EG4 3000 and 95% state of charge

[marionw]

It's hard to know which two wires in the RJ45 connector are connected to the RS485 Converter molded into the USB end. If there are only two wires in the RJ45 connector and they are on pins 1 & 2 it still could be that the wires are reversed. Hold the connector with the pins up and facing toward you with the locking tab facing away. Pins 1 & 2 are the left most pins.

You can make a cable using an ethernet patch cable (I use one that is 175 feet long). Cut the RJ45 connector off of one end, strip back about 3 inches of the outer insulation.
The Orange/White and Orange twisted pair will be pins 1 & 2 (assuming T-568B wiring ). Strip the ends of this pair.
RJ-45 Pin #1- White/Orange wire to B- on Dongle Terminal A
RJ-45 Pin #2- Orange wire to A+ on Dongle Terminal B




RS485 to USB Converter

 

[Mdim]

If the adapter I have won't work then thats probably the end of the line. I'm ok with some DIY stuff but these things are a science project.

I'm actually not convinced one of the batteries doesn't have an issue. I have two and they don't charge remotely inline with each other. Based on the SOC reading, one of them will charge to like 70% while the other is still showing a low voltage alarm. Would have thought they would charge more equally if working correctly.

Thanks for the help though, if I had the time to go build custom cables and what not to do a simple firmware update it could be an interesting project.

 

[marionw]

You can buy a read made cable or search the internet for "eg4 lifepower4 read write cable"

EG4 read/write cable

Could someone please give me the wiring configuration for this tool? https://signaturesolar.com/eg4-lifepower4-read-write-cable/ I just need to know which wires to put into the D+ and D- on the RS485 and what pins they connect too on the RJ45 connector. Thank you so much for the help

diysolarforum.com

EG4 USB Read/Write Cable

Signature Solar provides solar panels, off-grid solar systems, grid-tie, and hybrid systems. Quality solar inverters, bifacial solar panels, complete solar kits, solar batteries. Featuring brands such as EG4 Electronics with their solar battery, LifePower4 and EG4 LLifePower4 and EG4 LL

signaturesolar.com

EG4 USB Read/Write Cable - All Pros Solar LLC

SKU:1565404

allprossolar.com

 

[Mdim]

You can buy a read made cable or search the internet for "eg4 lifepower4 read write cable"

EG4 read/write cable

Could someone please give me the wiring configuration for this tool? https://signaturesolar.com/eg4-lifepower4-read-write-cable/ I just need to know which wires to put into the D+ and D- on the RS485 and what pins they connect too on the RJ45 connector. Thank you so much for the help

diysolarforum.com

EG4 USB Read/Write Cable

Signature Solar provides solar panels, off-grid solar systems, grid-tie, and hybrid systems. Quality solar inverters, bifacial solar panels, complete solar kits, solar batteries. Featuring brands such as EG4 Electronics with their solar battery, LifePower4 and EG4 LLifePower4 and EG4 LL

signaturesolar.com

EG4 USB Read/Write Cable - All Pros Solar LLC

SKU:1565404

allprossolar.com

Sigh....that would probably work although from a matter of principle perspective I guess it bothers me a lot to spend money to fix EG4's software issues. As a software guy, if you are going to send something out the door half baked, you darn well better make it easy to update. Again, thanks for the help.

Anyways, I did some isolation testing and think I have a better idea of whats going on. Shut down each battery (two of them) and used the inverter to measure each by itself. At 56.4 volts the newer of the two correctly reads like 99% SOC (current charge setting) while the older one reads 48%, which explains the combined 70% that I see when both are live. Good news is they both hit proper voltage so really does appear to be a software issue with the BMS (I think).

The battery with the low SOC reading is several months older so possible its on different firmware. So now I just need to figure out how to update the darn thing and see if that fixes the issue.

 

[marionw]

Communications cable and software. Download the latest firmware and update both. Cable is easy to fabricate.
The solar industry and hardware is in a constant state of change. Firmware updates to improve performance and inevitable.
Once you have the cable and software you will find yourself monitoring the batteries just to get a better feel for overall performance.

Let us know how things work out.

 

[Mdim]

The solar industry and hardware is in a constant state of change. Firmware updates to improve performance and inevitable.

Thats kind of my point. If you build software/firmware that you expect to change, best practice is to make it simple...

So I bought that other cable that signature carries. Couldn't get it to work with the prolific drivers, but when I used the drivers recommended by the manufacturer of the original cable I bought was able to get it to hook up. The BMS Test software isn't fantastic. Not horrible, but what I would expect from a hardware company I guess. It doesn't like to update status and I found I needed to restart it multiple times to get things to register and show properly during/after the update.

Anyways, after messing with it for a while was eventually able to get the firmware updated. At first nothing happened but after a few hours the battery that was registering incorrect SOC managed to correct itself and all has been great for the past few days. So thanks a ton for the help. Took some effort (more than it should) but all is working well now so I'll take that as a win.