Thank you very much Steve_S for pioneering the Chargery BMS system for us and to all the posters that have contributed. I just order the BMS16T 600 amp version with all its accessories from Jason for a total of $395. I also ordered the Chargery 10325 1500 W / 25 A power supply for $290. I realize that I could have gone cheaper but with a lot more details to work out to put together a safe control system for my 24 V 860 Ah BYD battery pack. ( I bought the BMS16T to allow me to go to a 48 V configuration in the future if desirable.) As a novice solar system builder, I got the well thought out, well designed Chargery system that many others here on this thread are using to make my system build safer and faster than if I attempted to put my meager knowledge to work building a system from the ground up. What really pushed my decision is the excellent and detailed build video showing how to assemble all the components for a Nissan Leaf battery pack and the fact that there is a manual on/off switch to allow me to turn the breakers off when not in use so they dont drain my batteries at the rate of 1.3 amps per hour. Even so, I am sure I will have questions as I put it all together and thank people on this thread in advance for helping me out when the time comes.
Chargery BMS now with Low Temp Cutoff
- Thread starter Steve_S
- Start date
Steve_S
Offgrid Cabineer, N.E. Ontario, Canada
TIDBIT ADDITION: to Posting # 2 in this thread.
If you are looking for boxes to put the LED, Buzzer or Delay board into, Hammond Manufacturing makes many plastic boxes. I use the black ones for the LED & Buzzer and use adhesive backed Velcro "tabs" to attach it to the top of the BMS remote, as well the delay board Transparent box is attached to the wall with the same Velcro Tabs. Makes things easy. On my first one, I used a clear transparent box, this batch I am using Blue & Red translucent ones. The size that works well is 100 x 50 x 21mm (7.5 x 4.3 x 2.2")
I ordered them from https://store.qkits.com/hammond.html?p=2
Direct to Hammond Site: https://www.hammfg.com/electronics/small-case/plastic/1591t
REMOTE with a Black Plastic box with the LED & Buzzer inside:
The "Delay Board" Box:
If you are looking for boxes to put the LED, Buzzer or Delay board into, Hammond Manufacturing makes many plastic boxes. I use the black ones for the LED & Buzzer and use adhesive backed Velcro "tabs" to attach it to the top of the BMS remote, as well the delay board Transparent box is attached to the wall with the same Velcro Tabs. Makes things easy. On my first one, I used a clear transparent box, this batch I am using Blue & Red translucent ones. The size that works well is 100 x 50 x 21mm (7.5 x 4.3 x 2.2")
I ordered them from https://store.qkits.com/hammond.html?p=2
Direct to Hammond Site: https://www.hammfg.com/electronics/small-case/plastic/1591t
REMOTE with a Black Plastic box with the LED & Buzzer inside:
The "Delay Board" Box:
I'm upgrading my system and taking the leap from lead acid by purchasing 8 3.2v 280ah LifePO4 prismatic cells on Alibaba and looking for an appropriate BMS which will work for my solar powered cottage in the Gulf Islands of British Columbia. I plan to hook my 8 cells in series to make a 24volt pack. (I'm running 24v in part because I have an old Sunfrost 24v fridge which I can run directly off of the battery via the Top One Power 60 amp mppt solar charge controller.) As far as I can tell, the charge controller does not have a communications port to coordinate with the Chargery BMS8T-300 which I'm considering purchasing. I'm still a bit confused as to whether the BMS8T-300 will work adequately by itself to shut off charging if it's low temperature setting is reached...or if other limits are reached for that fact...either to cut off charging from my charge controller, or cut off energy use from my AIMS power 2000w (24v) inverter. I notice some have mentioned the need for relays to make this work? Hmmmm. I'm not exactly a novice...but am not quite at the advanced level that many of you seem to be (yet). Any insight? Should I be looking at a different 8s BMS that has low temp disconnect? Thanks for your patience in advance. 
Steve_S
Offgrid Cabineer, N.E. Ontario, Canada
The chargery's work, the cutoffs all do their thing when they are supposed to (and programable too).
I'm also transitioning off FLA to LFP, at the moment FLA is still live with the LFP but soon enough, the FLA will be relegated to the Greenhouse to live out the rest of their lives.
I have never heard of hat SCC so I can't say much. 60A for 280AH pack is on the light side IMO But your in good sunny locale so it's probably ok.
I am somewhat familiar with AIMS, they work fine but from what I have seen with them, they are a bit too basic in their configs. Dip Switches and potentiometer settings. The Low Volt Disconnects and charge parameters are oriented to FLA / AGM not LifePo4 or other chemistries. See charging settings below for 24V pack. An Inverter Shutoff may be needed if it cannot have the appropriate Low Volt Disconnect setting. * The BMS will cut it off but it's "impolite" to the inverter.
The relays replace FETS & circuits which can fail most unceremoniously. For High Amp / Draw applications relays handle the power. Most FET based BMS' only go to 120-150A capacity, beyond that, relayed BMS' take their place. The Chargery essentially let's you configure as a "Single Port" or as a "Split / Separate Port" BMS. I use mine as Single Port as my charging is via Solar or Inverter/Charger, no separate charging from AC-Grid (I'm off grid).
The BMS8T-300 denotes that the "kit" comes with the 300A/75mv Shunt. Relays & Delay Board if desired are extra.
* The HD Relays that Chargery sells are good Heavy Duty relays BUT they are a bit "thirsty" with a max of 12v/3a. With an active system the overhead is not much and the solar will make it up BUT in some applications, it may be desirable to get lower draw NO Relays and those can get pricey. The charger can deliver a max of 12V/3A for the relay contactor circuit but there are relays that use quite a bit less for bigger bucks. There have been threads on this topic and some discussion on it in this thread as well.
nb: I order mine directly from Jason @ Chargery, it works out to be less and they ship out fast without hassles like with vendors on ali* or ebay inflated pricing. Mention you heard about them here at DIYSolarForum. I'm hoping that if enough people mention where they got the lead, that they would offer the members some perk or something. Jason is very good at trying to help out and do things for their customers.
Bulk Charge between 28.4-29.2V
* Absorb Charge 28.2-29.2V (0-15 minutes)
* Float charge 26..6-27.6
* Equalization OFF - or as short as possible, no higher than bulk rate.
Voltage cutoffs: Low 22.0V (2.75v per cell), High 29.2V (3.65v per cell)
Pending on your inverter, this may be an option with a bit of a twist as the Chargery BMS handles this a little differently.
PS, I just got up and working on Coffee #1, my brain doesn't fully fire fully till on mugga #2
I'm also transitioning off FLA to LFP, at the moment FLA is still live with the LFP but soon enough, the FLA will be relegated to the Greenhouse to live out the rest of their lives.
I have never heard of hat SCC so I can't say much. 60A for 280AH pack is on the light side IMO But your in good sunny locale so it's probably ok.
I am somewhat familiar with AIMS, they work fine but from what I have seen with them, they are a bit too basic in their configs. Dip Switches and potentiometer settings. The Low Volt Disconnects and charge parameters are oriented to FLA / AGM not LifePo4 or other chemistries. See charging settings below for 24V pack. An Inverter Shutoff may be needed if it cannot have the appropriate Low Volt Disconnect setting. * The BMS will cut it off but it's "impolite" to the inverter.
The relays replace FETS & circuits which can fail most unceremoniously. For High Amp / Draw applications relays handle the power. Most FET based BMS' only go to 120-150A capacity, beyond that, relayed BMS' take their place. The Chargery essentially let's you configure as a "Single Port" or as a "Split / Separate Port" BMS. I use mine as Single Port as my charging is via Solar or Inverter/Charger, no separate charging from AC-Grid (I'm off grid).
The BMS8T-300 denotes that the "kit" comes with the 300A/75mv Shunt. Relays & Delay Board if desired are extra.
* The HD Relays that Chargery sells are good Heavy Duty relays BUT they are a bit "thirsty" with a max of 12v/3a. With an active system the overhead is not much and the solar will make it up BUT in some applications, it may be desirable to get lower draw NO Relays and those can get pricey. The charger can deliver a max of 12V/3A for the relay contactor circuit but there are relays that use quite a bit less for bigger bucks. There have been threads on this topic and some discussion on it in this thread as well.
nb: I order mine directly from Jason @ Chargery, it works out to be less and they ship out fast without hassles like with vendors on ali* or ebay inflated pricing. Mention you heard about them here at DIYSolarForum. I'm hoping that if enough people mention where they got the lead, that they would offer the members some perk or something. Jason is very good at trying to help out and do things for their customers.
Bulk Charge between 28.4-29.2V
* Absorb Charge 28.2-29.2V (0-15 minutes)
* Float charge 26..6-27.6
* Equalization OFF - or as short as possible, no higher than bulk rate.
Voltage cutoffs: Low 22.0V (2.75v per cell), High 29.2V (3.65v per cell)
Pending on your inverter, this may be an option with a bit of a twist as the Chargery BMS handles this a little differently.
PS, I just got up and working on Coffee #1, my brain doesn't fully fire fully till on mugga #2
tim0shel
Solar Enthusiast
- Joined
- Jan 27, 2020
- Messages
- 464
? Low amp relay although little pricey
Steve_S
Offgrid Cabineer, N.E. Ontario, Canada
from that listing ($79 USD) + S&H. while the ones from Chargery use more juice to actuate the contactor and cost $37 USD + S&H.
Steve_S
Offgrid Cabineer, N.E. Ontario, Canada
CHARGERY INFO UPDATE
I had offered Jason Wang @ Chargery to do a review & update for their documentation a while back. With all the stuff going on, it's obviously a lower priority obviously. He finally sent me the source & raw docs, so I will be getting to work on that and hopefully I will be able to send up the revised docs to him next week... Ohhh geez, I'll have to drop my personal shorthand for the docs... dag-nabbit ! hehehe... Yes, I used to do technical writing on I.T. systems for decades as part of my former career, as well as instructional documentation. talk about dry & boring.
So the "Good News" is I will be de-chinglishing the docs an making them more readable (well I hope anyways) and with any luck, they will be posted up on the Chargery Site soon. Now I just gotta shake this damned springtime cold I got from being out doing hand to hand combat with the snow & ice and my monster snow blower.
And I am only a customer who bought & uses the Chargery BMS' ! "Needs of the Many outweigh the needs of the few" so my old Freeware/shareware & OpenSource me kicks in yet again.
I had offered Jason Wang @ Chargery to do a review & update for their documentation a while back. With all the stuff going on, it's obviously a lower priority obviously. He finally sent me the source & raw docs, so I will be getting to work on that and hopefully I will be able to send up the revised docs to him next week... Ohhh geez, I'll have to drop my personal shorthand for the docs... dag-nabbit ! hehehe... Yes, I used to do technical writing on I.T. systems for decades as part of my former career, as well as instructional documentation. talk about dry & boring.
So the "Good News" is I will be de-chinglishing the docs an making them more readable (well I hope anyways) and with any luck, they will be posted up on the Chargery Site soon. Now I just gotta shake this damned springtime cold I got from being out doing hand to hand combat with the snow & ice and my monster snow blower.
And I am only a customer who bought & uses the Chargery BMS' ! "Needs of the Many outweigh the needs of the few" so my old Freeware/shareware & OpenSource me kicks in yet again.
Steve_S
Offgrid Cabineer, N.E. Ontario, Canada
I'll probably muddle it up the first & second attempt. I'm good'n rusty and a tad crusty... ;-) Fingers crossed.
Awesome that you plan to help 'interpret' the language in the manual. It is a bit confusing at times for sure! Thanks in advance!
Steve_S: when you translate/update the user manual, can you improve/expand the section that deals with the current communication setup with a computer. The manual mentions COM3 can provide RS232 output but says nothing about using this output with a computer. Manual says USB port can be used by a computer to update firmware and goes into detail along with an update file. But again, it says nothing about using the USB port to see settings or observe system status. I realize that the display unit is designed to provide output and setup parameters. How about doing this with a computer? Is it possible to purchase a third party WI-FI tongle that goes into the USB port to allow a computer to communicate with the BMS system using WI-FI? I am not talking about Bluetooth here as we know it cant do that yet. BTW: thanks so much for doing this translation. If you need a copy proof reader, please feel free to call on me. I am a retired USDA Forest Service research scientist with over 100 published scientific articles to my name and two books. So I have some writing and editing background - just not in electronics.
Ok, sorry if I hijack this post into relay question territory again. I went over this thread and this is my conclusion, please correct me if I'm wrong. The purpose of BMS is managing cells and protection of battery overall. Over-charge protection cuts off the SCC (or other charging means) and Under-voltage cuts off the load, which in my case and most of the cases would be the inverter.
I did purchase BMS8T , but without relays since at that time I wasn't sure about the whole setup. The way I understand it now is that I can have a relay with somewhat higher rating for continuous load for over-charge protection to disconnect my SCC (which is now 60amp max. so 100A relay should be more than enough) . BUT, to disconnect the load, I could get away with a "light duty" relay to turn off my inverter, which will disconnect the load from batteries. So I shouldn't really need a heavy duty relay that handles all the load amperage for that purpose. As long as that relay turning off inverter is driven by BMS, it will achieve the same thing, which is disconnecting the load and stopping battery from draining.
Or am I still missing something ?
I did purchase BMS8T , but without relays since at that time I wasn't sure about the whole setup. The way I understand it now is that I can have a relay with somewhat higher rating for continuous load for over-charge protection to disconnect my SCC (which is now 60amp max. so 100A relay should be more than enough) . BUT, to disconnect the load, I could get away with a "light duty" relay to turn off my inverter, which will disconnect the load from batteries. So I shouldn't really need a heavy duty relay that handles all the load amperage for that purpose. As long as that relay turning off inverter is driven by BMS, it will achieve the same thing, which is disconnecting the load and stopping battery from draining.
Or am I still missing something ?
Steve_S
Offgrid Cabineer, N.E. Ontario, Canada
CRaig is correct, the USB port is just for the update process and can't access other data etc.
The RS232 - Serial port connection is limited and to access that you will need a converter/adapter to make it work via a USB port on your computer. There is no specific software from Chargery for that, it has to be done externally with something.
The RS232 - Serial port connection is limited and to access that you will need a converter/adapter to make it work via a USB port on your computer. There is no specific software from Chargery for that, it has to be done externally with something.
Steve_S
Offgrid Cabineer, N.E. Ontario, Canada
Well close.... pretty close.
1) Size the relays to the Max Load possible to go through them and then leave elbow room for "tolerance". Ever see a relay melt ?
You said you use 60A up to 100A BUT your inverter can most certainly pull more than that.
So your output relay has to be the one that handles the most, therefore the biggest.
The Charge relay has to be able to handle the maximum amperage that could be pushed through during charging from your charge sources. SCC, Inverter/Charger &/OR AC to DC LFP Charger if you have one.
I'm not sure what you mean by turning off the inverter. Are you thinking along the lines of Will video where the relay shuts off the inverter or ?? If the Inverter is also a charger then turning it off also disables the charge feature as the unit is off. Which would leave only SCC and an AC Type charger.
He wants to use this relay for the charge side, not the load side.
He wants to use a small relay to control the inverter via it's on/off input, not cut the high amperage line.
The Charge relay has to be able to handle the maximum amperage that could be pushed through during charging from your charge sources. SCC, Inverter/Charger &/OR AC to DC LFP Charger if you have one.- Correct, so if my SCC can push 60A max., that's why I'm thinking 100A relay on that side should be enough.
I'm not sure what you mean by turning off the inverter. Are you thinking along the lines of Will video where the relay shuts off the inverter or ?? If the Inverter is also a charger then turning it off also disables the charge feature as the unit is off. Which would leave only SCC and an AC Type charger.
What I mean by that is turning off Inverter by a relay wired to an ON/OFF switch of the inverter. Same way I've beeing doing it now with AGM batteries. It's just currently it is RaspberryPi with Automation HAT relays controlling that switch. So when I switch to LiFePo4, it will be the BMS controlling that relay. Rpi will be eliminated from the system. My inverter will be just that, it will not have a charger capability. I decided to go with Samlex PST 2000/24, and it does have a relay wiring for ON/OFF operations.
Your plan should work. I myself have been wondering how the remote samlex switch works but have not had time to play with it.
Similar threads
