EG4 Rack Battery communication between batteries

[Mr-Sandman]

Concerning EG4 Rack mount battery communications.

@Will Prowse asked this question in a comment on his latest youtube video: "What is the benefit of having the packs communicate for you guys? Just curious what the utility is." That got me thinking, IF your inverter won't talk to the EG4 batteries "not a growatt", do the batteries talk to each other or is there any reason to even hook them together?

I noticed while messing with the addressing on my EG4 LL batteries if I set one to master ID 1, it appears to poll the other batteries. If none are set to ID 1, there doesn't appear to be any traffic on the battery communication ports. I didn't leave my battery set to ID 1 as I couldn't get my computer with BMS software to talk to the RS485 port on that battery while it had that ID set. I think this is because it is set to talk to Growatt inverters on that port when that ID is set?

 

[robby]

Concerning EG4 Rack mount battery communications.

@Will Prowse asked this question in a comment on his latest youtube video: "What is the benefit of having the packs communicate for you guys? Just curious what the utility is." That got me thinking, IF your inverter won't talk to the EG4 batteries "not a growatt", do the batteries talk to each other or is there any reason to even hook them together?

The only reason to hook them up is so that they can communicate with the inverter. Hooking them up together without the inverter connection really serves no purpose.
When hooked to the Inverter and a closed loop is formed the results are pretty amazing. In a good inverter the settings for charging voltages, max current charge, max current draw and total Amps connected are passed onto the Inverter and used by the Inverter.

The battery BMS is reporting to the Inverter it's SOC constantly so that eliminates the guess work by the Inverter. and you get an accurate SOC. Also the voltage, current and SOC values allow the Inverter to charge that batteries much smoother. When I have my batteries in closed loop mode the charge current tapers off nice and slowly as the batteries go to 98% SOC up to 100% SOC. Without the connection the Inverter says the batteries are at 100% but is still pushing 5Kw to my pack as the BMS is really at some number like 85% charged. So the Inverter keeps pushing the current and then overshoots and starts to bleed power from the batteries and does a few back and fourths trying to get the SOC correct.

This also happens in reverse when discharging. I set the Inverter to shut off battery power at 20% SOC but it is not consistent as sometimes when it does shutdown at 20% I check the BMS with my computer and the real SOC is around 12% and the next day it may be 18%.

I noticed while messing with the addressing on my EG4 LL batteries if I set one to master ID 1, it appears to poll the other batteries. If none are set to ID 1, there doesn't appear to be any traffic on the battery communication ports. I didn't leave my battery set to ID 1 as I couldn't get my computer with BMS software to talk to the RS485 port on that battery while it had that ID set. I think this is because it is set to talk to Growatt inverters on that port when that ID is set?

All the batteries have to have a separate ID number for it to work. One of them must be set to number 1 and the rest can be 2,3,4 etc.

 

[Mr-Sandman]

OK, that's what I was thinking, no reason to hook batteries together unless they are hooked to a compatible inverter. Sure wish my Schneider XW PRO 6848 would talk to them. Having SOC available from BMS is as you mentioned a HUGE advantage. Without it my inverter basically knows when the batteries are dead and full by voltage.

 

[GVSolar]

Eg4 Battery-to-battery comms are valuable when monitoring with PC software (BMS.tools and BMS.test) as it allows you to see actual cell voltages (plus balancing) and monitor any SOC drift between batteries... I use it to verify the charge parameters for my Schneider Conext SW4024.

 

[Mr-Sandman]

Eg4 Battery-to-battery comms are valuable when monitoring with PC software (BMS.tools and BMS.test) as it allows you to see actual cell voltages (plus balancing) and monitor any SOC drift between batteries... I use it to verify the charge parameters for my Schneider Conext SW4024.

I never could get it to find more than the battery it was plugged into. I plugged into the rs-485 plug of my EG4 LL batteries. I could move cable and see all batteries one by one. I tried plugging into the battery communication plug but it didn't find any batteries there.

 

[robby]

OK, that's what I was thinking, no reason to hook batteries together unless they are hooked to a compatible inverter. Sure wish my Schneider XW PRO 6848 would talk to them. Having SOC available from BMS is as you mentioned a HUGE advantage. Without it my inverter basically knows when the batteries are dead and full by voltage.

Yep but @GVSolar has a point, if you have them all addressed properly and strung together you can hook up a PC and monitor SOC and cell info for each battery in the bank. It's not very useful on a day to day basis but it's nice to have for doing a health check on the batteries.

I wish someone would make a Raspberry Pi universal Inverter to Battery translator.
By that I mean you can plug in two (USB to RS485) converters or Canbus adapters into the Pi and then tell it which one is for the Inverter and which one is for the battery bank. Then use a Pull down menu to select what model Inverter and what model batteries you have and the Pi translates the data from one to another using an internal lookup command table.
So if my Inverter only supports BYD or Discovery Batteries I can select BYD on the Inverter and the Pi will translate the data coming from and EG4 into the BYD format.
Another cool feature would be if you could hook up a third or fourth adapter and plug in packs from different companies and the Inverter see's them all as being all from one brand. The Comm info for most of this stuff is already out there, it just needs the work done to get it coded. This would probably be as hot a seller as Solar Assistant.

 

[GVSolar]

I never could get it to find more than the battery it was plugged into. I plugged into the rs-485 plug of my EG4 LL batteries. I could move cable and see all batteries one by one. I tried plugging into the battery communication plug but it didn't find any batteries there.

Try daisy chaining on RS-485, then hit search device in upper left quadrant of BMS.tools - list should populate itself. Then select individual batteries to view from pull-down list on right side. At least, that's how it works on mine...

 

[Mr-Sandman]

Try daisy chaining on RS-485, then hit search device in upper left quadrant of BMS.tools - list should populate itself. Then select individual batteries to view from pull-down list on right side. At least, that's how it works on mine...

Do you have EG LL batteries or which model are you using?
Are you plugging your laptop into the RS-485 port or the battery comm port?
Do you have a battery with ID 1 assigned, even though you aren't hooking to an inverter?

With my EG4 LL batteries daisy chained on battery com ports and my laptop plugged into any of the batteries rs-485 I see the battery I'm plugged into show up when I do a search, but none of the others. Moving the cable to each battery and re-searching, I see only the battery I'm plugged into. I must not be doing something right.

 

[GVSolar]

You're doing everything you can - sadly, the documentation on these batteries doesn't live up to the batteries themselvelves.

Q. Do you have EG LL batteries or which model are you using?
I have two of the original Gyll batteries- which use BMS.tools - and one new Lifepower4 which uses BMS.test. Trying to get SSolar to exchange the new one for an EG-LL because of the BMS incompatibility issue. I have to manually switch cables and programs to monitor the Lifepower4.

Q. Are you plugging your laptop into the RS-485 port or the battery comm port?
Both Gylls are daisy-chained on RS-485, then plugged into PC using provided USB serial adapter.

Q. Do you have a battery with ID 1 assigned, even though you aren't hooking to an inverter?
No. My Gyll batteries are assigned ID 15 and 16 via dip switches.

I've had some SOC drift between the Gylls which has been reconciled by charging each to a balancing voltage - then the readings on both reset to 100%. The dual metering makes that relatively simple. Best...

 

[curiouscarbon]

Yep but @GVSolar has a point, if you have them all addressed properly and strung together you can hook up a PC and monitor SOC and cell info for each battery in the bank. It's not very useful on a day to day basis but it's nice to have for doing a health check on the batteries.

I wish someone would make a Raspberry Pi universal Inverter to Battery translator.
By that I mean you can plug in two (USB to RS485) converters or Canbus adapters into the Pi and then tell it which one is for the Inverter and which one is for the battery bank. Then use a Pull down menu to select what model Inverter and what model batteries you have and the Pi translates the data from one to another using an internal lookup command table.
So if my Inverter only supports BYD or Discovery Batteries I can select BYD on the Inverter and the Pi will translate the data coming from and EG4 into the BYD format.
Another cool feature would be if you could hook up a third or fourth adapter and plug in packs from different companies and the Inverter see's them all as being all from one brand. The Comm info for most of this stuff is already out there, it just needs the work done to get it coded. This would probably be as hot a seller as Solar Assistant.

cool idea!

interoperability is an area that is.. developing ?

 

[jberger]

I appreciate you trying to build a following, but could you please quit spamming the forums with your videos? You post the same links to multiple threads and that isn't helpful.

 

[On My Workbench]

I appreciate you trying to build a following, but could you please quit spamming the forums with your videos? You post the same links to multiple threads and that isn't helpful.

I am not trying to build a following, If I was I would not go months between posting videos, I am trying to help people that have not been able to get there batteries to work with the BMS TOOLS software and have not received the tech support from SS that they PAYED FOR when they bought there batteries. Why is it that I can call or email SS for tech support and NEVER get someone to answer the phone, return a call or return a email. But if I call and press the # for sales there is always someone there ready to answer the call. Yes I did post the same videos to multiple threads because multiple people ask the same questions in multiple threads and because multiple people are having the same issues with there batteries
and getting tech support for the batteries. And maybe not everyone sees all all of the threads.

 

[Bigblockcutlass123]

Why is it that I can call or email SS for tech support and NEVER get someone to answer the phone, return a call or return a email. But if I call and press the # for sales there is always someone



That's not just SS. Every were does that stuff. You probably know more that half the people there at SS. They went from 15 employees to 50 in six months. The skills and knowledge in the county is poor anymore with all the industry gone to China. Keep the video's coming. Anything to help people out is good.

 

[On My Workbench]

Why is it that I can call or email SS for tech support and NEVER get someone to answer the phone, return a call or return a email. But if I call and press the # for sales there is always someone



That's not just SS. Every were does that stuff. You probably know more that half the people there at SS. They went from 15 employees to 50 in six months. The skills and knowledge in the county is poor anymore with all the industry gone to China. Keep the video's coming. Anything to help people out is good.

Yes I agree that customer service after the sale has gone down the crapper everywhere and that's our fault as consumers for putting up with it.
If SS has grow so big so fast they had better get a handle on there Tech support and after the sale customer service, as much as I like my batteries (So Far) it will be hard for me to reamend them to others looking to buy solar products. "Keep the video's coming. Anything to help people out is good" Thank you I will, and I am working on another video where I will be testing a couple of devices that will replace my DIY 4 way cable for people that don't know how to build one or just don't want to build one but still want to use the BMS Tool software with out having to plug into and unplug from battery to battery .

 

[Sierra Nevada]

I am not trying to build a following, If I was I would not go months between posting videos, I am trying to help people that have not been able to get there batteries to work with the BMS TOOLS software and have not received the tech support from SS that they PAYED FOR when they bought there batteries. Why is it that I can call or email SS for tech support and NEVER get someone to answer the phone, return a call or return a email. But if I call and press the # for sales there is always someone there ready to answer the call. Yes I did post the same videos to multiple threads because multiple people ask the same questions in multiple threads and because multiple people are having the same issues with there batteries
and getting tech support for the batteries. And maybe not everyone sees all all of the threads.

Keep up the good work. I have 3 eg4 200ah 24 volt batteries. Only way I could get bms tools to work was to address 11 - 13 - 15 and that works great. They would not work at addresses 11 - 12 - 13. Address 12 would not work. I would not know how someone with 4 or more batteries could make it work. George

 

[Herb]

Please comment on your customer support experiences, we all need to do this. To me customer service says that the company/seller cares and is willing to help and I mean help, I hate when I get a simplified reply to a question that have taken me a few minutes to type. Like some of you have said customer service have gone to sheets. If we don't pull together so that these companies feel the heat and start loosing sales due to lack of support then we can not complain after all, correct? I have contacted SS 3 times and even though it takes them 2 days to reply they have always done so, so I don't have any gripes or complains yet, but time will tell. The only thing that I would like to see and applies in general to all video makers is to try and avoid editing mistakes out of their videos, hey we are not perfect and I would like to see exactly what has happened during the recording of that video so I won't make the same mistake or at least to know about it and how to correct it. SS videos could use revisions because is hard to understand that guy and seems like he don't really want the viewers to learn anything from them and this is crucial information about the products they sell. If you don't want to make a video then don't! I would appreciate it. Don't support companies that don't support you either! Added comment; I'm glad that some comments here are touching on the server type batteries. It seems like there are quite a few issues with their communications which is the only reason I was looking closely at them and considering getting a few in the near future. I think I'll hold off until I see these issues resolved, ATM I have 2 emergency backup battery banks, they are dumb and can't communicate but The Growatt works well with them and all I really need from it is the battery voltage so it can cut off/on whenever it needs to. To monitor SOC I use a Victron SmartShunt and it's app to monitor the batteries. that is enough for me to monitor and get a pretty good idea on battery status and is pretty accurate. It is sad that the Growatt's communications can not be used with regular dumb LiPo4 batteries (even with limitations) would be nice, but I'm hoping the server batteries prices will come down and their communication issues solved in the near future somehow.