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Inheriting a challenge

Chris_5339762

Ok, that title is probably a bit OTT, but my old parents in Galway have had an Eddi/Harvi system with a 3kW inverter and a 3.3kW (roughly) set of panels installed. It is very, very nice, and complements an old solar hot water system. It kind of all happened without all the thought that should go into it. Anyway, I have configured those two to work together with a bit of headspace allowed in temperature for the old hot water system to work. Seems ok, and the Eddi will put about 2kWh into the hot water daily. I have no idea the equivalent the old system puts in, but they are happy together and we end up with a 250l container of 60C water.

However the install has been a disaster. The installers were great, but the company (who were well reviewed) are not interested in trying to sort out the final configuration of the system and the extensive troubleshooting we need. They are just not answering calls anymore regardless of how much of the riot act they have been read.

I'm trying to troubleshoot a few issues myself and I can maybe solve a few of the minor ones. I'll try to keep to this thread. Here are two issues - I have others to come.

1) Occasionally the Eddi and the Harvi do not communicate properly, with the app and the Eddi saying 0kW from the panels, 0kW usage and 0kW import. This, I'm imagining, is simply the wireless connection between the Eddi/Harvi dieing temporarily, but it only seems to happen in the afternoon of hot days. At that point, I'm imagining everything gets imported. Can the Eddi/Harvi be connected by ethernet easily, or is it just wireless?

2) I've also occasionally seen the PV output drop to zero according to the Eddi, even when there is a blue sky. In that case, the Eddi says 0kW from the panels, say 1.4kW usage, and 1.4kW imported. Could that be a dodgy cable, or is it something more sinister?

Also 3) Often times the MyFusion app reported values bear absolutely no resemblance to those shown on the Eddi, even when a smoothing of data, or a five minute time average is assumed. MyFusion is often out by a factor of 2 or 3. The app says 160W current usage, for instance, and the Eddi says 800W. I don't know which to believe, if either, I'd say the 800W doesn't bear reality either as I know the oven usage shows up on neither, but thats another matter.

Any ideas? I'm sure this isn't the only question I'm going to ask.

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Chris_5339762

Interesting, thanks. After looking at the documentation the panels are more likely only about 15W in the difference so that probably isn't worth pursuing.

Its a SUN2000-3KTL-L1 inverter, so yup, two strings.

Will keep pressuring the installer about the password, it's silly really, but everyone I know is reporting the same problem. The system gets installed and companies have absolutely no interesting in snagging - they're too busy. I was tempted to do a factory reset but I don't want to wreck whatever settings they put into it in the first place. I just don't know enough about it.

There is also talk of a small wind turbine (which we already own) being put on the roof with a little 12V DC to 240V AC inverter to power a resistive load storage heater in the bathroom. God help me.

championc

See if you can find a manual. Maybe you have one already. Battery params should come from the battery. The only real inverter setting would be setting the country, so that it follows the specs laid down by EN50549IE.

You may end up taking a token €100 Small Claims Court case to force the installer to hand over the username and password, given that you have fully paid for your system. €20 covers the case cost and €80 to cover the loss of savings, making it clear that you will waive the €80 if the provide the details.

Don't let them in your house again - there's enough support on here I reckon if you need help with anything.

Chris_5339762

I agree, loads of help on here and I'm sure far more than the installers will ever give. The system still belongs to my dad though, and he would want the installers to finish the job, especially since he's paying for it!

I hope it won't come to the SCC, but I'll go there if needs be. It's such a simple thing. I have the inverter manual on my desktop as it stands so I'd be able to setup things. For the reasons above though, I doubt I'll be allowed to do a factory reset though.

championc

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120012140#Comment_120012140

It may be that you need to set them a deadline to "comply", and then go to the SCC route

Chris_5339762

Well they have partly complied, but I just wanted to doublecheck am I not doing something REALLY stupid before ringing them.

They have provided us, on three seperate occasions, password to connect to our Huawei inverter. NONE of them work. I am using the FusionHome app (not FusionSolar) to try to connect to it. They assure me that the password(s) are what the electrican gave them, but they just don't work and there are always days between ringing them to ask a question and them actually hearing back from the electrician.

I tried the default password, written on the inverter itself, and it does connect to the inverter wifi, but then gives me a seperate message "Failed to connect to the inverter. Ensure that the WiFi connection is correct".

Can different passwords give you different levels of access to the inverter? I've never heard of this on a wi-fi network (as the Username would be the same in the background). Or am I doing something very, very stupid. Unfortunately they never trained us in any of this.

Reading the manual - I don't know whether they enabled FusionHome to work through our own wi-fi network to connect to the inverter.. I can't get that far. All of the stats etc appear in FusionSolar correctly, but if I connect to my own wi-fi network and try and access the inverter I get the same error message as above.

Any tips would be appreciated!

championc

Since they originally offerred to make the settings, I would therefore assume that they have remote access to verify the password.

So ask them to verify themselves and let you know

Chris_5339762

Progress! Got in touch with a very helpful lady. She basically said to not use the FusionHome app, that everything is available and setup through the FusionSolar app. So I don't have the inverter password but she took me into the bowels of the FusionSolar app (which is awful btw) to settings I didn't know existed.

I plan to look at the weather every evening and decide whether to charge the battery overnight or not. I did this by changing the battery to TOU mode.

1) Here are the settings I've picked, can someone cast their eye over them so I don't burn down the house? Thanks.

End of charge SOC = 100%

End of discharge SOC = 5%

Charge from AC = Enable

AC charge cutoff SOC = 80%

Priority of excess PV energy = Charge preference

Allowed AC charge power = 3kW

Time settings = 0000 - 0400 charging, 0900 - 2300 discharging

My understanding of this is that the PV will charge the battery to 100% but an overnight charge on nightrate will only go to 80% (better on the battery and the cost).

2) The only one I'm unsure of is the Allowed AC charge power. I'm guessing this is the kW of the overnight charging? So it'll charge the battery at 3kW? I can't change it to 2 or 2.5kW. I don't know what the max of the battery (Luna2000) is, and it hasn't been sunny enough to generate over 2kW of excess PV since it was installed.

3) If I set the discharge time to say, 11am, between sunrise and 11am will the inverter allow Eddi to heat hot water on any PV excess? Might help getting into Feb or March.

Thanks a million!

Chris_5339762

Right well that did all actually work... I have set it up to TOU and indeed we are getting a nice 80% charge to the battery on the night rate, which then gets used during the day.

However I'm getting complaints that the hot water isn't hot enough, and as I can work out, the inverter doesn't give an option to heat hot water for a few hours with excess PV BEFORE charging the battery. It'll only divert excess to the hot water AFTER the battery is full. I don't want to charge the battery then use THAT power to heat the hot water... as the immersion is 3kW and the battery can only put out 2.5kW. It's also very manual.

Suppose I did the following for a few months until we have enough sunlight to do battery AND hot water.

End of charge SOC = 50%

End of discharge SOC = 5%

Charge from AC = Enable

AC charge cutoff SOC = 80%

Priority of excess PV energy = Charge preference (only other option is GRID preference)

In my head this will charge the battery to 80% on the night rate, but if the battery level is over 50% and the sun is out, then excess PV will go to hot water. If the battery goes below 50%, it will charge it off excess PV, but it won't charge higher than 50%. If the hot water gets to the max of the immersion, then it will export.

Is this a reasonable solution, or does someone else have any ideas? Eddi seems to be a bit redundant now, and whats displayed on Eddi bears no input to reality anymore as the inverter is in charge.

Just wish FusionSolar would update more than every 4 minutes.

bullit_dodger

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120089737#Comment_120089737

Set the Eddi to have a scheduled boost of the water at some period that works for you in night rate tariff (perhaps 6:30am for 30 minute). This way you will take from the grid at night rate and not use your battery. Water will get hot and assuming you have half decent insulation on your immersion tank, it will remain hot enough for 12-18 hrs.

championc

So if you set the battery to charge, it will not discharge during that period. So you need to use the Boost option in the Eddi, to heat the water from the grid.

You could leave this permanently in place, and rather than pulling from grid, it might just catch early morning solar, or you may decide to allow the battery to discharge on the basis that it will get charged during the day.

Maybe you need to start looking at automation now ? You could control an Eddi via it's API. If you had a temperature probe on the cylinder, you could stop the boost if the temperature hit xx°C and if the Solar was generating yy kW.

https://github.com/Emilv2/huawei_solar

Chris_5339762

Eddi is boosting for an hour at night as it stands... it can be set to 1 1/2 hours and thats simple enough, but the request I've gotten is splitting the PV somehow between battery and water... preferably put PV excess into the water for the first half of the day, then PV excess into the battery for the second half of the day. There doesn't seem to be an easy way to do that.

At the moment there isn't enough sunlight to do battery AND heat the hot water.

championc

So the only way to drive energy to the Eddi before the battery is with boost.

You could reduce the Amps of the Eddi, so that it maybe only pulls 1kW or 2kW rather than the full potential.

So you could halve it and double the time at night

Chris_5339762

Yeah thats what I was thinking - but it seems daft on a system that is otherwise pretty flawless, that you can't drive energy to the Eddi before the battery (without a manual boost anyway).

Silly question - but is reducing the amps of the Eddi something that is done on the Eddi itself.. I did look earlier and couldn't find an obvious setting. That would be reasonably good. Or is it a hardware job.

con747

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120091728#Comment_120091728

It's in advanced settings on the Eddi AFAIK.

championc

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120091728#Comment_120091728

Setting is in the Eddi

If you had an AC connected battery, then you could have done what you hoped. But with the battery within (so to speak) the inverter, the MyEnergi stuff cannot see anything there until it exits the inverter

Chris_5339762

Thanks. I've found it on the Eddi now, setting the maximum device to 10A will cap the immersion heater at 2.4kW.

Looks like I'm trying to do the impossible so.

I may try setting the AC charge cutoff SOC to 80%, then the End of charge SOC to 50% still though, to see what happens. In my mind that'll charge the battery to 80% on the night rate, then not use PV to charge the battery during the day unless its < 50%, capped at 50%. Result: Any excess PV goes to hot water. If it works, it might be an easier way to effectively boost the hot water during the day without having to touch Eddi (and I can change this from my phone during the day itself from work if I wanted to).

Weather looks pants tomorrow so no testing then. Thanks for all the advice anyways, I'm sure I'll have more questions soon... next up is one extra panel and then split to 4x panels on one string and 8x panels on the second string.

Jonathan

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120091728#Comment_120091728

Solis Hybrids have a Feed-In Priority mode which allows you to prioritise feeding power to the grid (or surplus for an Eddi to capture) ahead of your batteries being fully charged. There might be a similar mode on the Huawei?

Chris_5339762

Rats. End of charge SOC can't be set less than 90%. Looks like it'll be manual.

Huawei has two options, charging preference and grid preference. Sadly no option for "send to Eddi"!

Jonathan

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120096377#Comment_120096377

Grid preference sounds like what you need. It won't actually go to the grid - the Eddi will see it as surplus and capture it.

slave1

Perhaps a crazy idea but is there an isolator between your inverter and battery, turning that off will stop PV going to battery, but that’s crazy as easier to Boost the EDDI. This predicament is part of the reason why I went for an AC coupled battery

mp3guy

Myenergi have their own battery (Libbi) coming out soon which solves all of this (of course, within their own proprietary ecosystem, which you pay for, but is also good). If you're skilled at Python you can also emulate/automate full control over everything with Home Assistant.

championc

I haven't looked into it, but I wonder as to how they will potentially separate the solar from battery, or read solar PV and report it into the app.

Chris_5339762

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120096604#Comment_120096604

I'm going to try that when I'm next at home on a sunny day! (And when I can guarantee there isn't a tumble drier on)

Chris_5339762

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120096891#Comment_120096891

That would be an option, but would involve crawling around in the loft versus walking up to Eddi, so easy call there!

It is a very silly predicament though - I can't believe the Huawei software doesn't have an option for this.

slave1

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120100512#Comment_120100512

Perhaps the Libbi will RF talk to the Master unit on traffic

HotSwap

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120091962#Comment_120091962

There is an option on the huaweis called “fully fed to grid” - I can’t remember what impact this will have on the ability of the battery to charge. If you do a find in the documentation of the words above you might find something useful.

table 3-4 on this page:

https://support.huawei.com/enterprise/en/doc/EDOC1100167258/ff9f37a6/setting-the-grid-tied-ess-mode

you could also maybe reduce the max charge power of the battery so it won’t pull in all of the PV and export some and let the eddi kick in. But this would impact your charge rates at night. But maybe this can be set independently for each TOU slot you have configured.

HotSwap

Yeah. It’s on the TOU setup screen. Change the priority of excess PV to: “fed to grid”.

i think you had a 3KW inverter; so anything up to 3KW of PV will be sent to the loads in your house and then exported if not used (but the eddi will notice the export and eat it instead).

then when your generating over 3kw; still 3KW will be sent to the loads in your house and exported (or used by the eddi; if it wants to); but whatever your generating above this will be directly sent as DC to charge the battery. So you will only ever be charging the battery with the PV that a normal inverter would clip. The huaweis work well in this regard.

i Have a similar setup with 7.4kw of panels on a 6kw huawei with a 10kWh huawei battery. I’ve read the manual 100 times; hit me up if you have any questions about any of the settings.

championc

If you have a 3kW inverter, then how can you have any DC higher than this ?

And what happens when the Eddi reaches temperature ?

Ideally, the perfect solution would be tbbe able to control the inverter through an API ?

I use Node-Red for all of my stuff. If my battery >= 98% then I turn on the Eddi. If 97% or lower, I turn it off. If water temperature > 75%, the Eddi is Off too.

So if you could read generation levels from the Huawei (or buy a Shelly EM), you could turn on Eddi Boost when generation > xx kW, and turn off when .......

HotSwap

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120106372#Comment_120106372

High voltage DC from the panels goes directly into the battery; on of the benefits of the huawei setup. You can also have 200% oversizing if you use the optimisers.

When the eddi reaches temp it won’t pull down any power and in “fed to grid” up to 3kwh will be used to power the home / exported. And anything over 3kwh will be used to charge the battery. If the eddi dosent want to heat the water and the battery is fully charged; then it will simply clip anything over 3kwh.

im just giving some options. It’s not how I would set it up myself; just trying to help.

Chris_5339762

Thanks folks, that excess PV "Feed to Grid" option has done the trick... that actually sends to Eddi which itself sends excess to hot water. I can now decide remotely whether to top up the battery or get the water hotter which is really good. Its a bit of a poorly worded option to be honest, but works for the setup provided to us by the installers anyways!

Node-Red does sound good but is way over my skill level from a quick google!