I have it up and running, finally!

Dr. Dickie

Dr. Dickie

Member
Joined
Sep 23, 2020
Messages
363
I finally got my powerwall up and installed, with 120V AC going to my solar panel in the house. Was on solar power last night and right now.
A great BIG THANK YOU to all here who helped me, I really do not think I would have done it without the incredible knowledge given so freely and easily on this site.
Now (no rest for the weary) I have to start building the battery I am going to use to power a fan in the shed to keep the temps down in this coming summer.
ImageImage

This was when I was setting up the Batrium through the USB cable, it is now on the WIFI and I can monitor it in my house. I have e wifi set up coming to be able to get the Midnite solar on Wifi was well.
 
Yay! Looks good love the purple wall/shelf these are 160p? How many watts is your inverter?

Later floyd
 
floydR said:
Yay! Looks good love the purple wall/shelf these are 160p? How many watts is your inverter?

Later floyd
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Yep. 160P of LG M26 cells. The inverter is just 3 Kw. Like an idiot, I was so focused on making sure my battery could last 3 days without solar input, I was narrow focused on just 120 V. So when I ran the 140' of AC line, I only buried 2 conductor wire. DOH, why didn't I just run a 3 conductor for split phase down the road.
Well, next year I am going dig that all up and run 3 conductor wire. That way when I sell the house, the new owner need only put in some batteries (or maybe I will install a nice LiFePO4 battery) and they can go.
 
Why not put down a trench or pipe instead? And then later on you can expand it or add more wire without digging :)
 
Dr. Dickie said:
Yep. 160P of LG M26 cells. The inverter is just 3 Kw. Like an idiot, I was so focused on making sure my battery could last 3 days without solar input, I was narrow focused on just 120 V. So when I ran the 140' of AC line, I only buried 2 conductor wire. DOH, why didn't I just run a 3 conductor for split phase down the road.
Well, next year I am going dig that all up and run 3 conductor wire. That way when I sell the house, the new owner need only put in some batteries (or maybe I will install a nice LiFePO4 battery) and they can go.
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I do stuff like this all the time.... its so hard to implement something that's all-new correctly the first time! And also willing to move ahead and redo/make it better. Refreshing to read that I'm not the only one :)
 
daromer said:
Why not put down a trench or pipe instead? And then later on you can expand it or add more wire without digging :)
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It is in conduit, but there is NO WAY you are pulling 130 ' of 6 AWG 2 or 3 conductor wire through that, especially at the 90o turns.
 
If the conduit is large enough to handle 6 /3 romex or 3 6 AWG wires if so you can just dig up the 90º elbows and install junction boxes so you have straight pulls.
later floyd
 
floydR said:
If the conduit is large enough to handle 6 /3 romex or 3 6 AWG wires if so you can just dig up the 90º elbows and install junction boxes so you have straight pulls.
later floyd
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Yeah. but even so, one run would be about 30' the other about 100'. 30'? Maybe, but pushing it through 100'? No way. It is just 1" pvc conduit. Easier to dig up the old 1" conduit and put in new. That way I just have to push/pull it 10' at a time. I wasn't that hard.
 
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I had a 4*30mm2 alu solid core cable pulled through a 20meter of pipe.. The pipe was 1 mm larger :D Pushed it plus dragged it. 4 person and had to use alot of things to get tit rhgough.. Nightmare but doable. Didnt plan for that thick cable but thats what i got.

I always dig down thick pipes nowadays and never with sharp bends and with proper pull lines from start :D
 
I had to run a pair of 4wire x 6awg cables thru a 2" pipe with a few 45deg elbows - the red line below. That's 8 x 6awg wires. Started off pulling - but the pull line came off the cables about 2/3 way thru. Pushed and pushed... no luck and could not pull it back!.
Finally dumped a entire bottle of "Wesson Oil" down the pipe - and somehow was able to finish the push. PHEW!!! It can be difficult to run wire in pipe :)

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I finally have all of my house (except for 240V systems--AC, Oven, Dryer, and Hot Water) on my solar/battery system, Now I just have to up my battery back by 1/2 again. I am back to processing cells, I expect that by this winter I will be able to up the battery.
 
Well, I flew too close to the sun. Hubris before the downfall.
The Inverter quit working. 72 pounds of inverter (I have to get my neighbor to help my mount it in my system), and it just stopped working. No error lights, no problems indicated, it just quit--imagine my surprise when the light went out.
Only indication of a problem is, the menu shows a battery voltage of 13.4 V, when the battery (measured at the terminal going into the inverter) shows 56.2V.
I am awaiting what Sungold is going to do. Of course, this died right before the Labor day weekend, so I am still waiting.
Quite sure I will have to return it (what a major pain in pancreas, but what are going to do?
Very sad 😓
 
unfortunatly those "reliable " brand inverters are anything but. I have had my MPPSolar LV2424-HS for a couple years now and still working great Generated over 1MW of energy
 
Sorry to hear about this. As you might remember, I have ETL AIMS and they are doing OK. The idea being (besides fire insurance) that ETL (e.g. UL) might have better components that non-ETL? Who knows... I can only attest that the 'blue' AIMS pure sine waves have been working perfectly for over 2 years continuously now.

In the trailer - the MPP Solar 3048LV has also been working continuously for 5mons now - no problems.
 
Sungold inverters should be better quality than the unReliable brand inverters. As they look like clones of Aims PICO series inverters. I believe That the Reiable inverter was replaced by a sungold inverter.

Later floyd
 
floydR said:
Sungold inverters should be better quality than the unReliable brand inverters. As they look like clones of Aims PICO series inverters. I believe That the Reiable inverter was replaced by a sungold inverter.

Later floyd
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Yeah, I cannot find any difference between the Sungold and the AIMS--at least cosmetically. Unlikely that they are two different inverters--although components might be different, the design is the same.
They think the Control board went bad based on the fact that it shows an incorrect battery voltage.
I am going to crack it open today and pull the out the control board. Once I get the number off of it, they are going to ship me a new one.
So long as I don't have to take that monster back down off its mounting board (dang thing is 72 pounds), I will give it a try.
 
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jdeadman said:
unfortunatly those "reliable " brand inverters are anything but. I have had my MPPSolar LV2424-HS for a couple years now and still working great Generated over 1MW of energy
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Actually, the reliable 3kW inverter that is in the picture was the old one. It worked perfectly, albeit I only had it going for about 4 months. If it wasn't such a huge pain the take the new Sungold one down, I would put the old reliable on back up in the meantime.
 
It would be very interesting to compare the control board and other internals between the Aims and Sungold inverters to learn how they are the same and different. I have a Ampinvt brand inverter I got on Amazon that seams like another close although with a slightly different box and with a 120vac charger rather than the 240vac passthrough of the Aims, this and the price is why I decided it was the best fit for my needs. Still need to finish scaling up my batteries to test it out though, knock on wood.
 
cak said:
It would be very interesting to compare the control board and other internals between the Aims and Sungold inverters to learn how they are the same and different. I have a Ampinvt brand inverter I got on Amazon that seams like another close although with a slightly different box and with a 120vac charger rather than the 240vac passthrough of the Aims, this and the price is why I decided it was the best fit for my needs. Still need to finish scaling up my batteries to test it out though, knock on wood.
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Yeah, don't know.
I DID learn that they are sending me a new control board to put it.
The fly in the ointment is that the control board is being shipped out from China!
I knew it would be made in China, but buying it off Amazon, I thought maybe they had a US distributor and so could have part and units here in the US.
Nope.
Maybe that is standard for inverters, I don't know.
If I knew that part would have to shipped from China, I would have perhaps changed my mind on buying this.
So, now I have a month or two wait to get the board. So, here I sit with lots of sunshine and no way to use it.😭
 
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