Connecting Solar Assistant to EG4 Lifepower batteries

[elizabethii]

I have a pair of EG4-3000EHV inverters setup in split-phase and a bank of 6 EG4 Lifepower4 v1 (as far as I know; purchased in mid-2022) batteries. I have closed-loop (RS-485) communication running between the inverters and batteries. Solar Assistant is working great for the inverters, and through the inverters, I'm getting basic capacity and voltage statistics on the battery. However, I don't have detailed cell-level data, temperatures, or any of the in-depth statistics on the batteries.

I connected the EG4-supplied RS-485 cable to the open end of the RS-485 bus, configured SA to connect to the batteries via Narada RS485, and I get a "Invalid data received" error. I feel like the error is related to the ID settings, but I'm having trouble wrapping my head around what the SA documentation means about the IDs. I've tried starting the DIP switches at ID 1, then 2, then even 3, and seems to get the same error. I feel I have a pretty good understanding of DIP switches and being able to follow documentation, but this one is really beating me. I feel like the answer is obvious and I'm just missing it.

 

[Texican]

here are the setting I figured out for the switches
do yours match?


EG-4 Lifepower without LCD


Battery ID Dip Switches U= Up D=Down


1 UDDD

2 DUDD

3 UUDD

4 DDUD

5 UDUD

6 DUUD

7 UUUD

8 DDDU

9 UDDU

10 DUDU

11 UUDU

12 TBD

13 TBD

14 DUUU

15 UUUU



I will have to double check for 12 & 13 as I got 2 different settings giving that ID ???


I have a bank of 6 eg-4s so as per the Solar Assistant manual, my first battery is ID 2 and my last battery is ID 7

I got this info using the signature solar BMS software, attached to an individual battery trying all possible dip settings and then scanning using the software for the resulting battery ID

I have dual LV6548 inverters and they dont seem to talk directly to the batteries. some inverters may need to start at ID-1, not sure

what a pain. but seems to be working great mow

 

[Texican]

also, here is a thread I started on the subject


https://diysolarforum.com/threads/eg4-dip-switch-settings.39388/

 

[elizabethii]

I tried your DIP switch settings and SA did successfully connect to the batteries....but then the inverters were complaining they couldn't talk to the battery and shut down their inverters. From what I'm reading, for closed-loop communication with the inverters, one battery must be in ID 0, which appears to be incompatible with SA. So, I guess I have to choose between rich battery data, or the inverters talking to the batteries.

 

[Solar Eclipse]

I tried your DIP switch settings and SA did successfully connect to the batteries....but then the inverters were complaining they couldn't talk to the battery and shut down their inverters. From what I'm reading, for closed-loop communication with the inverters, one battery must be in ID 0, which appears to be incompatible with SA. So, I guess I have to choose between rich battery data, or the inverters talking to the batteries.

 

[Solar Eclipse]

My understanding is that these devices are using Modbus Protocol which only allows a single Master device to send/receive requested registries. Basically, you can only have one cop directing the network traffic. Not sure, but I believe the EG4 LL version may allow redundancy.

 

[EastTexCowboy]

@Texican - I followed your previous thread on this and I never did get everything working the way it seems it should. I have 6 of the EG4 Lifepower batteries and 2 LV6548 inverters set up like yours. I can get data from the batteries via SA but the inverters still don't appear to recognize the SOC. I'm guessing the BMS is preventing an overcharge. Ian from watts247 indicated that SA would have an update later this year to allow SA to act as a proxy for the battery communication, but I haven't seen any newer versions as of yet. Did you ever get it all working, and if so, how?

 

[Texican]

@Texican - I followed your previous thread on this and I never did get everything working the way it seems it should. I have 6 of the EG4 Lifepower batteries and 2 LV6548 inverters set up like yours. I can get data from the batteries via SA but the inverters still don't appear to recognize the SOC. I'm guessing the BMS is preventing an overcharge. Ian from watts247 indicated that SA would have an update later this year to allow SA to act as a proxy for the battery communication, but I haven't seen any newer versions as of yet. Did you ever get it all working, and if so, how?

I believe mine is doing exactly what it is supposed to do.
I never touch my inverters at all, I only use SA. I can see data on all 6 batts I set the soc minimum using SA not inverters directly
I will post a pic of my battery display in SA and you can tell me if you are missing anything, or maybe I am





I use this method in SA to switch to grid at 20% soc and back to batts at 30%
also to shut down inverters below 15%

 

[EastTexCowboy]

Yes, that looks right to me on the batteries. That's good to know on how you're managing the grid switching. I'll give it a try. I'm curious though - why are you shutting down the inverters if you're already switching over to the grid at 20%? Is this in case the grid is down as well?

Thanks for the info!
Rick

 

[EastTexCowboy]

I believe mine is doing exactly what it is supposed to do.
I never touch my inverters at all, I only use SA. I can see data on all 6 batts I set the soc minimum using SA not inverters directly
I will post a pic of my battery display in SA and you can tell me if you are missing anything, or maybe I am

I use this method in SA to switch to grid at 20% soc and back to batts at 30%
also to shut down inverters below 15%

Just to confirm my understanding of this, you're still dependent on the BMS to cease charging once the battery is at 100%, right?

 

[Texican]

Just to confirm my understanding of this, you're still dependent on the BMS to cease charging once the battery is at 100%, right?

I dont know.
I guess I thought SA was handling the charging. I set the charge voltages in SA and they seem to work as input, Im using 55v and 56v for settings and you can see the charging taper down as it approaches 100%
I set the 15% to shutoff inverters just as an extra failsafe if the switch to grid at 20% does not take place

 

[EastTexCowboy]

Makes sense on the 15%. When I have PV input (not much today) and the batteries are fully charged the battery indicator bars on the inverter still show it to be charging. The batteries are obviously not charging any longer based on the SA reading. That's why I figured the BMS was doing it. I don't think it's SA telling the inverter to stop charging or the inverter wouldn't indicate it's still charging. I'll do some photos when I have sun again and post them.

 

[Jamsolar876]

I believe mine is doing exactly what it is supposed to do.
I never touch my inverters at all, I only use SA. I can see data on all 6 batts I set the soc minimum using SA not inverters directly
I will post a pic of my battery display in SA and you can tell me if you are missing anything, or maybe I am

View attachment 130655
View attachment 130656View attachment 130657


I use this method in SA to switch to grid at 20% soc and back to batts at 30%
also to shut down inverters below 15%

View attachment 130660

Sa does the switching automatically,?

 

[Texican]

Sa does the switching automatically,?

yes

 

[wildbillpdx]

I believe mine is doing exactly what it is supposed to do.
I never touch my inverters at all, I only use SA. I can see data on all 6 batts I set the soc minimum using SA not inverters directly
I will post a pic of my battery display in SA and you can tell me if you are missing anything, or maybe I am

View attachment 130655
View attachment 130656View attachment 130657


I use this method in SA to switch to grid at 20% soc and back to batts at 30%
also to shut down inverters below 15%

View attachment 130660

Just getting started with SA and my 6000ex. Did you have to change all the battery IDs/DIPs? Do you have your inverters AND SA connected to the batteries? I have LifePro4 batteries without an LCD and would like to get more data on them from SA but still have the inverter working directly with them.

 

[Texican]

here are the correct settingss for lifepower4 batteries
with solar assistant you put the first batt at ID 2 then3.4. etc
so for my 6 batts, I use sertting 2 thru 7
my batts comm is only thru solar assistant not to the inverters directly
I am able to monitor batts just fine using only solar assistant


Battery ID Dip Switches U= Up D=Down


1 UDDD

2 DUDD

3 UUDD

4 DDUD

5 UDUD

6 DUUD

7 UUUD

8 DDDU

9 UDDU

10 DUDU

11 UUDU

 

[wildbillpdx]

here are the correct settingss for lifepower4 batteries
with solar assistant you put the first batt at ID 2 then3.4. etc
so for my 6 batts, I use sertting 2 thru 7
my batts comm is only thru solar assistant not to the inverters directly
I am able to monitor batts just fine using only solar assistant


Battery ID Dip Switches U= Up D=Down


1 UDDD

2 DUDD

3 UUDD

4 DDUD

5 UDUD

6 DUUD

7 UUUD

8 DDDU

9 UDDU

10 DUDU

11 UUDU

I sent a message to SA support and they confirmed it's either SA or the inverter. Do you know what functionality, if any, you lose by using SA rather than having the inverter connected to the batteries?

 

[Adam De Lay]

I sent a message to SA support and they confirmed it's either SA or the inverter. Do you know what functionality, if any, you lose by using SA rather than having the inverter connected to the batteries?

You lose the ability for the inverters to be controlled by the BMS in the batteries. You won't have SOC visible on the inverter. You will have to program the battery values into the inverter. It's not really an issue because lots of people run their inverters in USE mode instead of EG4 mode.

It really depends on which you would prefer. Do you want the inverter controlled by the battery or do you want visibility into the battery in SA?

 

[houseofancients]

Or , as an alternative, you forget the master battery, and just use the rest in SA and keep inverter comms going..

Batteries will balance themselves out in voltage anyway, and if something unforseen happens, you would want the inverters primarily talking to the BMS as they control the charging ( sd card corruption or maybe a broken pi power supply would be first that comes to mind)

Yet another alternative would be the communication hub which then acts as master in the rs485/modbus topology although I am not entirely sure those work with the V1 version of those batteries

 

[EastTexCowboy]

I sent a message to SA support and they confirmed it's either SA or the inverter. Do you know what functionality, if any, you lose by using SA rather than having the inverter connected to the batteries?

You could also look at installing a smart shunt on the batteries and letting SA work with the data from the shunt. You won't get the detailed battery data but this has worked well for me as far as resolving some of the SOC issues. I actually have a laptop connected to the batteries and use the battery test software from SS when I want to look at battery details down to the cell level. After the first few weeks I've found I rarely look at that anymore.