robby
Photon Vampire
- Joined
- May 1, 2021
- Messages
- 4,118
First of all as I stated, Sol-Ark says there is a bug in the "Load First option", it either works for some people or it doesn't.I'm not sure about this. I turned off Battery First a couple of days ago at Sol-Ark's suggestion, but the issue remains. Consider the following images, taken just now (3:34a PST).
Image 1 shows the current that my home is drawing (~500w) and that I'm getting it from the grid. The battery is at 98%
Image 2 shows the current TOU settings, with TOU not enabled. Notice that between midnight and 7a, I have TOU setup so that, if enabled, it will draw from the battery _up to_ 2510w to power the home until the battery reaches 85%. My home consumes nowhere near this, but larger max wattage settings make the effect I'm trying to demonstrate much easier to see. Since right now said home is using ~500w, which is well under 2510w, my understanding is that if I enable TOU now, the Sol-Ark will _stop_ drawing from the grid and draw the ~500w that the home is currently using from the battery.
Image 3 is me enabling TOU.
Image 4, taken just a few seconds after I enabled TOU, shows what the Sol-Ark _actually_ does. Notice that it's _still_ drawing ~540w from the grid, but now suddenly it shows that my home is drawing 2.84kw, though nothing in my home turned on to account for the load increase. Also notice that the Sol-Ark now reports that the battery is supplying 4.66kw to ... something, somewhere (the indicators one the batteries themselves also show this). It's as if the Sol-Ark _created_ a "phantom" load to consume from the battery. The size of the load it created (~2300w) is approximately the size of the max wattage I have setup for this TOU slot (2510w). I've verified this with different experiments using different max wattage settings for the TOU slot.
Image 5, taken just a few seconds after image 4, is after I once again disabled TOU. The Sol-Ark goes back to displaying that my home is drawing ~500w, and the grid is supplying it. The load-from-nowhere is now gone.
So, my questions:
1. When I enable TOU, why does the Sol-Ark continue drawing from the grid even though there is plenty of battery?
2. When I enable TOU, why is the Sol-Ark creating this "phantom" load to draw 2.84kw when my home was only consuming ~500w just seconds before?
3. When I enable TOU, why is the Sol-Ark drawing even more from the battery (4.66kw) than the "phantom" load (2.84kw) requires?
4. If my home is actually drawing 2.84kw (it's not), why does it suddenly return to only drawing ~500w as soon as I disable TOU?
So far, Sol-Ark support hasn't been able to answer, though they are honestly trying their best. I'm on the phone with them every day and they are very courteous, personable and helpful - seriously they rock and are really doing everything they can to help. They're telling me that my system shouldn't be doing this. They've tried 3 different firmware versions, but the behavior is the same. The current diagnosis suggests that the CTs are not operating correctly or are installed incorrectly. They've had me switch the CT leads inside the Sol-Ark (I'm not touching anything inside the main panel - I let the installer do the high-voltage stuff) and tell the Sol-Ark to detect the sensors multiple times, to no avail. I believe we're going to schedule a Zoom call later today so I can show them how the installer wired the CTs, as well as anything else they need.
Second thing is that I am not sure why you have "Limited Power to home" ticked? That changes the ball game completely. You want "Limited Power to Load" ticked if you want the battery to be using the TOU schedule in the way I described.
Don't get frustrated, this thing takes a few hours of fiddling with but after that it becomes really clear how it operates.
BTW what Battery combiner box is that in the picture, it looks really nice?
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