New 10kw NHX AIO From Watts247
- Thread starter Kornbread
- Start date
42OhmsPA
What's in a title?
Time to use the clamp meter and verify.
What's measuring the battery? Looks like 23a draw to me.
How is the load being measured? All through the inverter?
ok that makes sense. I was thinking real solar wire. there's not much that I do that I use thhn single strand for. my ac is usually romex or mc and solar is use2. I was starting to wonder how you where finding solar wire for those prices.
Zwy
Emperor Of Solar
How much was freight? I've found slightly lower prices but shipping was always the killer. Similar to buying solar panels, the shipping is the deal killer.
I bought 6 rolls of 10AWG 500 feet from Menards before copper took off here for $129 per roll and received the 11% rebate on that. Recently copper has taken off due to the futures market in a squeeze on copper short positions.
Yesterday, I disabled the "Grid Charge Enabled" option on the unit. To review, this has grid and battery but no PV so far and is intended to operate as a backup UPS for now.
Surprisingly, this made no difference. The unit still cycles between discharging the battery and charging it back up every few seconds despite having grid power the entire time.
On a daily basis, I am doing about 1-2 KWH of battery charging and discharging while the battery maintains an SoC of 99% or better. This wastes energy and wears out the battery somewhat faster, so I am trying to configure the unit to behave more sanely but failing so far.
I am at a loss to understand what "Grid Charge Enabled" means if it doesn't control grid charging of the battery. Any ideas?
Mike C.
Surprisingly, this made no difference. The unit still cycles between discharging the battery and charging it back up every few seconds despite having grid power the entire time.
On a daily basis, I am doing about 1-2 KWH of battery charging and discharging while the battery maintains an SoC of 99% or better. This wastes energy and wears out the battery somewhat faster, so I am trying to configure the unit to behave more sanely but failing so far.
I am at a loss to understand what "Grid Charge Enabled" means if it doesn't control grid charging of the battery. Any ideas?
Mike C.
Adam De Lay
Solar Wizard
Since "Grid Charge Enabled" is supposed to be a "global feature" I would think it should override anything else. I know I have that disabled, but I'm not in "batt priority" mode.
If you switch to a different mode, does grid charging stop?
Adam De Lay
Solar Wizard
Are you actually in self-consumption mode (I know SA shows that but there's other options that it doesn't have the ability to display) where you're back-feeding your grid panel?
I am in "Battery Priority" mode. "Backup Enabled" checked. "Sell Enabled" unchecked (must not back feed grid at all), "TOU Enable" unchecked.
I did not go for "Self Consumption" because it was described as using the battery first before grid, which is definitely NOT what I want. The battery should remained charged and be used only on grid down. "Peak Shift" is clearly not what I am after, either. The so called "Advanced Mode" options are disabled. "Sell First" makes no sense even if I had PV. "Limit Consumption" is confusing, I don't know what it does. "Zero Export" is dangerous since it can leak out some grid export on load changes (absolutely can't do that) and I don't want the battery powering the system until the grid fails anyway.
So "Battery Priority" seemed like the best fit for the present use case of a backup panel UPS.
Overall, the software and manual are not well written when it comes to clearly configuring this unit. You can't be sure what the settings do, and even when it seems clear, like "Grid Charge Enable", it doesn't seem to do as you expect.
Further complicating my experiments is that I am now remote from the system and the Solarman app seems to lack any ability to change the configuration remotely, which is disappointing. The only way I can get things changed is by talking to someone at the site with step by step directions on what to push and enter. This is risky since inadvertent parameter changes could result in grid export or power failure.
Mike C.
Adam De Lay
Solar Wizard
Yeah from looking at all the different modes I would think that Batt Priority would be what you need but it has to be overriding the Grid Charge Enabled (which is odd since it's supposed to be a global param).
I looked a SolarMan and was disappointed as well. The place you're supposed to be able to make changes doesn't exist for this inverter. Wonder if thats intentional to make you want to use Solar Assistant? Course even all the config options aren't available in SA either.
Yep, just have to stay awake long enough to catch it.
$75 and free shipping for 200' temco 12awg solar wire
Battery stats are what is being sent to SolarAssistant by the JK bms's. Load and solar are from the inverter.
Yep, copper is up. Freight was $9.99 for the first roll, free on the second. $180 total ... have to pay taxes.
Everything is ran except ct's but the breakers to grid are off.
Zwy
Emperor Of Solar
Around $0.40/foot is about normal price.
Did you unroll it and measure it to make sure is it 500 feet?Yep, copper is up. Freight was $9.99 for the first roll, free on the second. $180 total ... have to pay taxes.
My cost on the 6 rolls was $115 per roll. Plus sales tax of course. I can remember buying 12AWG UF 250 feet for about $30 bucks years ago. Things sure have changed. When copper prices drop, I will pick up a roll now and then and just stockpile it. I was remodeling the house and building the shop back in 2008 thru 2010 and had a nice pile left over. Was a good price back then but not as good as mid 80's. Haven't used it all yet.
So, the battery draw SA shows is correct. SA showed the battery drawing ~1200w, roughly 23amps, which the ammeter confirmed, but SA was only showing a load of ~600w, as did the nhx display. Don't think this equals a 23amp battery draw. Where are the other 600w? Was not able measure the actual ac loads since all wiring is covered and it's time to go to work. The rhythmic load spikes are the ac compressor cycling.
xx
xx
xxmy brother picked up one, and has found one flaw that Ian did confirm. Battery charge current doesn't work right unless set at 190 amps or less. so while you can have 16kw of panels hooked up. only about 10kw of battery charging is available. Apparently you can still use the rest to power loads or sell back if grid tied, but setting the battery charge amps to 195 lead to odd behavior and limited actual charging to 20amps. Ian advised to set it back to 190 max and it started properly tracking.
cs1234
Solar Wizard
- Joined
- May 9, 2022
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Sounds like it's time to get two so he can use all that power!
What type of load is this?
Actually this is just his experimental side project, his main array is 44kw. his main system is has 4 sunny islands and outback flexmax 100 mppts. also just to clarify, he didn't have enough panels hooked up to put out 15kw of power, but just setting the max charge amps above 190 caused the system to limit charging to 20a max.
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42OhmsPA
What's in a title?
That's interesting.
Do you have anything powered directly off the DC bus besides the NHX?
Until you can confirm the AC side we can only assume it's efficiency losses, which I find hard to believe, so I'll say reporting errors.
This is all skrewed up. Amp readings taken with clamp meter Ames cm1000a Ames Manual Accuracy " ... DC Current Accuracy ± 2.0% of rdg + 8D ".
Measured 3.9amps@120vac on L1 = ~468w. nhx says 202w.
Measured 1.25amps@120vac on L2 =~150w. nhx says 137w.
Measured 11.04amps@120vac on L1 =~1325w. nhx says 5.4amps and 592w.
Measured 8.34amps@120vac on L2 =~1001w. nhx says 1.2amps and 132w.
PV turned off, battery amp draw was 32.8amps@53.5vdc =~1755w. SolarAssistant reports, from the jk bms's, 31amp draw.
Ames clamp meter this inaccurate at such low amperages. It was on the lowest range, or is something else fishy?
Measured 3.9amps@120vac on L1 = ~468w. nhx says 202w.
Measured 1.25amps@120vac on L2 =~150w. nhx says 137w.
Measured 11.04amps@120vac on L1 =~1325w. nhx says 5.4amps and 592w.
Measured 8.34amps@120vac on L2 =~1001w. nhx says 1.2amps and 132w.
PV turned off, battery amp draw was 32.8amps@53.5vdc =~1755w. SolarAssistant reports, from the jk bms's, 31amp draw.
Ames clamp meter this inaccurate at such low amperages. It was on the lowest range, or is something else fishy?
Wow! Some of those readings are way off
The inverter is showing how much power its inverting, not how much it's pulling from the battery so the battery type does not matter
42OhmsPA
What's in a title?
Meter reading is close to the BMS reading on DC side, correct?
Not really seeing this having a bearing on how the inverter calculates ac output. Am I missing something?
Yes. 31amp draw reported from bms's, 32.8amp draw on clamp meter. bms rounds 31.4 down to 31amps so yeah, it's pretty close to the margin of error for the clamp meter.