Growatt Fault code 04

My 6k growatt inverter keeps getting fault code 04 and shutting down.
First time was 35mins battery only.
Second time was 1 hour and 45mins my guess is that my bms is Tripping for some reason or is this the inverter?
Any help on what to do would be awesome.
It’s very difficult to get the inverter to boot on.
I have 240v ac input.
I have 1v-5v coming from 48v battery.
The Battery I think goes into a protective mode once warning indicator 04 shows up.
To wake the battery you’re supposed to power on battery via wake up signal from inverter.
Not working very well. Weird. Please help if anyone has any input.

The inverter is indicating that the battery has gone into protection mode. Could be many things that caused it.
Over voltage from charging.
Under voltage from discharging.
Overload from drawing too many amps.

I forgot, how many batteries are you running? eg4 LiFePower4? SOC? Current draw? Lot of stuff figures into the equation. As Tim mentions, code4 may be the result of the battery going into protect mode.

Kornbread said:

I forgot, how many batteries are you running? eg4 LiFePower4? SOC? Current draw? Lot of stuff figures into the equation. As Tim mentions, code4 may be the result of the battery going into protect mode.


View attachment 104803

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I have one 100amp hour growatt AXE c-1 battery.

Kornbread said:

I forgot, how many batteries are you running? eg4 LiFePower4? SOC? Current draw? Lot of stuff figures into the equation. As Tim mentions, code4 may be the result of the battery going into protect mode.


View attachment 104803

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Soc at time off shut off and code was around %80 I’m trying to discharge to %30

Kornbread said:

I forgot, how many batteries are you running? eg4 LiFePower4? SOC? Current draw? Lot of stuff figures into the equation. As Tim mentions, code4 may be the result of the battery going into protect mode.


View attachment 104803

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Current draw was around 400- 500w

timselectric said:

The inverter is indicating that the battery has gone into protection mode. Could be many things that caused it.
Over voltage from charging.
Under voltage from discharging.
Overload from drawing too many amps.

Click to expand...

How do I get it out of protection mode? The battery’s only giving me 1-5v at the moment.
To wake the battery the manual states to power on the PCS.
I’ve done this a few times this way now but it’s very inconsistent. Sometimes it’s working…sometimes it’s not.
Ac input is %100 hooked up correctly. That’s the one thing I’m sure of.
Me and this battery are having issues is what this is coming down to.
I wish I bought two of the eG4 batteries opposed to one of these stupid bricks.
It seems like more people use eG4 successfully.

I'm not familiar with that battery. So I'm not sure how to reset it.

Thankyou as always regardless for the response.

Does not sound like soc or draw were at play. Plenty of issues with the eg4 LiFePower4 going into protect mode. Wonder if axe is made by the same company with same internals? Are the battery and inverter communicating? Was going to look at specs but no longer see the axe battery on SigSolar's site.

Kornbread said:

Does not sound like soc or draw were at play. Plenty of issues with the eg4 LiFePower4 going into protect mode. Wonder if axe is made by the same company with same internals? Are the battery and inverter communicating? Was going to look at specs but no longer see the axe battery on SigSolar's site.

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I believe they’re the same company. I’m glad you said that because I was interested in two of those eg4 LiFePower4 batteries.

I noticed I could stop this fault code 04 from appearing if I shut off one of my ac breakers in my panel ….the breaker is for one led light and a dewalt tools battery charger. Strange.

Battery also wouldn’t charge passed %86 reading 43.0v at battery with ac input connected and “charging” battery.

I honestly think I have a defective battery.

The eg4 short circuit protection issue seems to be hit or miss. Knock on wood, I've never had an issue with it. SigSolar is reportedly in the process of an update to alleviate the problem, but I think they're finding that working with their Chinese supplier is not the easiest of ventures. Some have reported issues with cell balance going awry after a few cloudy days. On the basic eg4, the funny looking three way breaker also shuts off the bms. Around 3 minutes in, Will shows the precharge/reset procedure. May not help with the axe, but worth a shot.

Are you using communications between inverter and battery?
Does the axe battery come with monitoring software? It would be interesting to know cell voltages.

Do all the problems go away when the one ac breaker is off? (edit: I should have asked if all the problems are alleviated and remain so when that one breaker is turned off?)

Kornbread said:

The eg4 short circuit protection issue seems to be hit or miss. Knock on wood, I've never had an issue with it. SigSolar is reportedly in the process of an update to alleviate the problem, but I think they're finding that working with their Chinese supplier is not the easiest of ventures. Some have reported issues with cell balance going awry after a few cloudy days. On the basic eg4, the funny looking three way breaker also shuts off the bms. Around 3 minutes in, Will shows the precharge/reset procedure. May not help with the axe, but worth a shot.

Are you using communications between inverter and battery?
Does the axe battery come with monitoring software? It would be interesting to know cell voltages.

Do all the problems go away when the one ac breaker is off?

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Reset procedure is similar. Instead of holding the bms reset like Will showed in the video. With this growatt AXE c-1 you just press it once and then the battery powers off and you get one flash of a green light on the RUN/ALARM light.
I’m assuming this means the reset was successful.
Power on battery. All should be good.
Not in my case though.
I have some type of inconsistency here.
Sometimes it powers on and works for a little while.
Sometimes it doesn’t power on at all.
Battery is at %86 SOC according to the growatt inverter.
Last night I was attempting to charge the battery via AC input and the battery wouldn’t budge passed %86 SOC. Reading 42.1v on inverter.
I shut everything off and went to bed with no power. I’m used to it…at this point electricity is a luxury for me.
This morning I wake up and the first thing I do is power on the battery and I see all my blue SOC led lights illuminated …4 in total. Green led flashes momentarily And then stays solid green.
Okay this is when you can turn the inverter on!
I flick the switch and it powers on!
15 minutes later I get FAULT CODE 03
High battery voltage?!?!
Battery is now showing 53ish volts
Still %86 charge.
I powered everything down.
Now I’m going to go grab a coffee followed by yelling at a tree in the woods.
Any help would be appreciated.
I wish I could plug a cable in and monitor the cells and see what’s actually going on inside this battery but as of now I’m not sure if that’s possible. The manual doesn’t say anything about that. I wish it did

I'm sure you probably already have the user's manual but if it helps anyone; Growatt AXE manual I see no mention of any kind of battery monitoring software.

It sounds as if you do have them communicating. Is the communication cable correctly wired? This has been a problem on other batteries and as we have found out in the past, the manual, either manual, can be found lacking. Maybe do away with the coms cable and use use/us2 settings. If going this route, you will have to manually set parameters.

53 volts should be in the flat part of the curve. The inverter was showing 86% soc and reading 42.1volt? Fishy.

Where is dealer support in all this?

It sounds like the BMS is not working/ or at least communicating correctly.

Kornbread said:

I'm sure you probably already have the user's manual but if it helps anyone; Growatt AXE manual I see no mention of any kind of battery monitoring software.

It sounds as if you do have them communicating. Is the communication cable correctly wired? This has been a problem on other batteries and as we have found out in the past, the manual, either manual, can be found lacking. Maybe do away with the coms cable and use use/us2 settings. If going this route, you will have to manually set parameters.

53 volts should be in the flat part of the curve. The inverter was showing 86% soc and reading 42.1volt? Fishy.

Where is dealer support in all this?
View attachment 104920

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Dealer is Signiture solar and I’m not getting the kinda help I need because they aren’t familiar with this battery even though they sold it to me.

I’m afraid of setting the parameters manually because I personally don’t know how to do it efficiently in real time. I also don’t know what to do if a problem where to occur from doing that.
I thought about that but was reluctant to doing so because I’m not qualified…yet.
I’m willing to do anything that sigsolar tells me to do.
They told me to update my firmware in my 6k growatt inverter.
But why?
Also how do they know it’s not the most up to date version?
I purchased the inverter from watts247 and I’m %99 sure that the inverter is performing properly.
Ian is also pretty helpful with any inverter related issues.
I think I’ve got a battery issue and sigsolar is trying to make it an inverter issue instead of addressing whats really going on.

If I were running the company I would be plugging a GROWATT 6k into one of these GROWATT AXE batteries that I’m selling and I would assure that it’ll work properly for the individuals whom are buying the products.

I also find it fishy how these are removed from their website now. I asked about it and they said someone bought 80 overnight.
I feel bad for whoever bought 400kwh of these

I also found SigSolar's customer service to be a bit lacking. Open a ticket with them and push em'. Be mindful, they have some small print that stipulates you pay shipping and a restocking fee on returned items.
Thinking out loud ... if the com cable is wired incorrectly, what is the result, flaky data or it simply does not work?
IIRC, for the software version, scroll through the inverter menu and the last few programs will show the software version. IIRC, you need windows7 to update, not sure about this so you will need to check. And yeah, I see no mention of it in the krappy user's manual.
Although not specifically for the spfxxxxt, I found this video helpful for the settings. Charge settings ... yeah, since I discovered the factory preprogrammed settings take the battery up to 58volts, I will be disconnecting communication and using my own settings.
Don't recall what you are using to monitor the inverter, but I really like Solar Assistant . It's easy to understand, use, setup, and so far reliable. Much better than the krap monitoring software the inverter manu supplies.
.

Kornbread said:

I'm sure you probably already have the user's manual but if it helps anyone; Growatt AXE manual I see no mention of any kind of battery monitoring software.

It sounds as if you do have them communicating. Is the communication cable correctly wired? This has been a problem on other batteries and as we have found out in the past, the manual, either manual, can be found lacking. Maybe do away with the coms cable and use use/us2 settings. If going this route, you will have to manually set parameters.

53 volts should be in the flat part of the curve. The inverter was showing 86% soc and reading 42.1volt? Fishy.

Where is dealer support in all this?
View attachment 104920

Click to expand...

Dealer is Signiture solar and I’m not getting the kinda help I need because they aren’t familiar with this battery even though they sold it to me.

I’m afraid of setting the parameters manually because I personally don’t know how to do it efficiently in real time. I also don’t know what to do if a problem where to occur from doing that.
I thought about that but was reluctant to doing so because I’m not qualified…yet.
I’m willing to do anything that sigsolar tells me to do.
They told me to update my firmware in my 6k growatt inverter.
But why?
Also how do they know it’s not the most up to date version?
I purchased the inverter from watts247 and I’m %99 sure that the inverter is performing properly.
Ian is also pretty helpful with any inverter related issues.
I think I’ve got a battery issue and sigsolar is trying to make it an inverter issue instead of addressing whats really going on.

If I were running the company I would be plugging a GROWATT 6k into one of these GROWATT AXE batteries that I’m selling and I would assure that it’ll work properly for the individuals whom are buying the products.

I also find it fishy how these are removed from their website now. I asked about it and they said someone bought 80 overnight.
I feel bad for whoever bought 400kwh of these

timselectric said:

It sounds like the BMS is not working/ or at least communicating correctly.

Click to expand...

That’s what I’m thinking as well. How do I verify that it’s working properly? I feel like that should be mandatory. I dislike this Battery management system that you can’t physically observe.

Without being able to look at the data from the BMS. Or having a second battery and inverter to check against.
I don't know

Kornbread said:

Don't recall what you are using to monitor the inverter, but I really like Solar Assistant . It's easy to understand, use, setup, and so far reliable. Much better than the krap monitoring software the inverter manu supplies.

Click to expand...

Hey thanks for that!
I just looked into them!
I’m definitely interested.

timselectric said:

Without being able to look at the data from the BMS. Or having a second battery and inverter to check against.
I don't know

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yeah thats where im at. i should be able to look at these cells.

Mannfamilywoodworks said:

yeah thats where im at. i should be able to look at these cells.

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Agreed

I also use Solar Assistant. I don't think that I would want to live without it, now. lol

timselectric said:

I also use Solar Assistant. I don't think that I would want to live without it, now. lol

Click to expand...

I’ll check it out more in depth this week.