₦airaland Forum

It's just 2pm and batteries are 100% charged. I will run the system down to 55% DOD tomorrow to simulate a worst case scenario, and see how the system will perform.

The screenshot below shows that by 8:50am, I already get up to 700W of power, where the system would be struggling to produce 300W prior to the reorganization.

Thanks to Zeestone, I have been able to get an improved yield from my panels using a combination of the following:
* Added 3 x 300W panels to the existing 1800W
* Oriented the panels from a shaded part of the compound to a more sunny one (still ground-mount though)
* Changed the panel arrangement from 2Sx3P to 3Sx3P (voc from 88V to 132V)

Statistics before:
* Controller wakes up at 7:30am
* Maximum power output is 1306W from a 1800W array
* Max output current ever was 21A
* Average daily ampHours generated is 38AH (even without loads on)
* Degraded output as from 3:15pm due to shading. Output drops to zero by 6:30pm

After reconfiguration:

* Controller starts working from 6:45am
* I've seen up to 1,897W and 26.4A output from the (now) 2700W array, and it's not even midday yet
* About 64.9AH already generated before 12 noon
* From 75% SOC, batteries (4 x 200AH, 48V) are already in absorb (which, for me, usually starts at approx 97%) by 11:30am
* Panels still receiving sunlight and generating up to 150W by 6:30pm as at yesterday evening (no shading)

Also, he organized a neat job for my backboard, considering the mess I put together by myself before

chris81964:
For some who have turned solar into a business. I have started to tell my story. How I started AWPS Renewable Energy LTD. I do periodic YouTube videos that I post to my personal page. I hope it is instructive and it teaches you to avoid some of the mistakes I made. Visit my blog and click on the embedded video link. Please share ideas on things that you did to make your business a success.
https://thengwacorner..com/

This is awesome, Chris!

nonoski:
The Inverter is Exulted Inverter 3.5Kva; The Charging Current is 53.4v and the charging current is 11.4A
The Solar Panels are also Exulted 300w rated (Voc 38.8v; Isc 10.21A) 12nr connected in 3S4P.

For now i believe the problem is the Inverter and 1 or 2 bad batteries.

I am making arrangements for Mustpower 5Kva Inveter then i change and increase my battery bank

Yes, that charging current is pretty low for your bank. If you're buying the mustpower, bear in mind the idle power consumption: its about 100W.

nonoski:
Lol
Why was the comment above me hidden?
Abi the person don commit

The post was mine. Dont know why it was hidden. And this is the third time.

I am concerned about what happens when the inverter feeds incoming mains (or generator power) directly to house appliances when it's in bypass mode. The other day my gen produced almost 290V and blew up the charging circuitry of my DC fans. Another time the voltage from PHCN was so low (it got as bad as 130VAC) the LED lights were barely providing any visibility, yet the inverter refused to take over. In both cases it just just fed the out-of-range voltage straight to house devices. I would like the inverter to only feed regulated power to appliances.

Pranil mentioned the AVS30 but it seems to only work with a range of 'acceptable' voltages - it doesn't step up/down and will just cut off if dirty power comes in. Would a 5kva relay-stabilizer (non-servo because i'm cutting costs and also because I don't mind the +/- 10% variation in output voltage) be appropriate to put in between mains power and a 3kva inverter proper?

For the developers here, if you want to use @Pranil's weather station to get your temperature/insolation stats, use the API url:

http://api.wunderground.com/api/<your api key>/conditions/q/pws:IABUJA3.xml
or
http://api.wunderground.com/api/<your api key>/conditions/q/pws:IABUJA3.json

NiyiOmoIyunade:
One general piece of info for MorningStar users.

The MS View software has a 'control reset' feature which is designed to restart the CC via software - I hear using this feature destroys the CC and MorningStar are yet to fix the flaw.

Indication is to manually disconnect or power down the CC and manually reconnect it to power it back up.

LOL to think I almost used this function yesterday when I was fiddling around with the settings.

My tristar seems to be absorbing at 56.8V, where I expected it to be at 57.6 (i.e. 14.4V x 4). The DIP switches 4,5 and 6 are set to OFF-ON-ON for AGM which - according to the manual - should give me 14.4V. Did I get it right?

babaegun:
@sinistrian

Can you throw more light on the bolded. Thanks.

Compare the two graphs below. The frequency of the troughs show how often the sweep is done, while the the depth/width of the troughs in the graph indicate how far it fell and how long it took to get back to Vmp.

The first one is the fangpusun with intermittent clouds passing over. Whenever it's overcast, the controller drops output and then starts hunting for the max power point. There is an annoying one around 2pm where it took a long time to get its wits together.

The second graph is for the tristar (low power output in the morning cos we were not home and all appliances were off). The troughs are not as deep/wide and yet they are more frequent, indicating that it detects the Vmp quickly after the clouds pass. This graph is not a great comparison as it wasn't too sunny today. But this result looks promising.

Very little sunshine here too. I was waiting to boast of the stats generated by my morningstar
Anyway, the only thing i can say for now is that the MPPT sweep is very very fast - like once a minute, you wont even notice it. No more starting from zero like the Fangpusun 150/70.

mank1234:
What's the total solar panel wattage connected to this charge controller?

Currently 1.8KW but I'm adding another 900W when I sort out where to put them

NiyiOmoIyunade:
Congratulations Sir and welcome to the club.

With the MorningStar, you will now see clearly that 'charge controller pass charge controller'.

Please come back and give the house your reviews soon and if perchance you have any questions about any aspects e.g. custom programming, please do not hesitate to ask.

I am assuming you will want to monitor your system performance at some point? Instead of buying that TS-M-2 or remote meter with their sickly yellow screen - just get yourself an RJ45 crossover aka network cable and connect directly to your PC - the cable costs under $10 and is also commonly available in Lagos (Computer Village).

Via PC you get access to convenient live monitoring as well as data logs with many parameters of interest conveniently on display.

Thanks for this Niyi. While trying to get m monitoring software to read this data, i discovered there's an API over the network cable that can give me much more info . Documentation is here: http://www.morningstarcorp.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/TSMPPT.APP_.Modbus.EN_.10.2.pdf

The api (for the programmers here) can be called via a regular web request to http://tsmppt<your serial>/MBCSV.cgi?ID=1&F=4&AHI=0&ALO=0&RHI=0&RLO=80

sharks776:
How much?

150k

Just picked up the Morningstar TS-MPPT-60 from @Ola28. Yes, it's the 60Amp Tristar Mppt and yes, it was the same price.

kiekie1:
Good morning Boss ,
Nice professional tools you got there ! As for me, i use and also sell handy true rms Uni-T 210 & 203 DC clamp meters which gives me accurate reading !

How much is your DC clamp meter?

pranil:
I used to use SCR for my generator changeover but they tend to get pretty hot and are quite lossy ( apart from switching surges)

Victron has a product called battery protect which does the same thing around 55,000 NGN

https://www.victronenergy.com/battery_protect/battery-protect

Yeah, I saw it too. It was the price that chased me away

pranil:
basic data -

<a href="http://www.wunderground.com/weatherstation/WXDailyHistory.asp?ID=IABUJA3"><img src="http://banners.wunderground.com/cgi-bin/banner/ban/wxBanner?bannertype=pws250_metric&weatherstationcount=IABUJA3" width="250" height="150" border="0" alt="Weather Underground PWS IABUJA3"></a>

or API - be7fc5493e144f07 ( https://www.wunderground.com/weather/api)

If you find a suitable application let me know as most of them don't show solar DATA - I resorted to using WEEWX ( http://www.weewx.com/) on raspberry pi and remote VNC whenever required . The vnc acess allows me to check ICC for ipower and victron venusGX in one location

Thanks for the link. I'm using a local install of emoncms, so I wrote some php scripts to extract data from my inverter and feed into it. The wunderground api will be useful to compare actual insolation with production from my panels

NiyiOmoIyunade:
Nice one Sir.

Does this disconnect the loads on the AC or DC side?

The wiring does not look very beefy to carry DC amps.

I have been looking for a DIY device such as this for a long time but alas never found the time to make one up or perhaps my power electronics skills have gone rusty

Will reach out to you privately to discuss further.

The disconnect happens on the AC side (inverter output)

I just finished constructing my Low-Battery disconnect device (actually it's just a pair of relays) and testing it now. It will be controlled by a BMV-702, but i'm simulating the DC voltage from a 7ah battery. Looks like it's working pretty well.

pranil:
you can always check actual solar insolation from my weather monitor ( installed in Wuse 2)

https://www.wunderground.com/personal-weather-station/dashboard?ID=IABUJA3

Thank you for this pranil. Any endpoint/api i can integrate into my own monitoring system?

dapsyra:
Today will go down in history as my poorest harvest since I ventured into renewable energy more than 10years ago.

There was just NO SUN in Abuja today. It rained almost all day.

I managed to harvest a meagre 3.000kWh ==> an efficiency of 0.667kWh/kW.

I have never had it so bad!

Well, at least you got your panels cleaned for free

HeartforGod:
I may be needing it. Want to confirm with the end-user if he is okay with the idle power consumption.
Can you send me your whatsapp mobile? to my email clennyng@gmail.com

it

You've got mail

Barezzi:
Agc (amazon gift cards) or amazon checkout.
1. Buy agc at between 275 and 290 N/$ depending on the merchant.
2. Redeem in your amazon account.
3. Purchase away with reckless abandon... Lol

I need to try this out

makavele:
Per chance; do you happen to know the idle watt-consumption of the inverter ?

Thanks

It's a little over 80W if you don't enable power saver' mode.

mank1234:
If the tristar is the MPPT version, then your price ($417 @ N360 per $) is more than $100 below what is listed on Amazon US exclusive of shipping.

I'm highly interested in the morningstar

HeartforGod:
Hi Sinistrian, I emailed you bout this inverter. Is it still available?

Oh, I didn't see the email. Yes it's still available.

mcTrinity:
I also noticed something that shocks me with this hybrid system. At any point in time, If the load capacity becomes less than the solar power, the Inverter won't charge the battery. there were times that the solar power was showing around 2.7kw but the load capacity was around 2.9kw and the charger wasn't coming on. it only comes on once the solar power excess that of the load. Can you just imagine that!!! 2.7kw and battery won't charge.!!! this was monitored for 4hrs and the inverter charger keeps coming on and off depending on whether the solar power is greater or less than the load capacity.

That's the way they were designed to work. It only dumps excess power from the panels to the batteries after using up what it needs for the load.

bigrovar:
victron bluesolar or fangpusun

Na fangpusun o. My wallet cannot carry Victron products yet.