Help! SunSynk 12K inverter not drawing any power from grid

[sigzug]

Hello,

We have installed a few solar panels, a battery and a SunSynk 12K 3-phase Hybrid Inverter at work. It runs fine in "island mode", meaning that the solar panels and battery are working fine alone or together, but it never uses the grid. There are no fault codes, the inverter just never uses any power from the grid. The grid power is always at 0W.

We have enabled grid charging in battery settings, and also set a "user time" with battery targets above what it is currently at to see if it would ever start charging the battery from the grid. The AC light also turnes on when we switch on the grid breaker, which I think should mean it has a connection with the grid power.

We are located in Eastern Norway, meaning that we have a 3-phase 230V IT system. My guess is that this is whats causing the issue. I know the inverter has a Grid-setting for IT system, which we have enabled with no luck. The voltage between the phases are a little higher then raw 230V, currently at about 243V, which might also be causing problems? I'll attach a photo of the connections.


We have also noticed a red G in the button left corner on the dashboard which we believe always has been red. See first image below.

We have contacted SunSynk Support for help, but have gotten little response as of yet.


Has anybody else encountered a similar issue? We would appreciate any help. Thank you!


Images
Solar panels, battery and grid on:


Grid settings:


Use timer:


Solar panels disconnected, just battery and grid:

 

[wpns]

First guess is that the grid doesn't match the inverter's expectations, so it's not connecting, but waiting for the grid to get within spec for (5?10?) minutes before it'll connect.

 

[sigzug]

First guess is that the grid doesn't match the inverter's expectations, so it's not connecting, but waiting for the grid to get within spec for (5?10?) minutes before it'll connect.

It's been sitting in "no solar" mode for about an hour now. Still nothing happening with the grid power.

 

[wpns]

It's been sitting in "no solar" mode for about an hour now. Still nothing happening with the grid power.

It may be waiting for the grid to get in spec, and if the settings are wrong, the grid may never get in spec. I can't parse your grid or your settings, but that's my first guess. Is there an app or website you can use to view more data?

 

[houseofancients]

Hello,

We have installed a few solar panels, a battery and a SunSynk 12K 3-phase Hybrid Inverter at work. It runs fine in "island mode", meaning that the solar panels and battery are working fine alone or together, but it never uses the grid. There are no fault codes, the inverter just never uses any power from the grid. The grid power is always at 0W.

We have enabled grid charging in battery settings, and also set a "user time" with battery targets above what it is currently at to see if it would ever start charging the battery from the grid. The AC light also turnes on when we switch on the grid breaker, which I think should mean it has a connection with the grid power.

We are located in Eastern Norway, meaning that we have a 3-phase 230V IT system. My guess is that this is whats causing the issue. I know the inverter has a Grid-setting for IT system, which we have enabled with no luck. The voltage between the phases are a little higher then raw 230V, currently at about 243V, which might also be causing problems? I'll attach a photo of the connections.
View attachment 229455

We have also noticed a red G in the button left corner on the dashboard which we believe always has been red. See first image below.

We have contacted SunSynk Support for help, but have gotten little response as of yet.


Has anybody else encountered a similar issue? We would appreciate any help. Thank you!


Images
Solar panels, battery and grid on:
View attachment 229456

Grid settings:
View attachment 229457

Use timer:
View attachment 229458

Solar panels disconnected, just battery and grid:
View attachment 229459

remark 1

your CT's should be at the entry point of your Grid, not that close to the incoming lines into your inverter.
Furthermore check the direction of the CT's

remark 2

the grid is in sync and phase rotation is also correct, otherwise the alarm light would be on..
can you post a picture of the faults ?

 

[sigzug]

remark 1

your CT's should be at the entry point of your Grid, not that close to the incoming lines into your inverter.
Furthermore check the direction of the CT's

remark 2

the grid is in sync and phase rotation is also correct, otherwise the alarm light would be on..
can you post a picture of the faults ?

Remark 1

We asked SunSynk support about the CTs being that close and they said it should be fine. Since we are only running a test installation here we aren't able to get them to the entrypoint, but we could try moving them further down.

The arrows are pointing towards the inverter.

Remark 2

I have been changing some grid settings to see if anything changes, and I saw there were another Grid mode preset for 133V. Since the phases are 133V LN I figured I'd try it. This time the Normal light goes out and I get a "W03 Grid phase wrong" fault. Change Phase type to the other setting (0/240/120) and it disconnects and bangs every time it tries to reconnect (some emergency breaker I assume). So thats not it. Changing back to 0/120/240 and the load power comes back, but no Normal and no W03 fault?

Anyway, thought I'd explain the codes. Here they are:

 

[houseofancients]

Remark 1

We asked SunSynk support about the CTs being that close and they said it should be fine. Since we are only running a test installation here we aren't able to get them to the entrypoint, but we could try moving them further down.

The arrows are pointing towards the inverter.

Remark 2

I have been changing some grid settings to see if anything changes, and I saw there were another Grid mode preset for 133V. Since the phases are 133V LN I figured I'd try it. This time the Normal light goes out and I get a "W03 Grid phase wrong" fault. Change Phase type to the other setting (0/240/120) and it disconnects and bangs every time it tries to reconnect (some emergency breaker I assume). So thats not it. Changing back to 0/120/240 and the load power comes back, but no Normal and no W03 fault?

Anyway, thought I'd explain the codes. Here they are:
View attachment 229482View attachment 229483

your ct's are used to measure current coming or going to the grid.
if they are the wrong way, they will let the inverter know you are selling to the grid instead of charging..
if you haven't check grid selling it will simply not take from the grid


your complaint is that the inverter is not using grid, co incidence?

if you are only testing, i'd remove the ct's for now completey, as they make no sense.
they are used to tell the inverter what is using the grid which it cannot sense itself ( all internal ports come equiped with an internal measuring shunt )


sunsynk support was wrong

also , be aware that these inverters wait for the grid to stabilize before allowing grid frequency sync and opening the contactor ( you'll def hear it clicking)

 

[wpns]

Grid phase wrong

Is that grid phase rotation wrong?

Banging sounds like connecting to the grid when the parameters don’t match, and is probably incipient failure.

 

[LydMekk]

Som han over sa: er du sikker på at alle 3 faser er koblet til i rett rekkefølge?
Hvis noen av fasene er byttet om (aka LINE kablene) vil dette skje.
Prøvebytt noen av LINE kablene og se om det retter seg. NB. tar et par minutter etter påslag for inverteren til å godta AC-tilkoblingen og slå på releene fra nettet.

Sjekk også at du ikke har byttet nøytral og en line kabel, mål med multimeter, ikke se på fargene...

Du får også kjøpe et fasemeter som måler faserotasjon på f.ex. Clas Ohlsson. Ser ut som et digitalt multimeter.

En ting til: du er sikker på at du ikke har 400V inn til sikringsskapet? I tilfelle, prøv å velge Grid "General standard" istdf. å rote med IT settinger. De fleste norske husholdninger er nå bygd om til 400V 3-fas inn over hele landet.
Mitt skap i Midt-Norge ble bygd om rundt 2008-2010.

 

[andymcl]

Interesting. I wasn't aware that anywhere in Europe used delta to the home. Check your incoming line to line to make sure that you actually have 230v L to L. If you do have that then you need a Grid level setting to match it.

 

[houseofancients]

Interesting. I wasn't aware that anywhere in Europe used delta to the home. Check your incoming line to line to make sure that you actually have 230v L to L. If you do have that then you need a Grid level setting to match it.

3 phase is actually very common in europe.
Here 3 phase has been the defacto standard since 2000

 

[andymcl]

not the 3 phase bit .... the delta instead of wye. We have heaps of 3 phase in Australia - I have it here but all 3 phase to the residence is wye

 

[andymcl]

Pretty much every house in Canberra - the national capital (I lived there a while back) - has had 3 phase since the 1960s because there was no gas and they used bloody great wall mounted electrical heaters that nearly sent the meter in to orbit. Eventually they got gas and stopped using the wall units and now people are ditching gas for reverse cycle. Time marches on

 

[sigzug]

your ct's are used to measure current coming or going to the grid.
if they are the wrong way, they will let the inverter know you are selling to the grid instead of charging..
if you haven't check grid selling it will simply not take from the grid


your complaint is that the inverter is not using grid, co incidence?

if you are only testing, i'd remove the ct's for now completey, as they make no sense.
they are used to tell the inverter what is using the grid which it cannot sense itself ( all internal ports come equiped with an internal measuring shunt )


sunsynk support was wrong

also , be aware that these inverters wait for the grid to stabilize before allowing grid frequency sync and opening the contactor ( you'll def hear it clicking)

I have turned off the export controller setting and still no power is drawn. Removed the CT's and still nothing.

I believe this should work as the CT's only need to tell the inverter whats actually being exported or imported to the grid itself. If you have loads behind the CT's it could see loads using power as an export.

 

[sigzug]

Is that grid phase rotation wrong?

Banging sounds like connecting to the grid when the parameters don’t match, and is probably incipient failure.

This issue only occured when using 0/240/120 phase setting, meaning no banging at 0/120/240. Inverter also goes into normal when I use EN50549_1_Norway_230V instead of 133V. I would then assume that this should be the correct setting for the grid mode, but it still does not want to import or export power fromt he grid. Stays at 0W

 

[sigzug]

Som han over sa: er du sikker på at alle 3 faser er koblet til i rett rekkefølge?
Hvis noen av fasene er byttet om (aka LINE kablene) vil dette skje.
Prøvebytt noen av LINE kablene og se om det retter seg. NB. tar et par minutter etter påslag for inverteren til å godta AC-tilkoblingen og slå på releene fra nettet.

Sjekk også at du ikke har byttet nøytral og en line kabel, mål med multimeter, ikke se på fargene...

Du får også kjøpe et fasemeter som måler faserotasjon på f.ex. Clas Ohlsson. Ser ut som et digitalt multimeter.

En ting til: du er sikker på at du ikke har 400V inn til sikringsskapet? I tilfelle, prøv å velge Grid "General standard" istdf. å rote med IT settinger. De fleste norske husholdninger er nå bygd om til 400V 3-fas inn over hele landet.
Mitt skap i Midt-Norge ble bygd om rundt 2008-2010.

Enig, er nok greit å være sikker på at de har blitt koblet inn riktig rekkefølge. Skal få skaffet et meter og målt.

Det er 230V IT her jeg bor, altså ingen N. Mange har fått 400V TN, til og med her i bygda, men ikke akkurat i dette gamle bygget til min frustrasjon

 

[sigzug]

not the 3 phase bit .... the delta instead of wye. We have heaps of 3 phase in Australia - I have it here but all 3 phase to the residence is wye

Whats the difference between delta and wye?

 

[sigzug]

Just an observation i noticed now. I have connected Home Assistant using the SunSynk add-on and the Modbus connection and realised there is a "grid connected" sensor. This is Off and has always been off. I guess this is an internal switch that is separate from the AC light on the inverter? In that case it makes me very confused. What does the AC light actually mean and why is it a separate internal indicator if the grid is connected and not?

 

[andymcl]

Whats the difference between delta and wye?

No neutral on delta. In Australia the main transmission is 3 phase delta (no neutral). At the step down transformer to the street it goes from delta to wye
This site gives a somewhat useful description

https://eepower.com/power-electronics-textbook/vol-i-electrical-power-systems-design/chapter-1-introduction-power/what-is-wye-and-delta/#

We ground the neutral at the main switchboard and can have multiple neutral grounds on sub boards (MEN - multiple earth neutral). No residential supply would be missing a neutral here. So it seems that the 230v IT is deriving the 230v from line to line instead of line to neutral. Although Sigzug indicated that is disappearing in Norway

 

[sigzug]

Okay, problem solved!

The guys that suggested phases were correct, but in combination with a mistake we made when installing the inverter!

When we first installed this inverter we connected grid like we would normally (L1->L1 L2->L2 L3->L3, black black black), but connected load like it was TN (N->blue, L1->brown). And with the default factory settings on the inverter we got battery and solar giving TN LN:230V LL:400V, the new default for Norway. This made it so the load side also gave TN which worked great since it makes no difference for the load appliances. We did not think this was weird and only though it was cool that we could have IT in and get TN out. However we of course also noticed the grid was not being used.

I have now discovered that it needs to be the same grid type (IT/TN) on both the load and the grid side of the inverter. This does make sense when looking back at it.

I moved the N (blue) on the load side to L2 so it has the same format as the grid side. I also had to set grid mode to EN50549 133V because the inverter uses LN for numbering voltage (like andymcl also pointed out is common elsewhere). Since it is common to use LL to number voltage here this made us confused. We thought the EN50549 230V Grid mode was the correct because of this.

In additon to Grid Mode, Grid Level also had to change to LN:133VAC and LL:230VAC.

However we are not done since we now got a W3 phase wrong fault. I though I'd try changing the phase setting again from 0/120/240 to 0/240/120, waited a few minutes and voila! It uses the grid! JippiI!

Thank you guys so much for the help!

 

[andymcl]

Well done. I'm impressed.