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Bricked EASun SMW8k inverter during FW upgrade

Thanks for the info @Hristo .

I have a contactor (OWON 32A Zigbee switch/energy meter) on both input and output of the inverter so I can easily isolate the inverter from the grid whenever I want but I find it a bit safer to always have the inverter supplied with 230VAC, that way it uses the grid if it needs to without my control...

As much as possible, I use the SBU mode but whenever the sun is letting me down, I switch to USB to charge the batteries in the cheapest hours or whenever needed if batteries are about to be empty. Very easy for me to only supply the inverter when needed but I don't know if that helps at all.

Easun 24 hour support is absolutely NO SUPPORT AT ALL. For 12 days now, they have sent me 2 or 3 messages of no value at all.

It's almost impossible to get hold of new inverters like these nowadays but I found some "SP24 Axpert Max II 10K-48 10000 Watt 48 Volt Inverter Off Grid Solar Island" in Italy and one of them is due to arrive on my doorstep in 3 days (monday).
 
Congratulations @SveinHa SP24 Axpert Max II 10K-48 10000 Watt 48 Volt is listed as a higher class Voltronic OEM than EAsun who also use Voltronic Factories to fabricate their products, but are a bit on the lower quality (and difficult support class). By the way the Italian guys from Solarpower24.it should have decent support and may be able to assist you with bringing back to life your SMW 8kw as they offer the SP24 Primo Axpert MAX 8000 and Voltronic Axpert MAX 8000 (those are quite similar with EAsun Isolar SMW 8kw, but supposed to be better quality) ..... and for the records since 18th of July I still have no response to my technical questions to EAsun support :)
 
Congratulations @SveinHa SP24 Axpert Max II 10K-48 10000 Watt 48 Volt is listed as a higher class Voltronic OEM than EAsun who also use Voltronic Factories to fabricate their products, but are a bit on the lower quality (and difficult support class). By the way the Italian guys from Solarpower24.it should have decent support and may be able to assist you with bringing back to life your SMW 8kw as they offer the SP24 Primo Axpert MAX 8000 and Voltronic Axpert MAX 8000 (those are quite similar with EAsun Isolar SMW 8kw, but supposed to be better quality) ..... and for the records since 18th of July I still have no response to my technical questions to EAsun support :)
this is where i bought my 3 * 8000 maxes.
agree with everything you say.
nice friendly folk, good and fast with support and in my local time zone, and in eu
 
To be 100% sure I don't supply power to the grid, the italian guys suggested a contactor between inverter and grid but their solution was not quite usable for me. The tiny amount of energy that go to the grid (1.5kWh total in 3 months) happens when large loads come or go from the inverter and the inverter needs a bit of time to readjust according to the italians. As long as the inverter is not equipped to feed TO the grid, I think this solution should do the trick:
1659981076521.png
The point of all this is that my power company obviously don't want me to feed 230V TO the grid and I think this may be a good enough solution for them to be satisfied.

Any comments on this solution?
 
New inverter arrived and up and running.
View attachment 105945

The Italian guys offered to repair the old one for an estimated cost of €150 but I'm still not finished with EASun (lack of) support and I'll also try to make PayPal put some pressure on them.

Looks nice ! The Easun lack of support is strange as they were recommended to me by several guys that have used them for years. I have today received their assurance that they have sent my log files and questions to their engineer (could be that he is quite busy) . 150 EUR for repair is not so much....... I assume they will do it remotely .
 
To be 100% sure I don't supply power to the grid, the italian guys suggested a contactor between inverter and grid but their solution was not quite usable for me. The tiny amount of energy that go to the grid (1.5kWh total in 3 months) happens when large loads come or go from the inverter and the inverter needs a bit of time to readjust according to the italians. As long as the inverter is not equipped to feed TO the grid, I think this solution should do the trick:
View attachment 105950
The point of all this is that my power company obviously don't want me to feed 230V TO the grid and I think this may be a good enough solution for them to be satisfied.

Any comments on this solution?
I think a contactor will work and I am actually planning to put one myself. Probably your Zigbee Smart meter 32A single break relay can be programmed to open when it detects export.
 
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Probably your Zigbee Smart meter 32A single break relay can be programmed to open when it detects export.
No programming possible...

I have a hard time believing that the grid-feed is a real problem at all but I also think that I need some kind of simple fool-proof solution to get the power company off my back, hence the contactor with grid-feed to the solenoid.

The power export in it self is neglible, 1.5kWh total for 3 months...
 
No programming possible...

I have a hard time believing that the grid-feed is a real problem at all but I also think that I need some kind of simple fool-proof solution to get the power company off my back, hence the contactor with grid-feed to the solenoid.

The power export in it self is neglible, 1.5kWh total for 3 months...
what you can do, if you're indeed very worried about back feeding, is an automatic transfer switch hooked to your genstart.
if battery => 20% -> turn on grid power to inverter
if battery <= 80% -> turn off grid power to inverter

in my mind your batteries would take any residual.powerspikes that may occure when inverter is switching , but when your batteries are low enough grid can still be used for passthrough and charging

never tested this though
 
in my mind your batteries would take any residual.powerspikes that may occure when inverter is switching
Obviously not enough. I have a 12kWh LiFePO4 and 10kWh flooded batteries connected and still a tiny bit of export happens.

A UK Voltronic dealer wrote this to me:
Please notice that the inverters can not send power back to the grid. They do withdraw very very low power and if you have an energy meter that simply shows apparent power not active power.
I think this is correct but as I said, I need some simple fool-proof solution to make my power company happy.
 
Obviously not enough. I have a 12kWh LiFePO4 and 10kWh flooded batteries connected and still a tiny bit of export happens.

A UK Voltronic dealer wrote this to me:

I think this is correct but as I said, I need some simple fool-proof solution to make my power company happy.
hence the auto transfer switch on your grid in
 
hence the auto transfer switch on your grid in
Yes, I think this would be a bulletproof solution:
1660027657828.png
This should keep the power company off my back...

The official electricity meter also have a contactor built in and I've asked them why that contactor isn't isolating me from the grid when grid is down but they didn't answer me om that one... but they did confirm that the meter HAVE a contactor... They really don't want to talk about that contactor since that is the key to effective power rationing that we most likely will see this winter.
 
Yes, these are not designed to feed active power back to the grid. Its the reactive capacitive component that is bothering the Utility Companies which I have to manage/compensate. As if I do not they want me to either shut of my installation , or they will shut me off from their services.

In SBU mode there is no such problem. I have monitored for a while and power factor is always positive in that mode.

In SUB mode is the problem . When the house consumption exceeds the solar power production (cloudy day, sunrise, sunset periods) then there is no problem it takes the rest from the grid and power factor is always positive.
In SUB mode when solar power is exceeding the house consumption ( the clouds dissipate, sun is going up, or we just switch of a consumer in the house ) then the power factor becomes negative and the solar inverter behaves as a capacitive reactive load to the utility. The reactive power returned to the grid is what bothers the utility company.

I have tried two options now
1 . Monitor the system and switch to SBU when I detect export. This option is fine if there is enough and stable sun irradiation. Alternative to that is the contactor to switch of the grid power....which I have not yet tried.
2. Add switch on an additional consumer in the house to increase the consumption above the PV production. This option I use when the weather is cloudy and/or unstable.
So, far I do it remotely from the watch power up which is very unreliable and has delays. So, my intention is to go with raspberry pi and real time monitoring and going further with MQTT and scripting to automate the process.

Of course best option is EAsun / Voltronic to come with solution.........but so far no reply from EAsun support.
 
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As an inductive load the fan motor should create inductive reactive component that should compensate the capacitive one
I would believe that the capacitive load would be welcome since most other loads are resistive or inductive. At work, we have large capacitors to get the power factor slightly above the limit where the power company punishes us...

It's a pity the WatchPower app usually is unreliable. I have a RPi running mpp-solar to get data from both the inverter (serial) and a couple of JK BMS (Bluetooth) to my Node Red home automation system.

But to the point here: I need to make sure I don't feed anything TO the grid when grid is down and I believe my contactor solution is going to do just that. I've just been shopping the contactor and it will be installed later today. 3D printing of bracket needs a few hours...
 
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I would believe that the capacitive load would be welcome since most other loads are resistive or inductive. At work, we have large capacitors to get the power factor slightly above the limit where the power company punishes us...

It's a pity the WatchPower app usually is unreliable. I have a RPi running mpp-solar to get data from both the inverter (serial) and a couple of JK BMS (Bluetooth) to my Node Red home automation system.

But to the point here: I need to make sure I don't feed anything TO the grid when grid is down and I believe my contactor solution is going to do just that. I've just been shopping the contactor and it will be installed later today. 3D printing of bracket needs a few hours...
Hi, I did not in the beginning understand that they are mostly concerned to disconnect your inverter when the grid is down for safety. The contactor shall definitely work.

Capacitive load indeed shall be good for the utility company, however the regime of my installation is such that i shall not feed anything..... or at least they shall not detect anything, as I am not licensed as production plant and so on....... while those licensed and of course with high capacity plants would even pay extra fee if for more than 15 minutes their power factor is out of the range +94 to -94 (less than 94 either inductive or capacitive)...... what to say - administration

I wanted to check base with you, if +86 19146482625 is this the EAsun 24/7 support you are talking to ? I never got reply from them directly, just my dealer Easun power store keeps telling me they will speak to an engineer, but never give me his contacts.
 
if +86 19146482625 is this the EAsun 24/7 support you are talking to ?
Yes, that is the 24 hours lack of support using WhatsApp.

In addition, I have sent emails to:
Still little or no feedback. Several of these adresses responded quite fast until the point where my inverter died...

when the grid is down for safety
Yup, that is their main concern. If I export 0.5kWh every month without getting paid is no problem for me.
 
Hi Svein, I was looking around to find the latest firmware for the SMW 8kw/Axpert Max 8kw and found info from the Australian forum.... sharing same problems with firmware 45.01 and power feed to grid.

QTE
I have this inverter since August. Full review on spanish forum

Conclusion: Plenty of bugs at initial firmware 45.01. Voltronic in 3 months has released many update firmwares to this model. Jump to 45.xx to 90.xx number firmware, so I think they have rebuild full firmware because 45.xx was unstable (F55 error everytime on SBU and SCC on).

On SUB and SCC on, too many active power feed on grid (2kW peak) with 7kWp field solar installed.

Voltronic should improve much more the firmware of this model.

Regards.

UQTE
 
Hi Svein, I was looking around to find the latest firmware for the SMW 8kw/Axpert Max 8kw and found info from the Australian forum.... sharing same problems with firmware 45.01 and power feed to grid.

QTE
I have this inverter since August. Full review on spanish forum

Conclusion: Plenty of bugs at initial firmware 45.01. Voltronic in 3 months has released many update firmwares to this model. Jump to 45.xx to 90.xx number firmware, so I think they have rebuild full firmware because 45.xx was unstable (F55 error everytime on SBU and SCC on).

On SUB and SCC on, too many active power feed on grid (2kW peak) with 7kWp field solar installed.

Voltronic should improve much more the firmware of this model.

Regards.

UQTE
i have seen that in the past too, however havent found a place to download, norba update procedure
 
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