Sunny Island Lithium Battery Summary?

[Calvin98]

Does this look about right for options for using Sunny Island 6048-US with lithium batteries?

When connection to a lithium battery:

1. Update SI firmware that has lithium battery option. Some SI don't list lithium battery in the battery options.

Actual battery options:
1. Buy SMA approved battery. Like the LG RESU10H 9.8kw battery for $6056. = $617/kwh capacity. Very high cost.

2. SOk 100AH Server battery - CAN bus communication works. $1,739 x 5.12KWh = $339/kwh. Plug and play setup. High cost.

3. EG4 server rack battery - no can bus communication, might work, might not. Might have future software to make CAN communication work. Have to play with SI or battery settings to get it to work. $1499 x 5.12kwh = $292/kwh. Better cost, but at a price of no CAN communication.

4. Any other lithium battery and any other BMS - set up as AGM in SI and play with settings. Maybe CAN bus communication (or you write your own code and buy parts to make it work). Take your chances.

5. DIY battery using lithium cells and REC 16S BMS for $600/ 5.12kwh battery. Can also parallel cells and use same BMS in the battery. If you want lots of storage, you need several $600 BMS for each pack. REC BMS will work with SI CAN bus communication, but it costs $600/battery.

Say you want 40kwh of storage. The LG way would cost $24,680 ($617/kwh x 40kwh). SOk would cost $13,560, EG4 $11,680, DIY with 280 ah cells could be less, but depends. Also not easy to tell if the quality of the cells is good or not., etc. The REC BMS could make it cost more than other options.

There is also the question of how many battery packs can be connected in parallel to the SI. EG4 might be limited to 6 packs in parallel. Then you may need multiple parallel battery packs to get the KWH of storage that you want.

Trying to see the best way to go.

 

[johnboyinar]

Would like to see more on this too

 

[etatdiysolar]

I don't think there is a SI lithium software option, if true it probably only talks to super expensive batteries...

I have a mix of EG4 and DIY, they all connect together to a 500A victron smartshunt. The Smart shunt is awesome and calculates SOC charge but does not communicate with the SI as yet!#!!$

I run the SI in AGM mode and spent many hours tweaking the settings. It works and charges up perfectly I think, HOWEVER the real SOC and SI SOC get off and it can be dangerous. Been running like this for 9 months now, then couple days ago it rained all day, the SI SOC low end was way off and thought it had plenty of charge left but it ran the batteries to 0% SOC until the entire system shut down. When I got it all running again the SI had no errors... Not sure if I damaged the batteries..

I have to find a way to get the Smartshunt SOC to the SI... if anyone knows a solution.

 

[SilverbackMP]

I don't think there is a SI lithium software option, if true it probably only talks to super expensive batteries...

I have a mix of EG4 and DIY, they all connect together to a 500A victron smartshunt. The Smart shunt is awesome and calculates SOC charge but does not communicate with the SI as yet!#!!$

I run the SI in AGM mode and spent many hours tweaking the settings. It works and charges up perfectly I think, HOWEVER the real SOC and SI SOC get off and it can be dangerous. Been running like this for 9 months now, then couple days ago it rained all day, the SI SOC low end was way off and thought it had plenty of charge left but it ran the batteries to 0% SOC until the entire system shut down. When I got it all running again the SI had no errors... Not sure if I damaged the batteries..

I have to find a way to get the Smartshunt SOC to the SI... if anyone knows a solution.

REC BMS set up for Sunny Islands are supposed to communicate. I'll be finding out.

 

[Maitake]

I have the REC and a pile of cells. Not put together yet.
@MurphyGuy has actual experience.

 

[ChrisFullPower]

I’m currently assembling my Sunny Island system. 64 150ah Lishen cells, 4p16s, with Batrium as my BMS. So far in my testing it’s worked pretty well but have heard issues when the charge current gets pretty high. I chose Batrium because of its amount of customization and how well it integrates with Home Assistant.

 

[MurphyGuy]

REC BMS set up for Sunny Islands are supposed to communicate. I'll be finding out.

It is basically plug and play. You just tell the SI its on a lithium battery and set the REC BMS up for your battery, then plug in the coms cable and done.

 

[shingsam]

I don't think there is a SI lithium software option, if true it probably only talks to super expensive batteries...

I have a mix of EG4 and DIY, they all connect together to a 500A victron smartshunt. The Smart shunt is awesome and calculates SOC charge but does not communicate with the SI as yet!#!!$

I run the SI in AGM mode and spent many hours tweaking the settings. It works and charges up perfectly I think, HOWEVER the real SOC and SI SOC get off and it can be dangerous. Been running like this for 9 months now, then couple days ago it rained all day, the SI SOC low end was way off and thought it had plenty of charge left but it ran the batteries to 0% SOC until the entire system shut down. When I got it all running again the SI had no errors... Not sure if I damaged the batteries..

I have to find a way to get the Smartshunt SOC to the SI... if anyone knows a solution.

can u share config battery charger on SI ?
Same me too, use VRLA mode and i use 15s lithium, i sett 46v on SI

 

[toms]

Keep in mind if you are using multiple packs in parallel with a Sunny Island, you can use a REC-BMS on one pack, and cheap ebike BMS’ on the remaining packs in parallel.

This is a cost-effective solution for those looking for large capacity batteries without using parallel cells.

 

[shingsam]

Keep in mind if you are using multiple packs in parallel with a Sunny Island, you can use a REC-BMS on one pack, and cheap ebike BMS’ on the remaining packs in parallel.

This is a cost-effective solution for those looking for large capacity batteries without using parallel cells.

How about JBD bms? On description they support with SMA ?