Very new to solar but started purchasing items, not sure of the final specs of the whole system.

[kromc5]

Total usage for the last two months.

 

[kromc5]

Batteries are in New Jersey and need to get started on the busbars. We have had 3 days of heavy clouds and raining, but it’s doing well. I still wonder if we have enough panels for the winter, but happy with the charge rates today.

 

[kromc5]

Bunch of batteries arrived. time to build the triple parallel 4p16s with dual 12kw inverters. Still need to verify if the running dual 12kw inviters off the same battery is ok. I cannot see a problem doing so but want to verify. The end goal will be 3-12kw inverters, 9 charge controllers with 240kwh worth of batteries with 58kw of pv.

 

[kromc5]

Finally made my way through all the boxes, all perfectly flat but two were dented. I would have to sit down and double check but out of roughly 160 ish only two had issues. I will test the new batch and post the results.

Bulk of the batteries are from:
Hayley miu

Dongguan Lightning New Energy Technology Co., Ltd. - 12V 24V Battery/ 48V Home Energy Storage/ Portable Power Station/ Lithium ion Batteries, Battery Accessories

Dongguan Lightning New Energy Technology Co., Ltd., Experts in Manufacturing and Exporting 12V 24V Battery/ 48V Home Energy Storage/ Portable Power Station/ Lithium ion Batteries, Battery Accessories and 0 more Products.

shandian.en.alibaba.com

 

[kromc5]

Starting the 4th 4p16s, lightly sand the terminals with 1500 dustless then clean and apply ox-gard. Forgot I was out of grub screws so top balance is delayed. Few pictures of the two dented, packaging was perfect and I sent the video to Hayley. I always record from start to finish opening every package, but they are already telling me its fine. But the batteries cannot sit close together so I consider them unusable. Will report back on the outcome and hope they make it right.

 

[kromc5]

Grubs screws were lost yesterday in the mail but the second order is out for delivery. I have been researching how to charge an ev off the solar. The good aspect is there are many aftermarket chargers that are adjustable in steps of 12, 16, 25 amps etc. The level 1 ford charger says 30 amps but plugs into 120 or 240. The interesting aspect to see if the panels have enough capacity for heating and charging around 25 amps to 30. But if not even 16 amps gets 90 miles in 6 hours.

https://www.ford.com/cmslibs/content/dam/brand_ford/en_us/brand/trucks/f150/f150-lightning/pdf/F150LightningMobilePowerCord-Specs_08_v2.pdf

Also bought a dedicated charger to free up the time spent checking constantly.

 

[kromc5]

Got the rest of the grub screws in and started charging, will have 3 -40 amp chargers this time.
The tester/charger is decently accurate.

 

[Hedges]

Positive and negative cables both connected at same end of looong grow of batteries?
Would rather see one at each end.
What is the voltage, +/- on cell terminals of first cell, and of last cell?

 

[kromc5]

Positive and negative cables both connected at same end of looong grow of batteries?
Would rather see one at each end.
What is the voltage, +/- on cell terminals of first cell, and of last cell?

Currently at 3.319 on the charge side and 3.315 on the farthest side. Each side is 32 cells so your saying to have only have positive on one end and negative only on the other?

 

[Hedges]

3.319 and 3.315 sounds good enough. But ...

Yes, prefer positive at one end, negative at other (if only one wire for each.) If two wires each, both ends seems good.
If you are already driving both ends of 32 cells (or is that both ends of 64 cells, and they jump across from one group to the other?) then measure in the middle, compare to the end.

The point was to find how far some some cells lag the others. Hard to believe far end of a long runs is just 4 mV different. 40A? That would be 0.0001 ohm (if all current drawn from end; it is really tapped off 32 or 64 places.

So I think it is middle of string of cells that will have lowest voltage.

 

[kromc5]

3.319 and 3.315 sounds good enough. But ...

Yes, prefer positive at one end, negative at other (if only one wire for each.) If two wires each, both ends seems good.
If you are already driving both ends of 32 cells (or is that both ends of 64 cells, and they jump across from one group to the other?) then measure in the middle, compare to the end.

The point was to find how far some some cells lag the others. Hard to believe far end of a long runs is just 4 mV different. 40A? That would be 0.0001 ohm (if all current drawn from end; it is really tapped off 32 or 64 places.

So I think it is middle of string of cells that will have lowest voltage.

Thank you for the information, I needed a few more lugs but will have a 3rd 40amp running which will be connected in the middle. In the evening I do turn off two since they are all the smaller bank. I can already see the increased usage with just one running all night.

 

[kromc5]

Decent charge rate, ac is running with two 40 amp chargers. It usually around 12:40 when the suns hits all the panels.

 

[Hedges]

Before you connect 3rd charger in the middle, what is voltage in the middle?

If you connect three chargers, at 0%, 50%, 100% (both ends and middle), what are the voltages across cell terminals (not bus bars) at each of those locations, also at 25% and 75% (the new middles, the sagging center of suspension bridges)?

 

[kromc5]

Before you connect 3rd charger in the middle, what is voltage in the middle?

If you connect three chargers, at 0%, 50%, 100% (both ends and middle), what are the voltages across cell terminals (not bus bars) at each of those locations, also at 25% and 75% (the new middles, the sagging center of suspension bridges)?

The middle are now at 3.317, outside is 3.322 to 3.331. The new charger is doing well, nothing is warm anywhere on the unit.

 

[Hedges]

3.331 - 3.317 = 0.014V delta

Did you measure 3.317 after connecting the new charger (3rd one?) to the middle?
Measure a point that does not have a charger. Measure the 25% and 75% points, and remeasure 0%, 50%, 100%.
Repeat this test when some point reached 3.65V.
If there is substantial voltage delta up the knee of the curve, I think it will be useful to let them sit charging (constant voltage) waiting for low ones to catch up further, tail off.

 

[kromc5]

3.331 - 3.317 = 0.014V delta

Did you measure 3.317 after connecting the new charger (3rd one?) to the middle?
Measure a point that does not have a charger. Measure the 25% and 75% points, and remeasure 0%, 50%, 100%.
Repeat this test when some point reached 3.65V.
If there is substantial voltage delta up the knee of the curve, I think it will be useful to let them sit charging (constant voltage) waiting for low ones to catch up further, tail off.

I checked all across the bank, they are much closer now, with the 3rd charger going. I changed the wiring and have been monitoring them. I do check and move the chargers around as needed as well.

 

[kromc5]

Slowly moving all three chargers around, here's the delta in the middle of the bank.

 

[kromc5]

The chargers are near the center but offset from one another. This seems to work even better than two outside and one middle.
Both banks are at the same in the middle and the farthest outside are at 3.319

 

[kromc5]

Test drove a f150 lariat/er all options, only 21k dealer mark up .
Pros:
Great acceleration.
Very quite.
Great AC
Very roomy back seat.
1 pedal function was very easy to use, breaks could last the life of the truck?
Regen did add miles back on the long down hills.

Cons:
Was told any orders would probably not be full filled till 2024.
Many are marking them up but other dealers are doing msrp.

Look close at pictures cigarrete ash all in the vehicle, with only 300 miles.

 

[kromc5]

It's definably going faster with the 3rd charger, all batteries are 3.348 to 3.357. I have continued to move the chargers around as well.
I may this time get them to 3.45 to 3.5 and then break them down to 2/4 groups and test the new automated charger. I finally found the software
but will need to see if it works.