Victron app question

Hello, I have a 100|30 controller and was curious about one one the settings. On the main page there is a "Solar" section with Voltage and current. I have a 200 w panel and I am showing 19-20v. Sometimes I show the full current values of around 10-11amps. Other times , same voltage , less that 1 amp. I do see that when the battery is pretty much full this happens. I am a nubie but this is kinda confusing. If you have a section showing just solar output wouldn't these values be determined by panel output only? Thx for the help.

Mike

Think of those values as input values to the solar charge controller. It's drawing a very small amount of amps from the source PV because the battery is full.

As the battery gets near to full, the difference between the voltage developed by the controller and the voltage 'stored' in the battery reduces. As a result the current that the battery can accept falls to a lower value. Eventually when the battery is completly full, the current into the battery will fall to zero or a very low value.
Since the controller now needs less energy from the solar panel, the current from the panel will fall. The controller 'load' on the panel determines the panel current.

Mike

wntrhwk said:

If you have a section showing just solar output wouldn't these values be determined by panel output only? Thx for the help.

Click to expand...

Solar panels don't push power to the SCC. The SCC only draws the amount of power it actually needs at the moment, up to the max amount of power the panel can produce under the current solar conditions.

So the section showing "just solar output" isn't showing solar output, it's showing solar input being drawn by the SCC.

Think of a solar panel like an electrical socket in your house. Just because the socket is capable of providing, for example, 120V at 15A doesn't mean it is pushing that much. Plug in a 60W light and the light only draws 120V at 0.5A for its needed 60W of power. Same with your 200W solar panel. It may be capable of producing up to 200W (at roughly 20V at 10A) but if the SCC only needs 30W at the moment then it only draws 30W (at maybe 20V and 1.5A), not 200W. The SCC then converts that 30W into its output voltage and corresponding amperage (maybe 13.6V and 2.2A).

Thx everyone, makes complete sense now. I appreciate the reply's.

Mike