I've just installed a combined 3kW 24V solar controller/inverter that I bought from Amazon. It has an LCD config screen and RS232 data i/f.
Seems kind of generic. No software came with it despite reference to a CD so I went hunting and found Watchpower 1.14 (I'm quite new to this).
Installed and connected OK and yesterday I grabbed a day of data, exported to Excel and took a look.
My objective is to end up with an answer to 'so how much am I saving' by determining what % of the load is provided by solar/battery compared with how it would be if I were running straight from my 240V main. ( Feb in UK, the answer will likely be "not much" but hey-ho )
I haven't worked that bit out yet but was puzzzled by why the "PV input power" column is always zero when I would guess it should be the product of the V and A.
Also, the "Battery capacity" values don't look sensible, particularly when switching to line mode and increasing to 100% in a few minutes which can't be right.
Are these just bugs/features/limitations of Watchpower or have I missed something please?
Also, are there any other similar programs/apps that might be better? I'm currently using RS232 but have a RS232->WiFi adapter on order to hopefuly network-enable.
Many thanks for any thoughts.
Regards,
Bernie (UK)
Seems kind of generic. No software came with it despite reference to a CD so I went hunting and found Watchpower 1.14 (I'm quite new to this).
Installed and connected OK and yesterday I grabbed a day of data, exported to Excel and took a look.
My objective is to end up with an answer to 'so how much am I saving' by determining what % of the load is provided by solar/battery compared with how it would be if I were running straight from my 240V main. ( Feb in UK, the answer will likely be "not much" but hey-ho )
I haven't worked that bit out yet but was puzzzled by why the "PV input power" column is always zero when I would guess it should be the product of the V and A.
Also, the "Battery capacity" values don't look sensible, particularly when switching to line mode and increasing to 100% in a few minutes which can't be right.
Are these just bugs/features/limitations of Watchpower or have I missed something please?
Also, are there any other similar programs/apps that might be better? I'm currently using RS232 but have a RS232->WiFi adapter on order to hopefuly network-enable.
Many thanks for any thoughts.
Regards,
Bernie (UK)