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Solis Hybrid Inverter Charge from other PV production

SteveC4

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Joined
Feb 12, 2022
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17
Hi all, can the Solis 5K-48-5G send excess energy generated from other sources to the battery? I have 3 different PV strings but not connected to the Solis. They were installed separately so not easy to get them connected + I'd need 3x inputs which the Solis doesn't have. I'm using the Solis to send cheap rate electricity at night to the battery to use in the day so the settings are set to:

Charge Time 12am - 4am
Discharge Time 4am - 12am

This works very well but I need to send excess solar production in the day to it as well. The Acrel meter / Solis can see the excess going to the grid but doesn't use it. I imagine there must be a way to achieve this?
 
Hi Steve
Quick question as you sound like you have similar set up to myself. I have AC coupled PV which I want to stay as is. This is on fits tariff so wouldn't make sense to connect to a solis hybrid. Im looking to have a solis 5kw hybrid installed with a separate pv system & batteries, this will be DC connected ( charge batteries & supply loads as required). Does you Acrel meter see any potential export from your PV which isn't connected directly to the solis inverter and charge the batteries if not required by the house rather than export?

After support as I cant find any information anywhere on web/manuals to see if it will capture the energy and charge batteries before exporting. I can see there is an option to pull power in over night to charge batteries (if cheaper tariff available at certain time) as you mentioned.

Help appreciated

Gavin
 
Sorted it! Can be deleted.
Any details on how you did this?

Manual is really vague on this and implies it isn't possible (which seems unlikely)?

I'm only at install stage and most info on Solis are they are fine/good-for-cheap inverter, but concerned over this issue!

Any details gratefully received.
 
Sorry chaps. Only just seen these replies.

Yes, the Acrel meter sees any excess from any generation source and uses it. I have 3 different Solar arrays, none of them connect to the Solis and it uses the power from all of them. The logic is House demand first, then charge battery and if both satisfied, send back to the grid.
 
Sorted it! Can be deleted.
Hi, I have a similar arrangement, just installed but can't get the Solis hybrid to send the excess from my external PV system to the battery. Solis say it should work but I can't find any settings to make it work. How did you manage?
 
I had a reply from Solis UK (EU service) which was useful. I had set up the time of use to charge during off peak (00:30 to 04:30) and to discharge during the other 20 hours. This apparently prevents it charging the battery from surplus power from an existing PV system. I removed the discharge times and things sort of work, which is a step forward. Today was quite sunny with my PV system generating about 1.5kW for several hours so I had time to do some experiments. The battery sometimes charged and sometimes would not charge. It alternated every 2nd time I switched on/off a kettle, very consistently. If the Solis was generating power to power the house (and kettle) and I switched off the kettle the Solis output power ramped down to a few Watts and the surplus PV power was exported, not routed to the battery. Switching on the kettle for a few seconds again briefly drew mains power as the Solis got up to power. Switching off the kettle again resulted in the surplus PV being routed to the battery. This is very repeatable; switch the kettle on for two seconds, PV power is exported, switch it on again for two seconds, PV power is routed to the battery. I tried changing everything I thought might affect this but nothing does. It looks very much like a software bug in their control loop. I'm going back to Solis with this information. Has anyone else seen this sort of behaviour?
 
...This is very repeatable; switch the kettle on for two seconds, PV power is exported, switch it on again for two seconds, PV power is routed to the battery. I tried changing everything I thought might affect this but nothing does. It looks very much like a software bug in their control loop. I'm going back to Solis with this information. Has anyone else seen this sort of behaviour?
Guess an on was really an off there?

This guide may help you...


When you do tests, IMHO, put the kettle on (or off) for a longer period - at least 20s. I find it sometimes takes several seconds for the Solis to recognise the grid load and to ramp up (or down) the MPPT or Battery production. In those first few seconds after a big load change there may be some import (or export) that is not indicative of how it will settle.
 
Thanks for the reply. I have the inverter set exactly as the document shows. I had set a discharge time for all time except charging time but learned from Solus that was wrong and prevents charging from surplus power. So I now have no discharge time set and am getting charging from surplus power from my existing PV system. The problem I described was repeatable, with the inverter alternating between charging and not charging every second time a high load was applied for a short period. I originally had the load on for minutes and the inverter would not switch to charging from the surplus. A short interruption in the load made it start charging. Very odd.
However it seems to get itself sorted out eventually and has put some charge into the battery from surplus PV power. So I'll just leave it alone. I'm still pretty sure there's a mistake in the control loop firmware but hey ho...
 
Thanks for the reply. I have the inverter set exactly as the document shows. I had set a discharge time for all time except charging time but learned from Solus that was wrong and prevents charging from surplus power. So I now have no discharge time set and am getting charging from surplus power from my existing PV system. The problem I described was repeatable, with the inverter alternating between charging and not charging every second time a high load was applied for a short period. I originally had the load on for minutes and the inverter would not switch to charging from the surplus. A short interruption in the load made it start charging. Very odd.
However it seems to get itself sorted out eventually and has put some charge into the battery from surplus PV power. So I'll just leave it alone. I'm still pretty sure there's a mistake in the control loop firmware but hey ho...
Hi Boltzmann

Interesting reading your problem as mine is almost identical problem as yours, Ive just installed a Solis 6kw Hybrid inverter with Pylon tech US 5000s on existing system of 2 sets of 4KW panels into 2 separate Aurora Inverters, seemed to work the first day as it should taking surplus power and charging batteries as it should and force charging on E7 at night however after the first day it stopped sending surplus power to charge batteries and kept sending back to grid apart from very occasionally sending short spurts to charge battery like you I found switching kettle on and off it would send charge to batteries for a short period and then stop, I spoke to Solis Service who went and checked all my settings and confirmed they were correct they thought it must be the Eastron Meter so they sent me a new meter and Ct coil and after installing it I still had the same problem . I then rerouted one of my Solar arrays into the Solis Inverter and then the surplus started to go to charge the Batteries some of the time but then send surplus back to the grid even though the batteries were 50% soc however over the last few days with the extra sun the periods of surplus energy that go to charge the batteries is getting longer and surplus to the grid getting shorter so hopefully it will settle down , let us know if it gets worse or if you find a solution as I assume it has to be a software problem with the inverter.
 
Hi, My 1st post here. Seeing a similar issue with a newly installed Solis Hybrid inverter and 10.5 kWh Pylontech installed in the garage. House has an AC coupled Solis inverter; when this is exporting the excess isn't being sent to the battery via the Hybrid.

Some musings...
- Hybrid inverter doesn't currently have any PV installed.
- Power flow arrows on Hybrid screen reflect the correct direction and power and verified on the Power Meter (Eastron SDM120CTM with CT)
- Anyone know if low temperatures we have in UK (batteries are at 1degC in garage) the BMS will stop the charging?

@SteveC4 & @Boltzmann Thanks for the settings above. I've adjusted to suit and managed some testing but ran out of sunshine today. Not seen any charging taking place today.
 

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... 10.5 kWh Pylontech installed in the garage. ...
- Anyone know if low temperatures we have in UK (batteries are at 1degC in garage) the BMS will stop the charging?
Don't "know", but I remember reading on here somewhere that Pylontechs reduce charge from 5 degrees and cut off at 0 (as they should).

= need to insulate + heat it ♨️
 
Thanks makes perfect sense. Just enabled charging from grid and battery started charging at 2.55KW. Looks a bigger issue charging from solar than just temperature alone.
 
Can you share a diagram of how the two inverters are connected and where CT clamps are?
 
Only have 1 CT for Hybrid inverter in garage, installed on the origin so can see all the loads connected. House inverter doesn't have metering installed. Hybrid inverter shows the export.
 

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The diagram is helpful. In self-use mode the Solis RHI should charge batteries if PV input is greater than house usage. But you have no PV input, so IMHO there is no reason the RHI would start charging batteries, unless it is configured to force charge.

Can you not replace the house Solis with the hybrid and batteries, or is the garage location part of a longer-term plan?
 
The diagram is helpful. In self-use mode the Solis RHI should charge batteries if PV input is greater than house usage. But you have no PV input, so IMHO there is no reason the RHI would start charging batteries, unless it is configured to force charge.

Can you not replace the house Solis with the hybrid and batteries, or is the garage location part of a longer-term plan?
The Eastron Meter and Ct should detect all surplus power and divert to charge Batteries not matter where it’s generated from so it should detect your other solar panels production and divert excess to the Batteries, you have the same problem as me but since I’ve been able to divert one set panels into my Solis Hybrid it’s now starting to charge batteries from Excess solar although it still seem to stop for 5 or 10 minutes starts exporting again and then start charging Batteries again
 
The Eastron Meter and Ct should detect all surplus power and divert to charge Batteries not matter where it’s generated from so it should detect your other solar panels production and divert excess to the Batteries
Where is that mode of operation documented?
 
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