EG4-6500EX Multiple Problems Unable to reach Signature Solar for Support for over 6 weeks

[TurbineTester]

I have been trying to reach tech support for almost 6 weeks, using various contact methods. First issue, my inverters are outputting fluctuating voltages rangine from 105-133 v causing lights to flicker and other wierd things. Second, i think one of my inverters may have a faulty MPPT as it is not shoing up in solar assistant when monitoring. I have solar assistant data for about 5 days showing what i am talking about. It's been very difficult and extremely frustrating trying to reach someone there for technical support with these inverters. I have filled otu two "contact us" forms, two+ weeks ago and today. I have called multiple times and been on hold for over an hour with no answer on the tech support line. I have attempted multiple times to "keep my place in the que and receive a call back" and that hasn't worked, as the call either disconnects before confirming my number or i don't get a call back. I try to answer any calls that appear to come from a 903 area code, but other calls may go to voicemail as i get MANY spam calls each day, but if they are calling and not reaching me i would expect them to at least leave a voicemail. I have not received any voicemails from Signature Solar. I received one email from a person named Travis at Signature Solar on the 4th November about the error 61 battery communication problem on my inverter and his suggested fixes didn't work. When i emailed him back stating such i never got a reply. Then i tried to also get his support through email for the output voltage problem. I have not received resolution to any of these issues and have not received any email reply from Travis since his initial email on November 4, despite emailing him back TWICE trying to get help. I have also called the sales line, spoke with a very nice lady there who said she would "hand deliver a message for someone in Tech support to call me back that day" and i STILL have not received a call back. What else can i do to try and contact Signature Solar to get the help i need? I'm running out of options other than complaining on public forums and very much prefer to just get the system i paid for working correctly. Below is a sample of one of the voltage spike/drop periods from the 2p1/2p2 inverter setup i have.

Additionally, for some reason Solar Assistant is only showing inverter one on the MPPT2 graphs. I assume this is a problem because I am assuming each inverter have two MPPT controllers, and that solar assistant is capable of monitoring both. I can see both voltage a current on both PV inputs on both inverters on the LED control panel, so either solar assistant just isn't picking up the second PV string on inverter two, or the MPPT is not actually doing anything. *note these graphs are a different time period from the output voltage graph.




I can see where it does correctly dial back almost all PV power once the batteries are charged but why is inverter 2 not showing on MPPT 2 graphs?

Thank you for any help you can provide.

 

[42OhmsPA]

@SignatureSolarAdam
@signaturesolarHelpUs
@SignatureSolarJames

It's a darn shame these posts keep popping up.
I'm glad I did my homework here before giving SS any $.

 

[PreppenWolf]

What batteries/? Whats your solar setup? Demand on Inverters?

Before you installed this system, did your electrical panel have grounding issues? Do you have a good ground rod in place?

Have you tried removing the solar assistant?

As to why it's not showing MPPT 2, that's going to be a question for Solar Assistant tech support, not Signature Solar.

 

[TurbineTester]

What batteries/? Whats your solar setup? Demand on Inverters?

Before you installed this system, did your electrical panel have grounding issues? Do you have a good ground rod in place?

Have you tried removing the solar assistant?

As to why it's not showing MPPT 2, that's going to be a question for Solar Assistant tech support, not Signature Solar.

All good questions that reminded me i needed to put all this stuff in my signature. This is for my stationary solar system. EG4 batteries, inverters, 36x455 solarever panels. All this is currently only feeder a fridge, a freezer, flourescent lights, and a garage door opener in my garage. Here is the load graph for the last ~6 days. All of these errors were happening prior to installing and linking solar assistant. I bought the solar assistant to be able to put data where the the problems were for better analysis.

No i did not have any grounding issues i was aware of and the panel is currently grounded through an 8' grounding rod.

 

[PreppenWolf]

All good questions that reminded me i needed to put all this stuff in my signature. This is for my stationary solar system. EG4 batteries, inverters, 36x455 solarever panels. All this is currently only feeder a fridge, a freezer, flourescent lights, and a garage door opener in my garage. Here is the load graph for the last ~6 days. All of these errors were happening prior to installing and linking solar assistant. I bought the solar assistant to be able to put data where the the problems were for better analysis.

No i did not have any grounding issues i was aware of and the panel is currently grounded through an 8' grounding rod.
View attachment 125684

Do the lights flicker randomly, or only when something cycles on, like the fridge or freezer?

Do the fridge and freezer have grounding prongs and are the outlets they are plugged into properly grounded?

How old are the fridge and freezer? I'd be interested if you own a clamp meter that can measure in rush current how much each of those appliances are drawing when they cycle on.

Where I'm going with this is my intuition says you have a motor locked up when it tries to start. A motor not moving is a dead short until it moves. So if your fridge has a bad bearing, the motor "sticks" at start, causing a large drop in voltage as it takes in rush current. Your inverter attempts to "catch up" by trying to increase voltage on the line, but it can't all it can do it throw amps downstream. But then the motor starts moving and all the sudden the inverter has to switch from trying to boost voltage to wind it down, but it can't do it quick enough so you get a voltage spike until it can balance the new load.

If you can, I would run each appliance on either grid or gen for half a day one at a time and see if the flicker goes away.

 

[Quattrohead]

Inverter number two is obviously fucked.
How is your solar assistant connected to each inverter? If it's only connected to the first one then it can only read very limited data from the second one via their parallel link but if you are full USB on both you should see full data on each of them.

 

[Male Human]

The flicker won't go away. I have these units, and have the same problems. oddly, when the grid is attached it's not too bad. Otherwise, it's a cheapass disco experience. I believe it's an inherent byproduct of the unit.

 

[TurbineTester]

Inverter number two is obviously fucked.
How is your solar assistant connected to each inverter? If it's only connected to the first one then it can only read very limited data from the second one via their parallel link but if you are full USB on both you should see full data on each of them.

It is only connected via a micro-usb cable to inverter #1.

 

[TurbineTester]

Inverter number two is obviously fucked.
How is your solar assistant connected to each inverter? If it's only connected to the first one then it can only read very limited data from the second one via their parallel link but if you are full USB on both you should see full data on each of them.

Also, I was confused about your statement because i'm looking in the documentation for the SolarAssistant and don't see any mention of "full USB" and don't see any way in the configuration to connect inverters in more than one USB port at a time...



UNTIL i disconnect and read this message: "*Note more than one USB ports can selected" Which as everyone knows is obviously Chinglish for "Note: If you have connected multiple inverters with USB cables then select ALL USB ports at the same time and THEN click connect."


Jeez...that was cryptic and hard and easy at the same time. Regardless, that did the trick. I can now see all information on both inverters. Thank you @Quattrohead

 

[Quattrohead]

Yeah it is not obvious that you can select multiple USB devices at the same time. Glad to be of assistance and hope you get that voltage fluctuation sorted out.
I have two of the sun gold power equivalent units and their 120 volt output is absolutely rock steady even under heavy load but they do make lights flicker if you have them connected to lighting circuits.

 

[BenFromSignatureSolar]

Sent you a DM, please send me your contact info. Which firmware version are you running?

 

[TurbineTester]

Want to give an update that signature solar tech support has called me and i have done initial diagnosis on teh inverters and sent many pictures with multi-meter reading at all relevant points in the system. No fixes yet but they are engaged now. If there is any other troubleshooting anyone here can do i'm glad to try things to see if that fixes problems.

 

[PreppenWolf]

The flicker won't go away. I have these units, and have the same problems. oddly, when the grid is attached it's not too bad. Otherwise, it's a cheapass disco experience. I believe it's an inherent byproduct of the unit.

I currently have 2/3rd of our house and my whole garage on (2) 6500 units in 2P1/2P2 config. I have no light blinking issues even with things like my well pump, furnace, two chest freezers and a full size fridge cycling. I have a 2HP knee mill in my garage. I can start that without the lights dimming.

I feel like something else is going on here.

 

[BenFromSignatureSolar]

The flicker won't go away. I have these units, and have the same problems. oddly, when the grid is attached it's not too bad. Otherwise, it's a cheapass disco experience. I believe it's an inherent byproduct of the unit.

Which firmware are you currently using?

 

[TurbineTester]

Which firmware are you currently using?

They are both on Firmware 79.02. Daniel @ signature solar tech support whom i talked to today, said that they needed a firmware update to have the settings for the EG4 batteries. Daniel said I had to buy a $15 cable adapter to do the firmware update. Honestly, if the inverters need to have a firmware update in order to work with the batteries they are supposed to support right out of the box, then @BenFromSignatureSolar shouldn't you guys send the cable for free?

 

[Male Human]

Which firmware are you currently using?

How can I tell? the system does not give up that information easily

 

[BenFromSignatureSolar]

Daniel said I had to buy a $15 cable adapter to do the firmware update. Honestly, if the inverters need to have a firmware update in order to work with the batteries they are supposed to support right out of the box, then @BenFromSignatureSolar shouldn't you guys send the cable for free?

I'll correct Daniel on this. Yes, we will send you the cable for free.

 

[TurbineTester]

I'll correct Daniel on this. Yes, we will send you the cable for free.

Great thanks!

 

[BenFromSignatureSolar]

They are both on Firmware 79.02. Daniel @ signature solar tech support whom i talked to today, said that they needed a firmware update to have the settings for the EG4 batteries. Daniel said I had to buy a $15 cable adapter to do the firmware update. Honestly, if the inverters need to have a firmware update in order to work with the batteries they are supposed to support right out of the box, then @BenFromSignatureSolar shouldn't you guys send the cable for free? View attachment 125731

View attachment 125732

The appropriate firmware will correct the majority of the issues that you are dealing with here. Versions 79.02 is for the CPU and 61.06 is the newest display firmware. Anyone who is currently using an EG4 6500, I recommend updating to these versions found at eg4electronics.com

 

[TurbineTester]

Also trying to sort out the battery state of charge discrepancy i'm seeing both in the inverters and with SolarAssistant. Until the firmware update cable gets here i'll be using the manual settings for the batteries as given to me by signature solar which are :
For the manual battery parameters for the EG4 Lifepower 4 batteries, the settings entered in the 6.5kw will be as follows:
Setting 02- 60a
Setting 05- USE
Setting 11- 30a
Setting 12- 46v
Setting 13- 52v
Setting 26- 56.2v
Setting 27- 54v
Setting 29- 45v

So the behavior of the inverters seems to be to charge the batteries unti they are full, then just supply enough solar the rest of the day until night happens then it uses the batteries. This is how i have it set currently as i do not have any major household loads running currently. I am only powering the fridge, stand up freezer and lights in a garage. My question is if the batteries are fully charged, why is Soalr Assitant not reporting 100% State of Charge? I'm not sure if this is a Solar Assitant Setting or an inverter setting or a battery setting. Here are graphs from relevant time period.









It just seems that if the actual 100% SoC is 54v (the float voltage which it levels off to after the 56.2 charge voltage), then shouldn't the SoC graph be reading 100% instead of ~87% when the inverter thinks the batteries are full?

 

[PreppenWolf]

Charge for lifepo4 is usually 58.4V to 100%.

 

[BenFromSignatureSolar]

56.2V is what you need for 100% on all EG4 48V batteries.

If you get up to 58.4V consistently you will likely run into some issues over time.

 

[PreppenWolf]

Ah. Then @TurbineTester does Solar Assistant have editable reference reporting voltages? You'll need to edit 100% to be 56.4V. My Overkill App let's me manually set personal voltage steps for percent reported.

 

[uncle.driftwood]

I'll correct Daniel on this. Yes, we will send you the cable for free.

Will you refund people who had to purchase the cable already to try and solve issues? It should be included!

 

[TurbineTester]

Ah. Then @TurbineTester does Solar Assistant have editable reference reporting voltages? You'll need to edit 100% to be 56.4V. My Overkill App let's me manually set personal voltage steps for percent reported.

I emailed SolarAssitant and this was the response:The SoC is determined by the inverter. You can try using the "Emulated BMS" in SolarAssistant to see if it provides a more accurate SoC:
Let SolarAssistant perform it's own state of charge (SoC) calculation by counting power flowing in and out of the battery. This is a good fallback option for anyone who can't get a real BMS reading. It's less accurate than a Victron BMS but much more accurate than the standard voltage based readings of an inverter.

That means i'm back to the original problem that the inverters are not communicating with the Batteries correctly because if i leave the battery setting on EG4 i was getting the error 61. Now that i have the updated firmware i'll try the EG4 setting to see if they will correctly communicate the battery SoC.