System shut down at specific time

[Pabloesguapo]

I'm looking for ideas as to why my system suddenly for the past week shuts down at ~3:00 every morning and batteries don't hold charge worth a sh*t. We don't have an automatic backup generator anymore, as it tragically died. I've been manually topping off the batteries when needed with a construction generator for the past year or so. Not ideal, but it limps us along until we can afford +$10,000 for a new generator. (Let me just fire up the printing press in the basement..) no matter what voltage I stop the generator at, at just after 3:00 a.m. every single night, power shuts off. No matter what the battery voltage is at the time, everything shuts down at 3:00 a.m. I didn't change a single thing in this system, it just started happening.

At first I thought it was heat. Summer has finally hit with a vengeance here in arizona, the temperatures are 100 plus degrees Fahrenheit during the day, barely gets down to 70 by dawn. At first I thought it could be the excessive heat ruining my batteries efficiency, so I threw a swamp cooler in the shed, battery temperature is went from the mid-90s down to the mid 80s. But, no luck. I got to 3:10am after that.

Any ideas where I can start hunting and pecking for a solution?

 

[400bird]

You provided no useful information to assist.
What type of inverter, battery, charger, BMS, voltage readings when it shuts down, voltage you've charged the battery to, solar panels, ect.

Any reason to jump straight to a $10k generator, not more battery or solar? Making it though the night is summer shouldn't be too hard on solar and battery unless your area gets cloudy daily in the summer.

 

[Pabloesguapo]

I'm looking for ideas as to why my system suddenly for the past week shuts down at ~3:00 every morning and batteries don't hold charge worth a sh*t. We don't have an automatic backup generator anymore, as it tragically died. I've been manually topping off the batteries when needed with a construction generator for the past year or so. Not ideal, but it limps us along until we can afford +$10,000 for a new generator. (Let me just fire up the printing press in the basement..) no matter what voltage I stop the generator at, at just after 3:00 a.m. every single night, power shuts off. No matter what the battery voltage is at the time, everything shuts down at 3:00 a.m. I didn't change a single thing in this system, it just started happening.

At first I thought it was heat. Summer has finally hit with a vengeance here in arizona, the temperatures are 100 plus degrees Fahrenheit during the day, barely gets down to 70 by dawn. At first I thought it could be the excessive heat ruining my batteries efficiency, so I threw a swamp cooler in the shed, battery temperature is went from the mid-90s down to the mid 80s. But, no luck. I got to 3:10am after that.

Any ideas where I can start hunting and pecking for a solution

You provided no useful information to assist.
What type of inverter, battery, charger, BMS, voltage readings when it shuts down, voltage you've charged the battery to, solar panels, ect.

Any reason to jump straight to a $10k generator, not more battery or solar? Making it though the night is summer shouldn't be too hard on solar and battery unless your area gets cloudy daily in the summer.

From my "about" tab ony profile. Sorry, I didn't include here. Voltage at shut down varies, from as high as 50.3v, as low as a crash of 44.6v. I've shut off the gennie as high as 58v and it still doesn't last the night with just the (energy star) fridges and some box fans running.

100% off grid.

-27 Kyocera panels, giving approximately 6.5kwh
-24 Interstate GC2 6v Batteries, 3 strings of 8 for a 48v system, 630 Ah
-Midnite classic 150 and a Classic Light charge controllers
- 2 Outback 3630 inverter/chargers
-an old construction generator, my Generac died and it's expensive to replaceBackgroundOff grid homesteader since 2012. I build the entire house and the entire solar power system (design and install guidance by pros)

 

[BentleyJ]

How old Are the batteries? Certainly not from the original installation in 2012

 

[Pabloesguapo]

No, these are 3 years old this summer

 

[400bird]

Lead acid is not something I've got experience in, but have you tested specific gravity? Are getting thought the absorb cycle when charging with the generator?

Doesn't the Outback have logs to tell you why it disconnected?

 

[EastTexCowboy]

FLA in a solar application is not my area either, but I've had lots of experience with them in traditional applications. I can tell you that lead acid batteries do strange things sometimes when failing. This sounds like a battery issue to me, other than the exact timing part. If I was going to troubleshoot this I'd start by testing each battery individually. It's a PITA, especially with that many batteries, but it would either identify the problem or rule out the batteries.

 

[Pabloesguapo]

I also have an outback mate 3. It's telling me THAT there was a shutdown and what the voltage was, it doesn't tell me WHY.

I spent the morning taking specific gravity readings, taking all the cables off cleaning up the cables, posts and nuts and a new layer of dielectric grease. I also reversed the polarity of the entire battery bank.

I found that the first of the three bank of eight batteries' specific gravity was an average of 0.120 less than all the others.

 

[ksmithaz1]

If it shut's down at EXACTLY (+- 1 min) 0300 every morning then I'd be willing to guess you have inadvertently set something on the inverter or perhaps the bms based on a clock, perhaps something reset, or you have a 2032 or something in the inverter that died and caused something to reset, or .... Anything on a threshold is going to vary significantly.

 

[ksmithaz1]

If it shut's down at EXACTLY (+- 1 min) 0300 every morning then I'd be willing to guess you have inadvertently set something on the inverter or perhaps the bms based on a clock, perhaps something reset, or you have a 2032 or something in the inverter that died and caused something to reset, or .... Anything on a threshold is going to vary significantly.

I don't know what kind of support you get with your inverters, but it's probably worth a ticket if you can't find it. This might be in a KB somewhere at the manufacturer.

 

[EastTexCowboy]

I also have an outback mate 3. It's telling me THAT there was a shutdown and what the voltage was, it doesn't tell me WHY.

I spent the morning taking specific gravity readings, taking all the cables off cleaning up the cables, posts and nuts and a new layer of dielectric grease. I also reversed the polarity of the entire battery bank.

I found that the first of the three bank of eight batteries' specific gravity was an average of 0.120 less than all the others.

Based on this chart, .12 variance is quite a bit of difference - as in 100% vs 40%. I'd say that bank deserves further investigation.

If it shut's down at EXACTLY (+- 1 min) 0300 every morning then I'd be willing to guess you have inadvertently set something on the inverter or perhaps the bms based on a clock, perhaps something reset, or you have a 2032 or something in the inverter that died and caused something to reset, or .... Anything on a threshold is going to vary significantly.

I can't argue with that thinking. The temperature thing still makes me suspect the batteries but it's highly unlikely the problem would occur at exactly 3:00 pm every time unless there's something happening at that time that causes a spike when the battery SOC has already degraded due to whatever is going on with that one bank.

 

[ksmithaz1]

Quick peek at the Mate 3 manual show settings that use a clock... Some around a generator, and apparently you can control from 3rd party applications as well. Logs sometimes don't tell exactly but you might trigger some similar events and see if the logging is any different. For example if you manually shut down something, it might not say much, but if it shuts down for a low battery it might give a warning then say it's shutting down.

M-4. Grid Use Time
This function allows the system to connect to (use) the utility grid and disconnect from (drop) it on a schedule.
Grid Use Time mode is programmed separately for weekday and weekend connect times. Before turning the
Grid Use Time mode on, set all weekday and weekend time periods.
○ Three Grid Use Time periods may be programmed on weekdays.
○ Only one Grid Use Time may be programmed on a weekend.
● Enable — either enables (Y) or disables (N) the Grid Use Time function.
Three Enable fields are present for the three possible weekday usages.
● Weekday: Use — the daily time (00:00 to 23:59, Monday through Friday) when the system is told to Use the utility grid.
Three different Use times can be set.
● Weekday: Drop — the daily time (00:00 to 23:59, Monday through Friday) when the system is told to Drop the utility grid.
Three different Drop times can be set.
● Weekend: Use — the daily time (00:00 to 23:59, Saturday and Sunday) when the system is told to Use the utility grid.
● Weekend: Drop — the daily time (00:00 to 23:59, Saturday and Sunday) when the system is told to Drop the utility grid

 

[Pabloesguapo]

Based on this chart, .12 variance is quite a bit of difference - as in 100% vs 40%. I'd say that bank deserves further investigation.
View attachment 157799

I can't argue with that thinking. The temperature thing still makes me suspect the batteries but it's highly unlikely the problem would occur at exactly 3:00 pm every time unless there's something happening at that time that causes a spike when the battery SOC has already degraded due to whatever is going on with that one bank.

I was thinking that too,but I can't find as culprit. Sometimes the well pump (900w, 120v) kicks in overnight and if conditions are just wrong, it'll trigger a shutdown.