kiekie1:


Hello, feel free to contact us for the Sealed 6v 315 trojan agm battery specs at discounted rate if applicable to your need or you contact solar depot(Mr Moses) for availability of the said brand posted ! See contact in my signature below ... Cheer's

I appreciate your response. I have actually contacted Solar depot but the are out of stock.

Let me ask a question. Can I use the Victron battery ballancer to combine the US battery with a trojan? I don't know if anybody has tried it. I want to know if the balancer can help to combine batteries of different makes, but both types of batteries are flooded lead acid.

I need the best batteries. 24V. 200ah. so maybe: 12v 200ah x 2.

Kindly mention me with your details. Buying once I can confirm it's the very best. Brand new only please.

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

As for the battery, well the charging characteristics were met pretty closely. The CC would charge up to 56v daily, same with the inverter. So it was never overcharged. we just started losing capacity rapidly. I mean we have 2,000 watts of solar, electricity from 10-7a.m, 4 200ah batteries and just running 500 watts load continuous. I feel under these circumstances, that the battery should have lasted for years.

Bro, I think ur problem is with ur batteries because with 2000 watts of solar power, u should be at least getting a good dose of energy from ur 200ah ×4 battery setup. As for ur mppt roasting,enuf has been said about it and I'm sure u hv learnt ur lessons though in a hard way,but d good thing is that you have acquired knowledge from this experience.

Hello everyone, I'm planning on increasing my solar panels, I currently have a total of 780 Watts (130w x 6) arranged in 2*3. Although, My new cc max PV is 1500w at 24v, which I plan to maximise. My problem is can I add 6 more panels (in 2*3) which will total 1560 (a little above the specified max pv). The cc is Fangpusun flexmax mppt60a.
Also, any idea on a good tier one 130w PV?

sharks776:
Hello everyone, I'm planning on increasing my solar panels, I currently have a total of 780 Watts (130w x 6) arranged in 2*3. Although, My new cc max PV is 1500w at 24v, which I plan to maximise. My problem is can I add 6 more panels (in 2*3) which will total 1560 (a little above the specified max pv). The cc is Fangpusun flexmax mppt60a.
Also, any idea on a good tier one 130w PV?

You are good to go..
Mppt control has current limiting function..
You can't even get 1560 out 1560 watts..

Yes you can.

sharks776:
...can I add 6 more panels (in 2*3) which will total 1560 (a little above the specified max pv).

sharks776:
Hello everyone, I'm planning on increasing my solar panels, I currently have a total of 780 Watts (130w x 6) arranged in 2*3. Although, My new cc max PV is 1500w at 24v, which I plan to maximise. My problem is can I add 6 more panels (in 2*3) which will total 1560 (a little above the specified max pv). The cc is Fangpusun flexmax mppt60a.
Also, any idea on a good tier one 130w PV?

With 6 extra 130w at 2x3 or 3x2 for flexmax 60A, you have not really max it out. I will recommend you go with 3x2 to enjoy flexmax mppt function (at about 1A for every 30w extra ur PV can make).

Pls note, if you have PV of different make and type, Going above 3 in series will give your flexmax hard time to read during instantaneous sweep. At the end you have production always beneath optimal setpoints for your array.

Above from my diy practice.

Good morning House
I recently aquired 4 sets of Monbat Batteries with a new Felicity 5KVa 48v inverter. Will likely go Solar in the next couple of months.
In order to maitain a 50% DOD regularly on the batteries, is their any battery monitor i can attach that would triger and alarm/shutdown when the batteries discharges to a certain value?
Recently saw this on aliexpress, dont know how useful it will help out towards what i intend to achieve.

https://www.aliexpress.com/item/High-quality-Display-DP50V5A-Constant-Voltage-current-Step-down-Programmable-DC-Power-module-buck-converter-voltmeter/32656651549.html?spm=a2g0s.13010208.99999999.262.ZlXUgO

sharks776:
Hello everyone, I'm planning on increasing my solar panels, I currently have a total of 780 Watts (130w x 6) arranged in 2*3. Although, My new cc max PV is 1500w at 24v, which I plan to maximise. My problem is can I add 6 more panels (in 2*3) which will total 1560 (a little above the specified max pv). The cc is Fangpusun flexmax mppt60a.
Also, any idea on a good tier one 130w PV?

Yes you can, call/whatapp 08117398294 for purchase n professional installation.

damola1:
I need the best batteries. 24V. 200ah. so maybe: 12v 200ah x 2.

Kindly mention me with your details. Buying once I can confirm it's the very best. Brand new only please.

Call/whatapp 08117398294 for monbat, spectra.

NoMoreTrolling:


men, i don't even know the name sef. like "Yamako" or some shh like that.

Sigh, are you for real though? something was telling me to wait till the sun goes down, but i had to disobey my gutt.

when the installer installed it, he didn't put a dc breaker between the solar panels and the charge controller. it would have been so easy to switch the solar off, if i had that.

i didn't know it was common knowledge here, sigh, should have been following this thread more closely.

wish i could afford another mppt at this time, like your EP, but, maaaan, sigh, wtf is all this bad luck though

I will just have to pick up a cheap pwm in the mean time.


Quick question, whenever you install your new battery bank, do you charge the batteries individually first before you series/parallel them I'm thinking maybe these ones where imbalanced from the start.

Sorry bro, jst contact a professional to audit ur system, so u v in mind things to replace wen the fund is available. gel Ba3s are fragile compared to AGM.

Thank me later Victron Battery Monitor

hancock:
...In order to maintain a 50% DOD regularly on the batteries, is there any battery monitor i can attach that would trigger an alarm/shutdown when the batteries discharges to a certain value?

Barezzi:
Thank me later Victron Battery Monitor

Thanks Barezzi for this.

***Edit*** Forgot to mention that the link you posted appears to be a 'buck converter' which will step down voltage and/or current between an incoming power feed and an output - it is not suitable as a battery AH monitor and also it seems to be rated for only 55v and 5amps which would be way under what your system would be doing either charging or discharging

================================================


A Battery Monitor/AH Meter/Coulomb Counter like Victron (Premium Price) or Fangpusun (Victron Clone at Value Price) or other solid premium variants like the Bogart Trimetric e.t.c will tell you how many AH you have put in or removed from your battery bank as well as an approximate battery percentage readout.

All the AH meters above will set you back from 35k to 150k on the average - if your sole intent is to cutoff at 50% DoD then you can use a cheapo battery voltage monitor (sells at 5k) in conjunction with a 'Battery DoD at X-voltage' chart to know that a 12v/24v/36v/48v (depending on your system nominal battery voltage) reading on the voltage monitor while your batteries are under load indicates an approximately 50% depth of discharge - you can use a higher cutoff for safety e.g 48.8v as 50% LVDpoint in a 48v system.

In my experience clients will always ignore this safety cut-off point and drain the batteries further anyways so if I had to choose I would go the following route in order of priority;

1) Size your battery bank for 2 to 3 days of autonomy so you never even get to the LVD point or 50% DoD on an average day. Your battery life will greatly increase by this practice

2) Install a LVD sensor and disconnect mechanism so that power cuts off once you go below the cutoff voltage for a preset time. Might have to rig up something yourself to get a good price point if your inverter does not have a DoD cutoff feature - Victron now has a 48v battery protect with this feature but it's pricey

3) Use a voltage monitor readout to approximate DoD - if possible install one voltage monitor per battery so you can detect individual imbalances or a failing battery quickly. I highly recommend this route as an early warning trigger to forestall battery issues regardless of any other mechanism you may deploy.

4) Last on my list is a battery monitor - only useful if you want value added features like knowing how much watts or amps appliances are consuming, net amps into battery and amps produced by solar or grid based source. Although I use an AH monitor, I believe now I could do without it using any of the other 3 options above. Some brands like Victron would still monitor midpoint voltage deviations in the battery bank but I'd still rather have a small cheapo monitor per individual battery.

hancock:

Thanks Barezzi for this.

hancock:
Good morning House
I recently aquired 4 sets of Monbat Batteries with a new Felicity 5KVa 48v inverter. Will likely go Solar in the next couple of months.
In order to maitain a 50% DOD regularly on the batteries, is their any battery monitor i can attach that would triger and alarm/shutdown when the batteries discharges to a certain value?
Recently saw this on aliexpress, dont know how useful it will help out towards what i intend to achieve.

https://www.aliexpress.com/item/High-quality-Display-DP50V5A-Constant-Voltage-current-Step-down-Programmable-DC-Power-module-buck-converter-voltmeter/32656651549.html?spm=a2g0s.13010208.99999999.262.ZlXUgO

Thanks Niyi once again for always putting out well detailed explanations to problems

Im not usually at home but i have family members that are. left to them they dont mind draining the batteries to 0v .
felicity inverters according to their manual have low battery alarm at 42v ( for a 48v system). This is very very poor
I just need a device (cheapest i can get) that will triger a continous alarm at a preset voltage value of 48.8v (50% DOD)
If you know of any other cheap device that can do this task, I'm all ears.
NB im not a techie guy when it comes to electricals so i cant rig or hold a screwdriver close to any electrical devices even if my life depend on it

abunafiu2:
Dear chief GeorgeD, you were about to give us a review of your solar water heater system.
kindly do sir

i tried uploading this review severally over the weekend but the spam bot keeps deleting my post
and banning me for 24 hrs. strange because i don't see anything that remotely resembles spamming
in my post. i know the bot has a loathing for special characters and i tried to minimize using those after
the first ban but it still had to do it's thing again the second time.

i will try again to upload the review. if it gets deleted again i might resort to posting a scanned copy.

all,
recall that i installed my solar water heater over a year ago and i've been using same
effectively since march 2017. i will now proceed to do a mini review of my experience:
the good, the bad and the downright shameful:

nameplate specs
product name - protek (white label)
type - non pressurized integrated solar water heater
capacity - 300l

installation
the installation presented a series of challenges when i had to decide on either a roof mounted
structure or erecting a separate water tower for the water heater. at the end i settled for the
later partly because of the weight and also ease of access for future maintenance issues. so,
after the decision was made, the rest was easy. retrofitting the existing bathrooms, toilets and
kitchen with new copper tubing was a breeze and my plumber was up to the task.
then came the commissioning part. coming from a background of electrical mains heated water
heaters with the likes of ariston, this was a new experience for me. i remember my first bath
with a solar heated hot water, it's a feeling out of this world.
max temp recorded from march to somewhere around june (before the onset of everyday rains)
was around 77 degrees celcius while the lowest was about 32 degrees celcius between july and
september (when the everyday rains set in).

Lolz.

Slowly and surely you will get more techy.

Based on all you have said and with a new inverter with variable DoD out of the picture, I think a Low Voltage Disconnect type device is what you need - Oga Pranil has plenty of experience in this area and I also recall Oga Sinistrian recently rigged up an LVD device too.

I hereby drag them into this matter - Oga Sinistrian is overdue to give a tear down of his LVD project anyways.

CC Oga Pranil and Sinistrian

hancock:
Thanks Niyi once again for always putting out well detailed explanations to problems

Im not usually at home but i have family members that are. left to them they dont mind draining the batteries to 0v .
felicity inverters according to their manual have low battery alarm at 42v ( for a 48v system). This is very very poor
I just need a device (cheapest i can get) that will triger a continous alarm at a preset voltage value of 48.8v (50% DOD)
If you know of any other cheap device that can do this task, I'm all ears.
NB im not a techie guy when it comes to electricals so i cant rig or hold a screwdriver close to any electrical devices even if my life depend on it

Lol Georged1 has been banned again
The devil is a liar, you must complete your review baba

NiyiOmoIyunade:
Lolz.

Slowly and surely you will get more techy.

Based on all you have said and with a new inverter with variable DoD out of the picture, I think a Low Voltage Disconnect type device is what you need - Oga Pranil has plenty of experience in this area and I also recall Oga Sinistrian recently rigged up an LVD device too.

I hereby drag them into this matter - Oga Sinistrian is overdue to give a tear down of his LVD project anyways.

CC Oga Pranil and Sinistrian

I built my own LVD because I couldn't find any inverter or device that could reliably cut the power at 50% DOD. The circuit below is what I used, please forgive the lack of professional terminology as I made use of my elementary electrical knowledge since secondary school.

The BMV700/702 has a means of effectively tracking DOD as Barezzi has already suggested, so it's the crucial element here. If you want to use voltage levels for your cutoff point instead of a battery monitor, a programmable inverter with dry contact terminals (like the axpert) can also work with this setup.

The dry contact device (in my case, the BMV because I already had one) is connected to the battery terminals in series with a 10,000+ Ohm resistor (to reduce the energisation current, we can't be wasting precious battery power), as well as a normally-open DC-AC solid state relay (SSR). I chose a normally-open relay because I only want current passing through it when needed, as opposed to all the time.

When the BMV DOD condition activates the relay, the SSR is energized and triggers the AC contactor (AC/AC) which is a normally-closed device. When the contactor is energized, the load circuit is interrupted and all output from the inverter is cut off. No matter who is watching TV at the time. Trust me, this pisses off The SWAMBO all the time but I need to save my batteries.

The BMV relay only resets when the SOC rises back to a set value (this is configurable too) and then all loads are restored.

@Sinistrian,
Nice! Looking at your sketch, the connection to the load seem to be at the same potential. Is that a mistake?
If you add a timer switch in series with the bmv, you can switch on your heavy loads between say 8am-4pm as long as the
battery soc is above say 75%.

sinistrian:

Same potential as inverter input, yes. The live passes through the contactor while the neutral feeds directly from the inverter.

Peace of mind guaranteed. No fear of anyone draining your bank to dangerous levels.

Barezzi:
@Sinistrian,
Nice! Looking at your sketch, the connection to the load seem to be at the same potential. Is that a mistake?
I use a similar setup to "switch on" my heavy loads db. I use a timer switch in series with a bmv as "on" permissive.

Same potential as inverter input, yes. The live passes through the contactor while the neutral feeds directly from the inverter.

Here are the contactor and SSR:

https://www.aliexpress.com/item/CT1-2P-25A-1NC-1NO-220V-230V-50-60HZ-Din-rail-Household-ac-contactor/1688946996.html?spm=a2g0s.9042311.0.0.79224c4duxKkn6

https://www.aliexpress.com/item/solid-state-relay-SSR-10DA-10A-actually-3-32V-DC-TO-24-380V-AC-SSR-10DA/32606149138.html?spm=a2g0s.9042311.0.0.27424c4dpEPjPr

Oga Sinistrian.

This is nice! Very nice and clear. You have managed to simplify a concept most find difficult to understand not to talk of explain.

Kudos and many thanks

sinistrian:

I built my own LVD because I couldn't find any inverter or device that could reliably cut the power at 50% DOD. The circuit below is what I used, please forgive the lack of professional terminology as I made use of my elementary electrical knowledge since secondary school.

The BMV700/702 has a means of effectively tracking DOD as Barezzi has already suggested, so it's the crucial element here. If you want to use voltage levels for your cutoff point instead of a battery monitor, a programmable inverter with dry contact terminals (like the axpert) can also work with this setup.

The dry contact device (in my case, the BMV because I already had one) is connected to the battery terminals in series with a 10,000+ Ohm resistor (to reduce the energisation current, we can't be wasting precious battery power), as well as a normally-open DC-AC solid state relay (SSR). I chose a normally-open relay because I only want current passing through it when needed, as opposed to all the time.

When the BMV DOD condition activates the relay, the SSR is energized and triggers the AC contactor (AC/AC) which is a normally-closed device. When the contactor is energized, the load circuit is interrupted and all output from the inverter is cut off. No matter who is watching TV at the time. Trust me, this pisses off The SWAMBO all the time but I need to save my batteries.

The BMV relay only resets when the SOC rises back to a set value (this is configurable too) and then all loads are restored.

hancock:
Good morning House
I recently aquired 4 sets of Monbat Batteries with a new Felicity 5KVa 48v inverter. Will likely go Solar in the next couple of months.
In order to maitain a 50% DOD regularly on the batteries, is their any battery monitor i can attach that would triger and alarm/shutdown when the batteries discharges to a certain value?
Recently saw this on aliexpress, dont know how useful it will help out towards what i intend to achieve.

https://www.aliexpress.com/item/High-quality-Display-DP50V5A-Constant-Voltage-current-Step-down-Programmable-DC-Power-module-buck-converter-voltmeter/32656651549.html?spm=a2g0s.13010208.99999999.262.ZlXUgO

That is a wrong product in the sese if you want to install a meter to measure battery you better install one with AH measurements
a cheap but reliable version is

https://www.aliexpress.com/store/product/DC-100v-50A-LCD-Combo-Meter-Wireless-Voltage-current-KWh-Watt-Meter-12v-24v-48v-Battery/2792045_32867047351.html?spm=2114.10010108.1000023.1.5a7958b8QLYjLV

if you want high quality but costly stuff then many suppliers here can sell you the Victron /Fangupson BMV 700/702-
https://www.victronenergy.com/battery-monitors/bmv-700

sinistrian:



The dry contact device (in my case, the BMV because I already had one) is connected to the battery terminals in series with a 10,000+ Ohm resistor (to reduce the energisation current, we can't be wasting precious battery power), as well as a normally-open DC-AC solid state relay (SSR). I chose a normally-open relay because I only want current passing through it when needed, as opposed to all the time.

.

The new BMV 712 has a latched contact which draws very little current when closed - I recently installed one for my lithiums as the drain on lithium is more serious issue than Lead acid

The bmv's contact can be connected directly to a contactor. No need for an intermediary relay. Add a 1A fuse in series to protect your equipment.

NiyiOmoIyunade:
Oga Sinistrian.

This is nice! Very nice and clear. You have managed to simplify a concept most find difficult to understand not to talk of explain.

Kudos and many thanks

Another simple design will be to use NC contact of BMV in series with a AC contactor coil. the AC contractor will be in the output of the inverter and the inverter if available can be set to power save mode So it uses minimum power from the battery when idling. Whenever the SOC is below the set value the BMV contact will open, the contactor coil will de-energize and output to the house will be disconnected

I had used similar scheme few years back but only to start the gen and disconnect heavy loads of the house.

Nowadays the Victron Quattro makes life much easier with it's dual output, Battery life algorithms and SOC based ESS - see my screenshot in the morning. The system will not allow washing machine unless SOC is 100 % but then the SOC can drop to 60 % before it will disconnect non-critical loads. forcing the family to start washing machine after 9 /10 am depending on the day . if the weather is bad and the battery cannot charge next day it will raise the lower limit to 65 and so on ensuring the batteries reach absorption every day and don't get abused

FOR SALE

EPEVER(itracer) MPPT CHARGE CONTROLLER 12/24/36/48V 60A

@100K

PLS CALL OLA ON 09057285592

Hello Team

I need an inverter. How do I go about it. Enough of the light whahala.

I need to power 2 fans, bulbs & TV set

pranil:


Another simple design will be to use NC contact of BMV in series with a AC contactor coil. the AC contractor will be in the output of the inverter and the inverter if available can be set to power save mode So it uses minimum power from the battery when idling. Whenever the SOC is below the set value the BMV contact will open, the contactor coil will de-energize and output to the house will be disconnected

I had used similar scheme few years back but only to start the gen and disconnect heavy loads of the house.

Nowadays the Victron Quattro makes life much easier with it's dual output, Battery life algorithms and SOC based ESS - see my screenshot in the morning. The system will not allow washing machine unless SOC is 100 % but then the SOC can drop to 60 % before it will disconnect non-critical loads. forcing the family to start washing machine after 9 /10 am depending on the day . if the weather is bad and the battery cannot charge next day it will raise the lower limit to 65 and so on ensuring the batteries reach absorption every day and don't get abused

This is brilliant... I saw what appears to be the Quattro's colour monitor component on solardepotng for 180k, but couldn't immediately see how fundamentally important its role could be. Many thanks for the education, pranil.

And thanks to you, hancock, for rolling out those relevant questions, to begin with.

........
P34c3
.....
...

Ogoli:
Hello Team

I need an inverter. How do I go about it. Enough of the light whahala.

I need to power 2 fans, bulbs & TV set

call/watapp 08117398294 for 1kva setup