hello daLover,
i monitored my system intermittently yesterday and i now have some pix to further explain the complementary nature of inverter and charge controllers charging of hybrid battery banks.

before i continue let me quickly say that even though the info here is specific to sukam inverter/morningstar charge controllers, the same thing applies to other combinations of inverters and solar chargers except for a few exceptions like xantrex, magnum, tripplite, sma, etc which have true 4 - stage charging algorithms built into their inverters.

firstly, there was power outage the previous evening so we were on backup power for the better part of the night (a typical scenario). by 9am the following morning the sun was already up and solar panels were working to restore lost energy to the battery bank. the weather was a bit cloudy so panels could not put out their best. but by midday charge controller was already indicating battery bank state-of-charge (soc) to be about 65% full. then around 2pm, public power was restored. inverter began charging battery along with the solar charger:

solar charge controller is still in bulk mode:

after a couple of hours of combined charging, inverter charger has now cut off with status indicating 'battery charged'. at this stage the batteries are only about 85% full as far as the solar charge controller is concerned. therefore you can see that the solar charger has continued to charge the batteries. rather than cutting off charging at this stage it has entered 'pwm' (absorption) mode. this is the last 15% stage of the charging process i was talking about and it will take another couple of hours to exit this mode after which the batteries would have been 100% charged.

here, still at absorption more than 2hrs after inverter has cut off charging:

more:

Hi George D,
Thanks for throwing more light on the hybrid charging for both solar and inverter,
But I think I know the reason why the Sukam and the cyberpower stop charging at 85%,

It's the same reason I believe inverters like zantrex and other higher end models of inverters may charge up to 100%.

The morning star charge regulator uses a thin sensing cable to determine exact battery voltage as against the sukam or cyberpower that measures the battery voltage through the battery charging cables which carry current...since the cable is carrying current, it means there is a voltage drop across the cable, hence the voltage measured at the inverter terminals is higher than what is actually on the battery..I.e when the inverter sees the battery as 100% and stops charging, the batteries voltages are actually less.

The thin sensing cable employed by the morning start ensures the morning start see the true voltage of the battery because it carries no current and hence no voltage drop.

I was at the SPDC fair in ph yesterday and an inverter sales guy there says zantrex, magnum etc have the sensing cables, but they are damn expensive...just imagine a 6kva zantrex for 900k

Thank u. as if buyright is d way for cyberpower or is there better way?

Thank u. it seems buyright is d way for cyberpower or is there better way?

@George D, pls,is it appropriate to use 260ah zenith battery with my luminous 0.8kva inverter. Becos I'm planning to buy 260ah zenith battery next week

hello daLover,
you are right up to a point. besides the voltage sense cable you mentioned, the morningstar charge controller also has a temperature sensor which helps to vary charging voltage according to changes in battery temperature.

besides all these however, a truly efficient inverter/charger must have a multi-stage charging algorithm inbuilt and must have a way of monitoring the actual state-of-charge (soc) of the battery bank. that is where the high end inverters like xantrex, magnum, tripllite, outback, sma, etc have an edge over the others. not only are they true 4 - stage chargers, their charging parameters are also adjustable over a range of options. besides, they do include optional battery monitoring devices, which together with their multi-stage charging abilities do give a complete charging regimen for optimal battery life.

so, in a nutshell the high end inverters mentioned above have true multi-stage charging abilities which in most cases are configurable to meet the user's need while the mid-range ones like sukam, cyberpower, nexus, luminous, genus, mopower, etc are just bulk chargers which charge your batteries up to a point and do cut off charging immediately the inverter senses that the battery bank has achieved a particular voltage. they are not true 3 or 4-stage chargers like the high end models. here lies the key difference and that is why they are more expensive.

idsolar: Thank u. it seems buyright is d way for cyberpower or is there better way?

yes, indeed. your best bet is buyright for cyberpower.

Akerekoroabijawara: @George D, pls,is it appropriate to use 260ah zenith battery with my luminous 0.8kva inverter. Becos I'm planning to buy 260ah zenith battery next week

no, your 0.8kva inverter charging output will be way too small to charge such a big battery effectively.

for best charging performance think of getting at least minimum of 1.5 or 2kva inverter if you can afford it.

most of the higher wattage inverters are 24v/48v system.........i somewhat prefer connecting my batts in parallel, than doing the series connection, can some1 tell me any higher wattage inverter that is 12v input?...and ios reliable?

Thanks @George D. I will go for 200ah battery

all,
here are more monitoring pix from my system, yesterday.
deliberately switch off public power and after more than 8hrs, thanks to solar input
batteries are already on pwm (absorption mode) which is more than 85& full :

forced out of absorption mode by switching on the water pump, load has climbed to 70%,
now on bulk:

tank is filled up, water pump now switched off. within minutes system is back to absorption mode.
load has equally dropped to 20%. led indicator now on green.

power cut time 8rs 19mins and still counting!

imagine if i had been running a mikano or perkins generator for this lenght of time!

@George D. Nice one there. I dey envy you o. Soup wey sweet na money kill am.

O ga gerorge D,
Nice one sir.i am planning to make an order from china for 3kva which is around 39k.the supplier told me that the solar inverter could work for 5 or more days without NEPA light and carries all the accessories in the house without any hassle.Now my question sir is that we can i get solar panel cos i will like to be charging it with solar power.

Hoping to read from u as soon as possible

Thanks alot

Akerekoroabijawara: @George D. Nice one there. I dey envy you o. Soup wey sweet na money kill am.

my brother, no be small thing o!

jayboskie7,
although i'm not trying to discourage you but i'll be very careful with those claims coming from china
if i were you. those people will tell you a lot of crap just to push inferior products at you. at the end
of the day you are left with a dud equipment that doesn't worth it.

all the same if you want solar panels, call vitus on 08039644115. he's my supplier in lagos.

all,
here is my end of day harvest for yesterday 24th october @17:45hrs
after over 13hrs, battery voltage is at 51v.

amp hour = 97.4
kilowatts = 5.2

a cloudy day no doubt.

downloading charge controller logging data into my laptop:

@ George D
With what i have seen here, i must confess you are making me jealous big time. Soon i will make others jealous too.
Big up bro

that's the spirit my brother. together we can extricate ourselves from the clutches of phcn monopoly!

O ga George D,
Thanks for your response to my message.Please can i have your number?then where did you get your own inverter...

hello jayboskie7,
i got my own sukam inverter here from a local dealer. if you're in lagos you can always get yours from any reliable inverter dealer.
or better still go to their head office:

simba group of companies
77/79 eric moore road
Surulere
lagos
tel: 08058697002


presently i'm out of town but you can drop your number here and i'll call you to discuss.

Oga geroge D,
Here is my number 08060615464.Thank u very much sir

hi George n friends on nairaland,

i need the phone no of mr henry the sole distributor of zenith batteries and i need advice on which very good battery to purchase for my 2.5kva inverter. your prompt response would be highlllllllllllllllllllllllyyyyyyyyyyyyy appreciated.

My email is venapeace@yahoo.com

[quote author=earthrealm][/quote]
hi earthrealm,

please i need the no of mr henry i also want to purchase original zenith batteries. pls it i urgent