrived today 🙂

Random question. Where did you purchase breakers and similar equipment like this from? 

2 minutes ago, Basil Katakuzinos said:

Random question. Where did you purchase breakers and similar equipment like this from? 

That was from https://www.sestore.co.za/  https://www.livecopper.co.za/ https://www.em.co.za/ All of this was online, simply because it seems that every retail shop has got some sales people with an attitude problem. Then there is the issue of stock and then one of quality, don't get me started here.

If you are looking for a specific product, and the sales person are too lazy ignorant arrogant or have some moronic comment, and they say it does not exist when I have the product code in my hand, they never see me again. Normally ordering online, is cheaper and delivered faster with almost always a return policy, so win win for me.

Charging the 16kWh battery like a boss

 

1 hour ago, Sarel said:

That was from https://www.sestore.co.za/  https://www.livecopper.co.za/ https://www.em.co.za/ All of this was online, simply because it seems that every retail shop has got some sales people with an attitude problem. Then there is the issue of stock and then one of quality, don't get me started here.

If you are looking for a specific product, and the sales person are too lazy ignorant arrogant or have some moronic comment, and they say it does not exist when I have the product code in my hand, they never see me again. Normally ordering online, is cheaper and delivered faster with almost always a return policy, so win win for me.

I think it is fair to also include a warning here. One shop, now gone belly up called Eco Depo, still has my money. I have ordered from them a number of times in the past, great pricing, great service, most items normally in stock and good communication, yet here we are. My last order were for R1.5k and they delivered 1 item with ~R1.2k now gone. 

5 hours ago, Sarel said:

Charging the 16kWh battery like a boss

 

Screen Recording 2021-09-21 at 11.42.21.mov 1.42 MB · 0 downloads

 

Damn... pity the link isn't working.

Will you be adding the system to Victron world? 

 

10 minutes ago, Basil Katakuzinos said:

Damn... pity the link isn't working.

Will you be adding the system to Victron world? 

 

Strange, I will shred's another version later. No not planning to share it there.

So we try again

 

 

Programming the system. From a software standpoint we have the following, Venus OS on the Cerbo, Quattro firmware and various assistants, PC charger firmware, BYD battery and Fronius Firmware. Then also the Ubiquiti LAN firmware.

For some of these like the MPPT PV charger and the Ubiquiti, its only firmware updates. For the rest its both firmware and O/S updates as well as programming to be done to setup configurations. I will explain the concepts for the Micro grid configuration in a bit more detail later.

Because this is a Micro grid with battery, AC coupled PV on the Fronius and DC coupled PV on the DC bus, we need to configure this lot to operate together. On the Cerbo running Venus O/S, we have to enable DVCC (Distributed Voltage and Current Control) to allow this device to control the Micro grid in my case. For systems with a Managed CAN-bus BMS battery connected like my BYD, the Venus O/S receives a Charge Voltage Limit (CVL), Charge Current Limit (CCL), Discharge Current Limit (DCL) from that battery and relays that to the connected inverter/charger, String inverters  and solar chargers. Detecting and enabling the BYD BMS CAN system, forces DVCC on in my system with pre-sets defined.

This then allows the GX device to manage Solar PV input to carry my loads as well as charge the battery bank and throttle both AC and DC coupled systems as the loads and SoC dictates.

PV charge controller were running a little hot 🔥 at 30A plus. Heatsink temps were 79C before the additional mods. Added the new plate heatsink with heatsink compound at the interface, temps dropped by about 20C ☺️ On this custom made plate.
 

1 hour ago, Sarel said:

PV charge controller were running a little hot 🔥 at 30A plus. Heatsink temps were 79C before the additional mods. Added the new plate heatsink with heatsink compound at the interface, temps dropped by about 20C ☺️ On this custom made plate.
 

Maybe I should do this to mine.... you sir have given me an idea  

My 250/70 runs in the high 70s also (i think the solar output is also throttled slightly at this temperature). Both my MPPT's run alarmingly hot and I do wish Victron would just put a fan on the fins to help out with cooling (They probably know more than i do though 🤣).

How did the programing go? everything run smoothly? 

You welcome man. Ally plate 1.2mm thickness, the bigger the better. I bent it up that way due to not having fins, a small chimney effect to compensate for the horizontal mounting.

Programming went swimmingly, performing to expectations. Due to the fact that sparky can only come back in a week or so to wire the ground floor, its not optimal but I use the grid feed in, with tight limit set, to feed the ground floor of the house so as to not feed Escam. The final wiring will have the complete setup on AC1 out as critical loads.

This is current. Here we see the BYD feeding my 1st floor via AC1 out and supporting the ground floor with 570W as you can see in the below image. Combined loads on the BYD battery are 805W for both floors.

My grid setpoint for tonight.

 

This is my Utility grid feed at the main incomers, measured at the same time. So battery bank supports about 68% of the ground floor loads, on average, while the batteries support the complete 1st floor including geyser and all the IT stuff and entertainment etc. These are safe numbers to prevent Grid feed in.

For the Micro grid system, everything should work automatically with no human intervention. Even the generator should start by itself based on PV charging and battery SoC. This Micro grid does exactly that. In my case my current generator must be manually started.
The genny is more than 20 years old…. When budget allows, it will be replaced with the appropriate remote start capable one.

My string inverter and PV charger are controlled by the Cerbo controller. The rest of the system control revolves around the Quattro and the battery bank for the complete system. The Fronius string inverter is regulated and throttled automatically to balance Solar generation (AC coupled) and load. The PV charger (DC coupled to the DC bus) is controlled to mostly charge the battery bank and throttled according to SoC. Spare current are inverted by the Quattro when SoC is at 98-99%, to then also support the load.

Here is a time slice of the blending from Grid to support the load as wel as the PV string inverter and partially from the PV charger. Only 128W is still going to battery charging with the rest inverted by the Quattro. The Utility grid makes up for the rest. 

And started integration of my Micro grid with my home automation ✅

Yesterday’s energy

And so far today’s

nd to be clear on the energy dashboard graph....A

Todays production vs the predicted curve for a system of my size, we had a bit of clouds later afternoon.... The prediction below the generation image.

This was the total as predicted for today's generation based on my system size, a sanity check for me.

 

Aaaand separated my AC and DC coupled solar on the graphs. Now I can compare the predicted solar charging capacity to actuals as per the Purdy pictures....

Predicted solar for today, versus

 

Actual  for today till now about....

Actuals generated, 41.4kWh for today

That's nice going @Sarel Thank you for your blow-by-blow account of your install, and sharing of your expertise. I am sure that all of us appreciate it, even the Sunsynk fans (I'm one) 😁

The burning question that I have been dying to ask you is: with your (albeit 20 year old) genny, surely you  have black start capability already? Assuming of course that the genny has the capacity to charge batteries and service base loads simultaneously?

Edited September 30, 20214 yr by YellowTapemeasure

@YellowTapemeasure Yes you are correct. Firstly, the plan is for automatic recovery, the genny aint that. Secondly the genny is a rotary device, a combustion device, reliant on fossil fuels and proper maintenance vs the PV Charger that only needs the Sun and is fully automatic.

So planning was for the system to work, me being present or not. Really the genny is a means of last resort, of desperation if you like. Should I not be around, the wify or my daughter can use the system with little to no intervention, no matter the SoC.

8 hours ago, Sarel said:

reliant on fossil fuels and proper maintenance vs the PV Charger that only needs the Sun and is fully automatic.

Well now, that is until the PV charger fails 😆🤪 well then hopefully we have fuel for the genny and it was serviced 🤞🏻🤙🏻