PIP-4048MS and PIP-5048MS inverters

[Andreixda]

I mean Lucibus. Anyway a BIG THANKS to you and Coulomb. I put the Fw 72.60A and after 3 days my batt are happy now.( 2x12Vx150Ah VRLA)

[Andreixda]

I will try the solutions .

The biggest problem of these systems is monitoring the , as long as you see how they work , you can do maintenance on them and also save money, I am a telecom engineer and I am am used to monitor and analyze performance on power systems ( in telecom , this is the reason that chose 4048)

[lopez]

hi !
i already use sonoff to switch on-off relay to use surplus power from 4048, twilight switch and external fan switch.
First of all you need use LUCIBUS, that is a software i made to display
situation of 4048.
peppe

Thanks. Peppe, Just wanted to ask you whether Lucibus can upload data for monitoring to www.PVoutput.org.

[coulomb]

I put the Fw 72.60A and after 3 days my batt are happy now.( 2x12Vx150Ah VRLA)

I hope that's a typo, and you haven't put the patched firmware into a 24 V system (2 x 12 V). Presumably you mean 2 strings of 4 12 V modules.

I'm glad to hear that the batteries are happy. It's also good to see that at least some lead acid setups need the fix, it isn't just the radical hippy lithium worshippers that see the problem.

[ Edit: removed a paragraph that responded to a misreading. Added emoticon. ]

[Fotosettore]

Thanks. Peppe, Just wanted to ask you whether Lucibus can upload data for monitoring to www.PVoutput.org.

hi lopez !
no, i'm sorry
lucibus creates its own mdb database and it works exclusively with it.

in Italy it is rare that data is shared, because it could be used for different purposes and therefore almost all people do not share or upload them.

[coulomb]

Hey guys you got to help me have tried every thing to get the db9 cable to work??? ... any help would be AWESOME!

Here is something that caught me recently. There are a bunch of fake Prolific USB to serial converters out there, and the drivers have recently (in the last year or two) stopped supporting the older models (including hopefully for them all the illegal clones). I ended up buying another one some years back. and marked it as bad, but the writing wasn't terribly clear, and I forgot all about the issue. Recently when I went to grab my Prolific, I found the old one, and didn't realise it.

Maybe this isn't your exact problem, but it caught me, so it may catch others. The symptom is that when you plug in this bad device, Windows sees it, and you get the happy USB sound, and it loads a driver. But that driver crashes, and no software other than Device Manager can "see" the comm port. This is what Device Manager shows:

     

There is a tiny yellow triangle in the corner of the small icon; I've zoomed in to 150% of normal to show it moderately clearly. If you double click on the Prolific entry, you get the second screen. Here at least it's onbvious that Windows isn't happy with this device. (BTW, it can still be used successfully on Windows XP, but not Windows 7/8/10). Click on the Detail tab underlined in green above.

     

Now choose Hardware IDs from the drop down Properties list. You should get something like the second screen shot above. If you see REV_0300 as above, then it's the bad device, and you won't be able to use it with Windows later than XP. (Perhaps if you find a really old driver it might work for a time, but Windows will "update" the driver for you soon. You're welcome.) If it says REV_0400 or later, then you have a usable device.

Solar Junky, hopefully you saw my post about the flash tool only being able to see comm ports 1 through 9 (COMM1 to COMM9, not COM10 to COM99). It's right at the end of a page with lots of other threads being discussed, so it's possible you missed that.

[paulvk]

"but Windows will "update" the driver for you soon"
You can stop windows doing this I use the old Prolific USB-232 on windows 8 & 8.1 with an old driver it has proven very stable
The best way to connect to the PIPs is the HLK-RM04 it gives you a virtual com port on your machine.

[speriator]

Hello EveryBody

First of all, i'm french and sorry for my poor English

I'd like to give many many many thanks for this incredible thread about this voltronic inverter ! It's full of very greats informations and it take me 2 full weeks to read every pages

The subject : How to write a gateway between the inverter and watchpower with a raspberry (to target small price) to inject the inverter informations (battVoltage, PanelPower, etc... on my Europeen home automation bus system KNX, to manage the power loaders (for example to make cold water) when the sun is full or not. More generaly : how to use the excedeed sun power when the batt is full ?

So i started on august to develop with my dev boy, a Raspberry Native C++ application with this scopes :

- The raspberry must communicate with the inverter with Serial or USB port (it was the more difficult part of coding).
- The PC with watchpower must be connected on Raspberry with a cheap USB to SerialTTL to target the ACM0 IO port. Bluethooth will be disabled on PI3
- If WatchPower is not connected, the program must run on a standalone mode to send commands on the inverter.
- a xml config file for the KNX object configuation, because of many possible GroupAdress Configuration already instaled.
- a future TCP socket et HTTP communication, to target an IOS and Android app, on LAN mode and far away a cloud mode to manage your inverter when you are on the beach !

I've got a MPPSolar 3MPPT (MST version 75.1), and I discover some undocumented commands to get the values on Panel2 and Panel3, but the dev was firstly done on a simple MKS with 72.4 version

The TCP and HTTP are still to code, but we've solven all the rest of this PowerManagement Program

For the future, i target the put LUA scripting, and a TouchLCD 7" screen to see the information easier than now

and many many other functionnality in this project for the future like BMS, but i prefer to stabilise what it done for now.

finally, I'd like to find some folks to help me to debug this first alpha version (I can give a IMG of an already installed System for PI3)

If you have interested, just give me a message

Many thanks.

[Solar Junky]

Thanks webber & coulomb!!! & hi to everyone!
You guys are great help! Plan to soon do a video to thank some people that have helped me. if it's ok with you guys i'll mention you two in the youtube video??? Let me know if it's cool?

[weber]

if it's ok with you guys i'll mention you two in the youtube video??? Let me know if it's cool?

It's cool.

Following on from Coulomb's excellent post re USB to D9 cables. Here's a website with suitable drivers and instructions for installing them.
http://www.miklor.com/COM/UV_Drivers.php

[Solar Junky]

Weber That information is good stuff!!

Yes most excellent post by Coulomb's!!!

[Solar Junky]

pip 4048 grounding question???????
Have my inverter, batteries, negative side of the solar input grounded to the same ground grid uses. been like this for a long time so kinda forgot about it.... How Should it be grounded or will it be ok??? Have the positive side of solar input threw breaker & Negative fused with ground on inverter side of fuse.

[coulomb]

[ I ] Have my inverter, batteries, negative side of the solar input grounded to the same ground grid uses. been like this for a long time so kinda forgot about it.... How Should it be grounded or will it be ok???

The inverter itself will be grounded via the AC in cable, or if no mains connection, it should be grounded via the AC in or AC out earth.

I would not earth the battery or the PV, and certainly not both. I'm pretty sure that there are models [ edit: of the PIP/Axpert ] where connecting the PV negative to battery negative would cause the MPPT to be bypassed, so the panels would be continuously charging the battery and at poor efficiency. I suppose it's possible that it's doing that now, though I would think that there would be clues as well as alarms if that was the case.

So I would definitely not earth the battery or the PV array. Just leave both of them floating. You can earth the frames of the panels, but usually that's not a requirement when the panels are Extra Low Voltage (ELV, <= 120 VDC). Of course, that's completely different from earthing the PV input (negative or positive).

[Solar Junky]

Just watched that video you posted thanks just the information needed!!

[paulvk]

I have noticed that my inverters seem to follow the mains frequency has anyone else noticed this?

[Solar Junky]

Thanks coulomb,
easy to disconnect it.
seems like it's working same as befor grounding solar & battery to earth
but did that some time ago and forgot about it.

[paulvk]

Note about earthing: As I have a 48V telco battery system as part of my battery racks the positive is earthed but no earthing on pos or neg from panels it has been working for nearly 2 years this way.

[coulomb]

I have noticed that my inverters seem to follow the mains frequency ...

I believe it was Weber who stated not long ago that the inverters probably synchronise with the mains for the least difficulty when switching the loads to and from mains and inverter output. That seems quite plausible.

[Solar Junky]

Weber is my hero! fixed my d9 to usb problem.
My d9 cable went bad somehow???????? Did try a new one long time ago but took it back???? must have messed up the drivers then????
Now it's time to update firmware!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
YEAH!!!!!!!!!!! AWESOME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
But need a mental break been working on this thing for days!!!!!!! lol!!!

[Solar Junky]

Thanks weber have learned lots in the last few days.....

[Tjadenw]

Is it possible to perform a voltage calibration on the 24 volt model that only have a USB port using access port ? I can fine lots of info on the PIP4048 voltage calibration using access port but nothing for the usb 24 volt 3kva model.

My 24 volt inventor seems to be .2 volts lower that the actual values when testing with a volt meter

[coulomb]

Is it possible to perform a voltage calibration on the 24 volt model that only have a USB port using access port ?

I believe that unlike the 48 V models, you can send commands to the 24 V models over USB. It's a virtual comms port, I think, even limited to 2400 bps.

But a quick check of the only 24 V firmware I have at present indicates that there is no BTA0-2 command, so if there is a calibration facility, it is very different to that of the 48 V models. Many of them also use a different processor (Freescale HCS08 versus a TI TMS320F2809). [ Edit: a later version I found does have the calibration commands, and does use a TMS320 processor. ]

I can fine lots of info on the PIP4048 voltage calibration using access port but nothing for the usb 24 volt 3kva model.

That seems to confirm my suspicion that they don't have calibration at all. [ Edit: I meant in the sense of a user instigated command based calibration. It may be possible to change an EEPROM value somehow, for a fixed scale change. ]

Your best bet for fixing this would seem to be finding the appropriate voltage divider resistor (or chain of resistors), and tweaking the values until it reads more accurately. Of course, you can't do much about drift and so on, but it sounds like a decent improvement could be had that way, if you are hardware inclined.

[ Edit: "They also use a different processor" -> "Many of them use a different processor" ]
[ Edit: "BAT0-2" -> "BTA0-2" ]

[offgridQLD]

A few of us in Brisbane took note of how ridiculously fast the shipping time was on a inverter that was aparently being shipped from Taiwan to Australia.

My first order several years ago was placed on a Friday and on the Monday I had a package at my doorstep. Though I didn't bother going through the tracking slips to look into it in detail.

It was mentioned that perhaps they have a storage facility in Au with local stock.

I now have a new project that requires another PIP4048. So I ordered a 2nd PIP last Friday afternoon online and tracked the delivery. I'm 99% sure they are actually being shipped from Taiwan and its just an incredibly efficient postal service. Living offgrid and relying on iverters to power your house and essentials being able to obtain a replacement or part over a weekend is not bad for a imported product.


Not to mention the shipping on this pip4048 was free and I was offered an extra 5% discount on the total price $949 AU delivered.

[PGutti]

Good to know! One question: Where did you order? MPP Solar or Voltronic?
(or is then name saying that

[Tjadenw]

Thanks for the info Coulomb.

Do you know what the adjustment's on the SCC are for ?