mank1234:



Possibly internal short circuit resulting from too high voltage, or too high current.

I am still studying the inverter itself. One of the batteries might have been having internal short circuit if my guess is right on the 2yrs+ agm batteries . I just noticed the inverter fan is also seizing and needs to be replaced ! I will drain the 7a batteries again and rerun another test observing how long it stays on bulk charge . Thanks

kiekie1:


Duely noted sir . The batteries wer reading 10 & 13v respectively! It all started with hotness , hissing sound and swelling alas. Batteries should be about 2 yrs old . Inverter charges at 28.4v, 26.8v 15a under my test result !

Yeah mine was reading 10.2v. My pals was reading 9.6v.
Started with hotness too..though mine didnt get to the stage. Yours were in.
Another theory is the defect may be from the batteries themselves..hv never seen the luminous battery exceed 3yrs in duty

GeorgeD1:
solar water heater review continued. the botman banned me
again yesterday

the good
over one year free hot water without electricity so far. although there is an optional electric
heating element installed, i have never had any need to use it - yet.

the bad
a few months post commissioning, i started noticing small leakages coming from the water
heater. so i climbed the tower to investigate the source only to discover that the leakage was
coming from the inlet to the assistant tank (the small tank on top - check the picture). i
called my plumber and after deliberating on possible solutions, we decided to apply silicon to the
leaking connection. that seemed to solve the problem until the leakage re-appeared a few days
later but this time it was from the right end cover. on seeing this, i was perplexed and decided
to escalate this to the supplier - protek power and energy ltd.

We are keenly following your update. I am anxious to know they resolution of the leakage and any other issues and Protek’s customer service attitude. Thanks.

How reliable are the inverters with built-in MPPT solar controller in terms? Do they track well?

kiekie1:
Hello fellow forumites,
I visited a site yesterday under emergency to inspect a 1.5va luminous ion inverter and duo luminous batteries set up . Whilst on site , I observed the batteries were already swollen & condemned. I was already of the opinion that the inverter malfunctioned and over charged its batteries. I took the inverter system home, under proper test & observation , I noticed the said system charges real good and floats after full charged. What would have spoilt the batteries

My money is on thermal runaway

Juokorow:

We are keenly following your update. I am anxious to know they resolution of the leakage and any other issues and Protek’s customer service attitude. Thanks.

yeah, so the spambot thinks it can frustrate me. hehehe, it got something else coming!

all,

after getting banned severally for the past couple of days i have finally decided
to go the attachment route. let's see if the botman can read attached files too

so, finally there you have it.

pix as referred:

Change to 3*2 panel configuration

sensisosu:
Hello guys,

I think I’m getting paranoid right now.. I have a 1500w system

12 250w mono installed 2*2 on a 48v inverter system with 4 200a 12v Sukham batteries.
60a epever e tracer

Right now the sun is shinning but total wattage produce is 330-375W, while charging with 7a

so i recently audited a system.
48v 5kva highpower inverter and 4 x 12v 200 long agm batteries, not upto 2months in service, 3 batts were reading 13.03v while 1 battery was 12.89v, so this is how soon batteries go out of sync !!!..so installed the 48v hao2 battery balancer, thoguh apart from a high freq whine, there is no way of knowing if the device is working or not., no leds, no screen, no nothing....at least my good ol desulphater had a bliniking led, and voltage display screen, abeg is there a way of knowing when the device is working?

GeorgeD1:
all,

after getting banned severally for the past couple of days i have finally decided
to go the attachment route. let's see if the botman can read attached files too

so, finally there you have it.

@GeorgeD1

Wow!! Thanks for the update. Your review is really eye-opening and will save a lot of us the stress. The after-sales service from Protek is so bad. I never imagined that. How will they survive in business without replacement parts? That business is doomed already. And to say I was saving money to buy that product after your earlier review. I will just make do with what i have now. But will still look forward to a solar water heater with good after sales service and warranty. Thanks once again for your review.

babaegun,
now you can see why the spambot was working overtime to ensure that
i don't get the message out. so strange you would think seun and protek
are working in league! anyway, things do happen but good enough i was
able to get the review out hook and crook!

GeorgeD1:
babaegun,
now you can see why the spambot was working overtime to ensure that
i don't get the message out. so strange you would think seun and protek
are working in league! anyway, things do happen but good enough i was
able to get the review out hook and crook!

nice review, nigerians and waranty claims..smh.
i wonder which other reliable solar water heater is in the market?

I use a clamp meter around the red positive wires of the HA02 to measure current flow between two batteries - power should move from the stronger (higher voltage) battery to the weaker (lower voltage) battery and the direction of current flow should be the same.

It is the stronger battery in a series string that would get overcharged/boiled to death if the excess charge current were not diverted.

Current flows from positive to negative so a negative current reading from the red wire in picture 1 below (orient the meter properly relative to the direction of current flow) indicates the HA02 is removing current (4.7amps) from the battery it is connected to and putting it in the next weaker battery.

One challenge you will face is that with closely voltage matched batteries such as you have the current flow can be very minuscule in the milliamp range such that a conventional DC clamp would not be able to show accurately what is going on and so enter the GTC CM100 low current meter with a resolution up to 1mA as shown in the last two pictures below.

earthrealm:
so i recently audited a system.
48v 5kva highpower inverter and 4 x 12v 200 long agm batteries, not upto 2months in service, 3 batts were reading 13.03v while 1 battery was 12.89v, so this is how soon batteries go out of sync !!!..so installed the 48v hao2 battery balancer, thoguh apart from a high freq whine, there is no way of knowing if the device is working or not., no leds, no screen, no nothing....at least my good ol desulphater had a bliniking led, and voltage display screen, abeg is there a way of knowing when the device is working?

GeorgeD1:
all,

after getting banned severally for the past couple of days i have finally decided
to go the attachment route. let's see if the botman can read attached files too

so, finally there you have it.

Thanks again for perseverance over the botman! Two questions, please. Where you able to control the leaks with silicone or other methods. Given that my the house that I am currently finishing has been piped with Protek in mind, could you recommend an alternative? Thanks.

DMerciful:
Change to 3*2 panel configuration

Hello house

For fans of outback.

New flexmax 100 - 250v/100A
allows series up to 7 of 300w > PVs and
Reduces installers' stress and lowers cost of installation for large arrays.

Plus other features as stated on the attached link below


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-T5i09-F2IY

earthrealm:
so i recently audited a system.
48v 5kva highpower inverter and 4 x 12v 200 long agm batteries, not upto 2months in service, 3 batts were reading 13.03v while 1 battery was 12.89v, so this is how soon batteries go out of sync !!!..so installed the 48v hao2 battery balancer, thoguh apart from a high freq whine, there is no way of knowing if the device is working or not., no leds, no screen, no nothing....at least my good ol desulphater had a bliniking led, and voltage display screen, abeg is there a way of knowing when the device is working?

I helped a neighbor having 48v 3.5kva prag Inverter and 1.8kw poly array having similar imbalance battery problem.

In his case, the installer added 100Ah alongside 3 other 200Ah gel batteries to extract the 48v.
How can a sane Installer do that. Making the owner believe " solar too get problem"

I ran a battery load test on the 3 200Ah batteries and they survived and added a new 200Ah battery & HAO2 48v balancer.. 3 months now the owner still dey send me recharge cards.

On your question, i wonder how one can measure it's effectiveness unless you shutdown to do battery test. To work round that, I personally prefer and still use victron clone balancer (as on the picture) with couple of watt meters on incoming solar input and/against battery outlet to inverter. Aleast this gives me, relatively what is going on on the setup.

Last weekend, I shutdown the system for few hours to see if the balancer had effect after months of usage. Surprisingly, they held 13.1v . mind you one set of my batteries (ipowerplus) which the dealer gave me 6months warranty are 2yrs plus .

GeorgeD1:
babaegun,
now you can see why the spambot was working overtime to ensure that
i don't get the message out. so strange you would think seun and protek
are working in league! anyway, things do happen but good enough i was
able to get the review out hook and crook!

Your are a leader any day.
Thanks for your time and reviews so far.

Personally, I have always fancied solar water heating through water heaters with 12v DC element powered from cc diversion of excess pv harvest, though I fear cloudy days.

Thanks Oga GeorgeD

efuro:



I helped a neighbor having 48v 3.5kva prag Inverter and 1.8kw poly array having similar imbalance battery problem.

In his case, the installer added 100Ah alongside 3 other 200Ah gel batteries to extract the 48v.
How can a sane Installer do that. Making the owner believe " solar too get problem"

I ran a battery load test on the 3 200Ah batteries and they survived and added a new 200Ah battery & HAO2 48v balancer.. 3 months now the owner still dey send me recharge cards.

On your question, i wonder how one can measure it's effectiveness unless you shutdown to do battery test. To work round that, I personally prefer and still use victron clone balancer (as on the picture) with couple of watt meters on incoming solar input and/against battery outlet to inverter. Aleast this gives me, relatively what is going on on the setup.

Last weekend, I shutdown the system for few hours to see if the balancer had effect after months of usage. Surprisingly, they held 13.1v . mind you one set of my batteries (ipowerplus) which the dealer gave me 6months warranty are 2yrs plus .

wow, the installer must have chopped the money for the other 200ah battery, hahahaha
so i whipped out my ol clamp meter and took some readings, batteries were low 48.8v load was about 40% on 5kva inverter.
the batt that was 12.89, others 13.01v yesterday when the inverter was charging is now reading 12.18,others 12.24v when they are deeply discharged/loaded. the + & - are clamp meter readings from each leg of the balancer. has anybody taken such reaings from each leg of the balancer during discharging [72w harvest from solar - almost 5.30pm]?, would take same during charging and compare
will wait 1week and retest again

Hello guys,
I noticed this afternoon that the battery supply circuit breaker keeps tripping off when the inverter is switched on - even when there is no load connected to the inverter output. What could cause this?

sinistrian:
Hello guys,
I noticed this afternoon that the battery supply circuit breaker keeps tripping off when the inverter is switched on - even when there is no load connected to the inverter output. What could cause this?

Is it really a DC Breaker. You will not find high success rate using a breaker btw bank and inverter. It will always trip under surge, Ask marketers in the house for 150-250A battery switch is available if at all they have.

Anyway am sure better experienced and knowledgeable guys will explain more.

It's a DC breaker rated 25A_DC. And it trips immediately I switch the inverter on. I just replaced it with a higher amperage DC breaker (63A_DC) just now and the same thing happened.

Which tells me the inverter is trying to pull an insanely large amount of current for a 48V system at startup. This never happened before - my max current draw (even with fridge surge) has always been about 15A_DC. Now, with zero load, the inverter wants to pull more than 63A_DC?

sinistrian:
It's a DC breaker rated 25A_DC. And it trips immediately I switch the inverter on. I just replaced it with a higher amperage DC breaker (63A_DC) just now and the same thing happened.

Which tells me the inverter is trying to pull an insanely large amount of current for a 48V system at startup. This never happened before - my max current draw (even with fridge surge) has always been about 15A_DC. Now, with zero load, the inverter wants to pull more than 63A_DC?

Minimum requirement is 100A DCv breaker Just like the fuse u have at the back of the inverter

I use a DC breaker btw inverter and battery.... It never trips cos it's well sized

efuro:


Is it really a DC Breaker. You will not find high success rate using a breaker btw bank and inverter. It will always trip under surge, Ask marketers in the house for 150-250A battery switch is available if at all they have.

Anyway am sure better experienced and knowledgeable guys will explain more.

My concern is that a house load of 400W max is tripping a 63A breaker via the inverter. And this is a 48V system! If I put the 100A breaker in, it means I am giving a 2.4kva nverter the go-ahead to pull 4800 watts from the battery!

sinistrian:
It's a DC breaker rated 25A_DC. And it trips immediately I switch the inverter on. I just replaced it with a higher amperage DC breaker (63A_DC) just now and the same thing happened.

Which tells me the inverter is trying to pull an insanely large amount of current for a 48V system at startup. This never happened before - my max current draw (even with fridge surge) has always been about 15A_DC. Now, with zero load, the inverter wants to pull more than 63A_DC?

If the inverter trips a 63A breaker at no load immediately, then there's no two ways about it. IT IS SIMPLY FAULTY

The breaker is suppose to trip at 3-5 times it's rated current instantly or at its rated current indefinitely. By tripping instantly, it means the inverter is seeing a load of more than 9kW. Either there's an internal short circuit at the output or the inverting circuitry is faulty.

Modified: 48V * 3 * 63A is least power the circuit breaker sees if it trips instantaneously.

sinistrian:
My concern is that a house load of 400W max is tripping a 63A breaker via the inverter. And this is a 48V system! If I put the 100A breaker in, it means I am giving a 2.4kva nverter the go-ahead to pull 4800 watts from the battery!

What is the rating of the DC breaker behind ur inverter?

sinistrian:
My concern is that a house load of 400W max is tripping a 63A breaker via the inverter. And this is a 48V system! If I put the 100A breaker in, it means I am giving a 2.4kva nverter the go-ahead to pull 4800 watts from the battery!

Doing that may spoil more parts in the inverter. At the rate you're going someone may suggest you remove the breaker entirely. Beware of risk of fire! If I were you, I did send it for service.

sinistrian:
My concern is that a house load of 400W max is tripping a 63A breaker via the inverter. And this is a 48V system! If I put the 100A breaker in, it means I am giving a 2.4kva nverter the go-ahead to pull 4800 watts from the battery!

Kindly check the inverter very well, it should never trip the breaker(25A) even at 50% load on, Talk less of no load at all!
Maybe a short circuit or if there is a breaker in the inverter, it maybe faulty. Do check this and don't put a 100A breaker on a 2.4kva 48V inverter(except u want to use it to roast yam)!

Yes, my suspicion is that there's a short/fault somewhere inside the inverter. I've disconnected it from the house now.
Time to go and look for petrol

NoMoreTrolling:


well the choice of cc was made my the installer, we just paid for the whole system, instead of paying for parts, so we had to deal with what he got.

As for experience, well, this stuff is all pretty basic. well i guess that sounds, weird, being that I made this cc error, but the more I think about it, the less sense it makes. When the batteries are full, the charge controller throttles charging current all the way down to zero, even in full sun, so why would it fry when the battery is disconnected isn't that open circuit similar to no current on a full battery

tbh I didn't really follow your OP however the quoted caught my attention and I feel it should be corrected before someone else subscribe to similar line of thinking. Most MPPT charge controllers are powered by the battery not the solar panel. We should remember that a charge controller is an electrical not a mechanical device. It requires electricity to carry out its functions of regulating and down converting solar from high voltage to lower voltage of the battery . Connecting a CC to PV without battery is basically short circuiting the controller.. The huge amount of energy unregulated coming from the PV can blow through the cc circuitry since they have no where to flow to.

On the question of a full battery.. What happens is the cc (remembered using power from the battery) stays in the higher voltage curve of the PV.. The higher voltage curve has lower current and that is how the system works.. If your battery is low.. The cc would detect the the battery state and move to the optimal curve that allows the battery to be charged using the maximum voltage obtainable at the best current.. There have to be a balance and the cc is always adjusting based on solar Ray. I am sure someone with a more in depth knowledge can explain this better.