Back up generator overload?

[JonL]

I did read through some things, but a lot of it I don’t understand. I have eight Battle Born Batteries tied in series parallel for a 48 V configuration. I have just updated my inverter from a 24 V Victron 3000 to 48 V Victron 5000.
I have a Generac IQ 3500 gas generator.
My inverter is set to 60 Hz, which, from what I can gather might be too high? Unfortunately, I don’t own a PC to change it or Microsoft software.
Anyway, it keeps overloading the generator so I have to turn it off before it may damage it!
I may have already destroyed one generator, so I don’t want to do do another one.
Below are some photographs of my equipment & connectors to the generator. I even bought a ground plug, which didn’t make any difference on the overload, using both 30 amp plug on the generator and the one 10 outlets. Any configuration caused overload. Any help would be appreciated greatly! ?

 

[Rednecktek]

You're going to want to re-configure the Victron to 50a or less of AC charging and just use the 30a plug on the generator. That should solve the overloading problem. The generator is only going to be able to put out about 26a of continuous load but the Victron is going to be trying to draw over 30 if it can.

 

[JonL]

Thank you! Now I just got to find a way to change the settings. Looks like I need to hire somebody. ? i’ve called around before, but there doesn’t seem to be many electricians who understand solar. ?

 

[Rednecktek]

So I took a look through the instructions and it can be set via the DIP switches on Page 24.



I would try setting it to Off/On/Off for 25a and see how stable it is. By default it's trying to draw 50a worth from the generator and your genny is telling you to piss off. If that holds stable you can try bringing it up 5a at a time on the DIP switches until the genny gets mad.

 

[JonL]

So I took a look through the instructions and it can be set via the DIP switches on Page 24.

View attachment 120301

I would try setting it to Off/On/Off for 25a and see how stable it is. By default it's trying to draw 50a worth from the generator and your genny is telling you to piss off. If that holds stable you can try bringing it up 5a at a time on the DIP switches until the genny gets mad.

Awesome thank you! ??

 

[time2roll]

I love low tech solutions Let us know how it works.

 

[JonL]

I love low tech solutions Let us know how it works.

Well, after solving some other issues with my inverter, I found out that the best way to get my gas generator working probably wasn’t the way you think!
After contacting Battle Born Batteries, and having them, tell me that I really needed to get a computer with Microsoft to change the settings. Unfortunately, I don’t have or should I say fortunately a Microsoft machine, only ever used Apple! I guess they weren’t too sure about me using just dip switches, as it might affect some other settings?
Anyway, here’s the fix: I removed all the wires from AC1 in and moved them to AC2 in. The amperage setting was half of that of number one. Remember that number one was 60 A and number two was at 30 A. I hooked up the gas generator and only wanted to charge the batteries, but it would not do it without me turning on the whole inverter. That’s probably one of the settings they’re talking about as far as needing to change with software. So since I could not just charge the batteries alone, I turned the inverter on and charged them that way. This way AC2 works fine, perhaps it’s a default, when AC1 is off-line. I was told by battleborn that I probably need some kind of switch. Turns out it just went on by default.
I had to adjust the amperage down from 30 A to 25 A, because the generator was on overload, as it’s only at 3500 Generac. I ran it for about 4 hours in order to test how everything went. So far so good! ?