Install and Operation of the SUNGOLD 10KW 48V SPLIT PHASE SOLAR INVERTER

[Lighthouse Beacon]

Kenny please just cycle it, plug it back the way it was. Leave settings as they were and just run it. Don’t change alot of settings shut down machine, reconfigure etc. Just run it and ignore it

 

[Kenny_]

Very similar to what I saw for several days prior to power board failure on my inverter. I let the alarm go, disabled my power coming in from breaker and ran house on batts all the way down to bottom of SOC range maybe 30%, then I turned on utilities and flip sub panel loads off and completely charged the batts of utilities. When I hit 97% the alarms went away. I let the machine run on batts all night and in the morning ran batts back down to 30% and charged again to 100% SOC. I didn’t have any problems again for 2 weeks and I actually replied to Sungold I think im
Good, cycling fixed it… 3 days later my inverter was dead. With that SG called “power board failure”. SG still have my invert and warehouse has not “processed” the returned device.

I don’t believe cycling fixed the issue, I believe it bought me time. I was running great with BMS connectivity prior to losing it completely, which made me sad because I’d had a great week of performance when it died.

I was babying machine only running 1 12k btu mini split and 4 ceiling fans on low setting, my amp draws on peaks were like 9amps. I’d been babying it big time. Still lost it

That's exactly what is worrying me. And or that this one battery is shit....
This today was caused (apparently) by ONE CELL being under voltage ... one out of 80 (16 cells in each rack battery) x 5 batteries. That's just doesn't seem right.

Currently the system is running in bypass mode for load....PV is charging batteries, but slowly as it is cloudy and snowy here since yesterday afternoon.

Not sure exactly what to do. (no response from SG yet but weekend...)

Cell #7 of battery 2 is coming up 3067 mv vs about 3190 for other 15 cells...

and I'm still confused about my inverter parameter settings (parms 09-14 in particular) which don't match defaults in the manual but I did not change them. I'm tempted to 'go back to factory' and reset the battery params and see if that affects other params like 9-14.

also the thing is if the BMS comm was disabled (as has been suggested by @42OhmsPA I believe) it would not have errored and switched to grid ... (at least I don't think it would have despite the battery itself displaying an error.

So much I need to learn and understand about all this battery stuff. Very important though when one is attempting to primarily run off of battery.

 

[Kenny_]

Kenny please just cycle it, plug it back the way it was. Leave settings as they were and just run it. Don’t change alot of settings shut down machine, reconfigure etc. Just run it and ignore it

That's what I've been trying to do. A huge part of my career was spent chasing things somebody (or I) have changed and it fucked things up. LOL!
I tend to be pretty conservative about making changes unless I understand the full implications of that change.

 

[Kenny_]

Emerson R48-3000e3

DIY 'Chargenectifier'

Based of the informative info recently posted by @ChrisFullPower in another thread I'm intrigued in DIY'ing a charger from used rectifiers. A quick search on eBay for '48v rectifier' has made me realize it's definitely doable at costs much lower than off the shelf options... I'll start with a...

diysolarforum.com

That's the most economical.
Chargeverter is the easiest

Wow that Chargeverter is quite proud of itself based on price! LOL

So here's what I'm doing for the moment.... The low cell 7 on battery 2 came up quite a bit from the limited PV this afternoon.....so....
I just enable charging from grid...3+ Kw at the moment will let it charge up to some amount...maybe 60/70% SOC and then set it back to SBU mode and see what happens from there.

I'm actually think I may have a defective battery and am dreading having to deal with Sungold to get it replaced....I'll start with contacting my CC Company. Not sure what the time limit might be but it's just over 30 days since that battery arrived (it was the one lost in transit for a few days). But with the 10 Year Warrant they should damn well replace it if it is not operating normally.

 

[Kenny_]

So now....neophyte question.... is the purpose of the BMS (in each of the batteries) to balance and charge the cells equally, to prevent overcharging and overdischarge as well as to manage error conditions (like happened with this Under Voltage error)?

 

[Lighthouse Beacon]

Wow that Chargeverter is quite proud of itself based on price! LOL

So here's what I'm doing for the moment.... The low cell 7 on battery 2 came up quite a bit from the limited PV this afternoon.....so....
I just enable charging from grid...3+ Kw at the moment will let it charge up to some amount...maybe 60/70% SOC and then set it back to SBU mode and see what happens from there.

I'm actually think I may have a defective battery and am dreading having to deal with Sungold to get it replaced....I'll start with contacting my CC Company. Not sure what the time limit might be but it's just over 30 days since that battery arrived (it was the one lost in transit for a few days). But with the 10 Year Warrant they should damn well replace it if it is not operating normally.

The first thing she’ll ask you to do is pop the hood and tell her the battery S/N you can tell they’ve used different providers over the years and they may have gotten better and worse suppliers over the years.

just cycle it a few times and keep running it. I’d rather you cycle off utilities at high amps and discharge at high amps tho.. just a preference of mine tho…

Good luck buddy, I’m sure you’re fine. Batts a lot easier than invert. I think the BMS pat comms change the inverter mem Params, mine did the same thing also, I got in and was like
Wtf are these params?!

 

[Lighthouse Beacon]

So now....neophyte question.... is the purpose of the BMS (in each of the batteries) to balance and charge the cells equally, to prevent overcharging and overdischarge as well as to manage error conditions (like happened with this Under Voltage error)?

Correct

 

[Kenny_]

That's what I've been thinking about the parameters being different from the Default. It sorta makes sense....may still give it a shot at 'revert to factory and start over' to know for sure...

 

[Ennis437]

That's exactly what is worrying me. And or that this one battery is shit....
This today was caused (apparently) by ONE CELL being under voltage ... one out of 80 (16 cells in each rack battery) x 5 batteries. That's just doesn't seem right.

Currently the system is running in bypass mode for load....PV is charging batteries, but slowly as it is cloudy and snowy here since yesterday afternoon.

Not sure exactly what to do. (no response from SG yet but weekend...)

Cell #7 of battery 2 is coming up 3067 mv vs about 3190 for other 15 cells...

and I'm still confused about my inverter parameter settings (parms 09-14 in particular) which don't match defaults in the manual but I did not change them. I'm tempted to 'go back to factory' and reset the battery params and see if that affects other params like 9-14.

also the thing is if the BMS comm was disabled (as has been suggested by @42OhmsPA I believe) it would not have errored and switched to grid ... (at least I don't think it would have despite the battery itself displaying an error.

So much I need to learn and understand about all this battery stuff. Very important though when one is attempting to primarily run off of battery.

sometimes you just have a cell that drops below the BMS allowable parameters its not neccsarrily defective Its happened to me before also, just do a top and bottom balance and watch that particular cell it will probably be fine once they all balance out. for instance my cell number 8 on my top battery will trip an over voltage with closed loop and I had to be a bit more conservative with charge settings to accommodate for it. I have tried the closed loop route several time and I found it easier to control my batteries behaviors using the "user settings". lowering my charge voltage to 54.5 to float gave it a nice slow top off without tripping over voltage in the BMS

 

[42OhmsPA]

That's exactly what is worrying me. And or that this one battery is shit....
This today was caused (apparently) by ONE CELL being under voltage ... one out of 80 (16 cells in each rack battery) x 5 batteries. That's just doesn't seem right.

Currently the system is running in bypass mode for load....PV is charging batteries, but slowly as it is cloudy and snowy here since yesterday afternoon.

Not sure exactly what to do. (no response from SG yet but weekend...)

Cell #7 of battery 2 is coming up 3067 mv vs about 3190 for other 15 cells...

and I'm still confused about my inverter parameter settings (parms 09-14 in particular) which don't match defaults in the manual but I did not change them. I'm tempted to 'go back to factory' and reset the battery params and see if that affects other params like 9-14.

also the thing is if the BMS comm was disabled (as has been suggested by @42OhmsPA I believe) it would not have errored and switched to grid ... (at least I don't think it would have despite the battery itself displaying an error.

So much I need to learn and understand about all this battery stuff. Very important though when one is attempting to primarily run off of battery.

Sounds like the cells are out of balance and the BMS is working. If you have one cell way out of balance from the rest it will reach HV or LV and cause the BMS to disconnect. The BMS is designed this way to protect individual cells within the pack as well as the entire battery. That's my understanding so far anyway.
The issue you run into using communications is that's it's highly unlikely that you will ever be able to balance them out with a passive balancer the BMS uses. This is where having voltage control of charging parameters is helpful, you can set your bulk charging ~3.5V / cell and float at ~3.45V / cell.
The balancing should start ~3.4V / cell if the BMS is setup correctly. If you run INTO HVD reduce bulk charge voltage in small increments, you can / should also reduce your charge current to stop the cells from 'running' so fast at the top of the knee (look at lifepo4 charge curve).
You could also flip to utility and let them float overnight, this should balance them out. You really want to connect to the packs with the BMS software while your doing this so you can see what the cells are doing... Check my thread for recent posts of cell voltage and balance issues for examples.
I highly advise building your own packs, even on a small scale 12V.... The amount of knowledge and understanding of how things work while building mine has been invaluable.
That was a wall of text, question anything that doesn't make sense.

 

[42OhmsPA]

sometimes you just have a cell that drops below the BMS allowable parameters its not neccsarrily defective Its happened to me before also, just do a top and bottom balance and watch that particular cell it will probably be fine once they all balance out. for instance my cell number 8 on my top battery will trip an over voltage with closed loop and I had to be a bit more conservative with charge settings to accommodate for it. I have tried the closed loop route several time and I found it easier to control my batteries behaviors using the "user settings". lowering my charge voltage to 54.5 to float gave it a nice slow top off without tripping over voltage in the BMS

Open loop ftmfw ?? ??

 

[Kenny_]

sometimes you just have a cell that drops below the BMS allowable parameters its not neccsarrily defective Its happened to me before also, just do a top and bottom balance and watch that particular cell it will probably be fine once they all balance out. for instance my cell number 8 on my top battery will trip an over voltage with closed loop and I had to be a bit more conservative with charge settings to accommodate for it. I have tried the closed loop route several time and I found it easier to control my batteries behaviors using the "user settings". lowering my charge voltage to 54.5 to float gave it a nice slow top off without tripping over voltage in the BMS

Thanks...that's a bit of relief.... I'm charging from grid at the moment...may let it run til it stops charging (what ever param controls that. )

When I noticed the differences in SOC etc between the five batteries I was thinking they probably need to run through a few full cycles....but with all these parameters turning on and turning off charging etc... it gets a bit confusing....

One of these days....one of these days.... I'm gonna understand all this and then Lucy Bar The Doors! LOL!

 

[Kenny_]

Open loop ftmfw ?? ??

That may be the issue here... all this damn inverter battery comm management etc...

P.S. had to google FTMFW LOL! Can use that one!

 

[Lighthouse Beacon]

Sounds like the cells are out of balance and the BMS is working. If you have one cell way out of balance from the rest it will reach HV or LV and cause the BMS to disconnect. The BMS is designed this way to protect individual cells within the pack as well as the entire battery. That's my understanding so far anyway.
The issue you run into using communications is that's it's highly unlikely that you will ever be able to balance them out with a passive balancer the BMS uses. This is where having voltage control of charging parameters is helpful, you can set your bulk charging ~3.5V / cell and float at ~3.45V / cell.
The balancing should start ~3.4V / cell if the BMS is setup correctly. If you run INTO HVD reduce bulk charge voltage in small increments, you can / should also reduce your charge current to stop the cells from 'running' so fast at the top of the knee (look at lifepo4 charge curve).
You could also flip to utility and let them float overnight, this should balance them out. You really want to connect to the packs with the BMS software while your doing this so you can see what the cells are doing... Check my thread for recent posts of cell voltage and balance issues for examples.
I highly advise building your own packs, even on a small scale 12V.... The amount of knowledge and understanding of how things work while building mine has been invaluable.
That was a wall of text, question anything that doesn't make sense.

I’ve seen you elaborate on this in another post. You also instructed me similarly in the past when I dropped BMS out and narrowed my “above knee below knee” parameters. Which did solve my issue. I ran back into it when I went back to letting BMS comms call the shots

 

[Kenny_]

Sounds like the cells are out of balance and the BMS is working. If you have one cell way out of balance from the rest it will reach HV or LV and cause the BMS to disconnect. The BMS is designed this way to protect individual cells within the pack as well as the entire battery. That's my understanding so far anyway.
The issue you run into using communications is that's it's highly unlikely that you will ever be able to balance them out with a passive balancer the BMS uses. This is where having voltage control of charging parameters is helpful, you can set your bulk charging ~3.5V / cell and float at ~3.45V / cell.
The balancing should start ~3.4V / cell if the BMS is setup correctly. If you run INTO HVD reduce bulk charge voltage in small increments, you can / should also reduce your charge current to stop the cells from 'running' so fast at the top of the knee (look at lifepo4 charge curve).
You could also flip to utility and let them float overnight, this should balance them out. You really want to connect to the packs with the BMS software while your doing this so you can see what the cells are doing... Check my thread for recent posts of cell voltage and balance issues for examples.
I highly advise building your own packs, even on a small scale 12V.... The amount of knowledge and understanding of how things work while building mine has been invaluable.
That was a wall of text, question anything that doesn't make sense.

No, it makes sense.... I'm just barely beginning to get a grasp of all this (see I may/am and EE but I spent my entire career writing software LOL) Makes me dangerous when it comes to electrical power circuits particularly.

I can definitely see how building a battery and using/managing it would make this much much clearer.

It does appear that the BMS on Battery #2 is beginning to balance the cells...

I'm up to 52% SOC overall

As I said above since I'm already on grid....might as well let it charge til full (or whenever it cuts off depending on these damned parameters!).

 

[42OhmsPA]

No, it makes sense.... I'm just barely beginning to get a grasp of all this (see I may/am and EE but I spent my entire career writing software LOL) Makes me dangerous when it comes to electrical power circuits particularly.

I can definitely see how building a battery and using/managing it would make this much much clearer.

It does appear that the BMS on Battery #2 is beginning to balance the cells...

I'm up to 52% SOC overall

As I said above since I'm already on grid....might as well let it charge til full (or whenever it cuts off depending on these damned parameters!).

I doubt you'll see any balancing until you get above 80% SOC.
Everything looks nice and balanced until you get to the top of the knee then everything happens fast.

Pay closer attention when cells get above 3.4V, your deviation will change drastically, if bet.

This is when you can reduce charge current to stop them from running to fast, when you do you'll see your voltage drop back.

 

[Kenny_]

I doubt you'll see any balancing until you get above 80% SOC.
Everything looks nice and balanced until you get to the top of the knee then everything happens fast.

Pay closer attention when cells get above 3.4V, your deviation will change drastically, if bet.

This is when you can reduce charge current to stop them from running to fast, when you do you'll see your voltage drop back.

What I mean by balancing is that the voltages of the cells (particularly the low one) are getting closer together.

currently via SA:
Cell voltage
3.335 Vhighest
3.329 Vaverage
3.317 Vlowest

and before lowest (cell 7) was 2.717

 

[Lighthouse Beacon]

What I mean by balancing is that the voltages of the cells (particularly the low one) are getting closer together.

currently via SA:
Cell voltage
3.335 Vhighest
3.329 Vaverage
3.317 Vlowest

and before lowest (cell 7) was 2.717

Yeap, cram them full. Run them down aggressively again, and then cram them full… they’ll dance together for another month. I’ve noticed in my EV which I’ve rebuilt in the past… a new battery is almost as annoying as an old battery about balance threshold discrepancy, and mid life battery really is the sweet spot. Keep exercising her. She’s got a good life ahead of her I think!!

 

[Crowz]

So now....neophyte question.... is the purpose of the BMS (in each of the batteries) to balance and charge the cells equally, to prevent overcharging and overdischarge as well as to manage error conditions (like happened with this Under Voltage error)?

Did the possibly bad battery reach 100% charge anytime recently? The weather has been crap for most people of late so if it stayed too low the bms can't do anything for you as far as balancing. It requires being mostly charged to achieve much of anything.

As for the chargeverter, I would get one of those for sure after the 2nd battery was purchased with each battery after it being a 100% more reason to buy one. You need a way to charge a single battery up for testing/balancing needs in a multi-battery setup in my opinion. Even back when I ran lead acids I had a battery charger on hand to fix any battery that drifted out of soc vs the others but that's just my method for staying on top of them back then.

48v battery chargers are not particularly cheap no matter what and the chargeverters ability to run off all kinds of input voltages makes it something I want to get one day myself especially when I add more batteries.

 

[Kenny_]

Thanks...no I don't think any of my five batteries have ever reached 100% ... System is only a month old.

 

[Crowz]

Thanks...no I don't think any of my five batteries have ever reached 100% ... System is only a month old.

I always consider charging batteries to 100% on a new setup especially when its multiple batteries involved. There is no way to sync them within a reasonable amount of time without charging all up to full to start with.

 

[Kenny_]

Well we're approaching full charge ... currently 91% SOC overall, one battery at 100% another at 99% ... charging is slowing so not sure how much longer... lowest battery is at 77% SOC
...
may just let it run overnight in bypass / charge mode...
I'll watch it another hour or so...

 

[Kenny_]

I always consider charging batteries to 100% on a new setup especially when its multiple batteries involved. There is no way to sync them within a reasonable amount of time without charging all up to full to start with.

Yeah I probably should have done that after I received that fifth battery, but was into the month of November (power bill) and wanted to see the effect...of course now all that's blown away as I'm cranking grid Kilowatts into the batteries....but at least it will give me a full/clean place to start to evaluate the Bleak Midwinter Xcel Bill.

 

[42OhmsPA]

Well we're approaching full charge ... currently 91% SOC overall, one battery at 100% another at 99% ... charging is slowing so not sure how much longer... lowest battery is at 77% SOC
...
may just let it run overnight in bypass / charge mode...
I'll watch it another hour or so...

What's the cell balance like now?

 

[Kenny_]

What's the cell balance like now?

Currently From SA:

Cell voltage on Battery #2 (the problem one) at 92.8 % SOC
3.364 Vhighest
3.359 Vaverage
3.347 Vlowest