EG4 18kvp battery won't discharge

[nEVER_confused]

Eg4 18kvp inverter. firmware fully updated 1-16-24. Eg4 LL 48v batteries. firmware updated as of 1-13-24. finally got the batteries to get recognized by the inverter (not simple plug and play as advertised) after setting the batteries to rs485 p03Lux. inverter set to battery brand Lithium 6.-Found on these forums -THANK YOU ALL! charging -no problem SOC is accurate, batteries top off with solar or grid. i am not set to set to export to grid yet so those settings are off.
now the problem. when it gets dark and the panels are done producing i expect the batteries to kick in and provide power, supplemented by grid if necessary. the batteries won't discharge. at all. Kill the grid input - all goes dark. batteries don't kick on.

The odd part is that i am using the same settings as a friend with the exact same setup, except he has Eg4 lifepower batteries, and his works fine.

I have even tried Forced Discharge and that is doing nothing. Discharge settings attached.

 

[BKY2003]

Since no one is replying, I’ll try, but I have no idea. I would change the battery discharge to volt and see if that woke the 18Kpv up. Sounds like the battery BMS doesn’t want to cooperate. Sorry, that’s got to be frustrating.

 

[solaruser120]

Does the battery detail page show the state of health, Vmin, Vmax etc. -- just to verify that battery communication is working.
(I couldn't get the RS485 com working and used CAN instead, this thread goes over more of the details: https://diysolarforum.com/threads/6000xp-wont-talk-to-eg4-ll.74096/#post-939636 the 6000XP uses the same com setup as the 18kpv)

 

[nEVER_confused]

Battery detail page looks totally normal. so it is clearly communicating BMS info at least.
Tried switching to voltage under discharge and no change.

Interestingly, I switch it to LeadAcid instead of Lithium and it will discharge. Unfortunately the SOC and voltage information being read by the 18kpv will be incorrect as it is not getting BMS info. have it set to read SOC and discharge to 40% which will still likely drain a lithium to 0% I assume the BMS on the batteries will prevent charging or discharging damage in spite of what the inverter is doing?

Ill see where it is in the morning.

 

[Quattrohead]

Off-grid mode and run without grid both need to be turned on.
It will still use the grid when required, a touch confusing.

 

[nEVER_confused]

Batteries discharged to about 15% before the sun came up and they started charging again. so it kind of works. They will definitely drain to zero though because inverter read SOC at 76% and voltage at 52v when actual was 15% SOC @ 52v.

 

[nEVER_confused]

Off-grid mode and run without grid both need to be turned on.
It will still use the grid when required, a touch confusing.

i will try that tonight!

 

[BKY2003]

So if all else fails you can set your "(On-Grid cut-off VoltV)" to 52v. I have mine set at 56 to keep my battery at 100%.

 

[nEVER_confused]

An update. I tried the above suggestions including turning everything to OFF grid and Run Without grid but no change.
SO i switched from RS485 to CAN. I was getting good info on 485 at the inverter but i figured why not. Set the battery to the first setting under CAN which i believe is EG4/Lux. rebooted and although it was able to read the batteries and display data in the inverter, it still wouldn't discharge. I was defeated. So I switched it over to Lead Acid for the night to discharge as i have done before, they discharged to 50% and stopped. In the morning before sunrise i went back and switched it over to Lithium so they could recharge with solar and 5 minutes later they were DISCHARGING!!! Finally. I have no idea why it wouldn't happen before i switched to Lead acid and back but Hey, it is working now for the past 4 days. I'm not freaking touching it and i hope my inverter doesn't reboot and screw something up.
I hope this helps someone else with similar issues. Seems like it shouldn't be this difficult when using Same Brand equipment.

 

[jlee24]

I have an 18Kpv and started experiencing a very similar issue as never_confused yesterday, but I think I have it resolved now. This may give more concrete information if you want to test specific settings.

My issue wasn't necessarily spontaneous as I had processed the firmware update to fAAB-1919 on Saturday. On Sunday my time of use settings still worked ok, however I used the "Start Quick Charge" feature Sunday evening to add extra charge to the battery (due to the chance of severe storms). On Monday afternoon the forced discharge did not work as configured. The only time I could get discharge to work is if I shut off the grid power and EPS would take over as expected. I tested some other configurations last night, including toggling the battery type to Lead Acid and then back to Lithium Ion. Still could not get forced discharge to work.

This morning I contacted SS support and the tech noticed a few settings could be off. One was the battery type. Even though I had "Lithium Ion" selected, the "Lithium Brand" selected was incorrect. I changed it to "0:Lithium_0" which the tech said is what I should use for the PowerPro battery. The other setting we changed which I think was related to the problem was to disable "Battery Backup Mode".

After changing these two settings I tested the AC Charge and Forced Discharge Start/End times and now the inverter is correctly applying those times. I've re-applied my original start/end times and we'll see this afternoon if the inverter behaves as expected.

I wonder if the "Start Quick Charge" changed some settings (i.e. Battery Backup Mode) to charge the battery but then after the hour of charge it perhaps didn't change it back? I've never used that button before, but perhaps I'll try it again this weekend and document the changes it makes to settings (at least the ones I can see).

 

[EG4_Jared]

I have an 18Kpv and started experiencing a very similar issue as never_confused yesterday, but I think I have it resolved now. This may give more concrete information if you want to test specific settings.

My issue wasn't necessarily spontaneous as I had processed the firmware update to fAAB-1919 on Saturday. On Sunday my time of use settings still worked ok, however I used the "Start Quick Charge" feature Sunday evening to add extra charge to the battery (due to the chance of severe storms). On Monday afternoon the forced discharge did not work as configured. The only time I could get discharge to work is if I shut off the grid power and EPS would take over as expected. I tested some other configurations last night, including toggling the battery type to Lead Acid and then back to Lithium Ion. Still could not get forced discharge to work.

This morning I contacted SS support and the tech noticed a few settings could be off. One was the battery type. Even though I had "Lithium Ion" selected, the "Lithium Brand" selected was incorrect. I changed it to "0:Lithium_0" which the tech said is what I should use for the PowerPro battery. The other setting we changed which I think was related to the problem was to disable "Battery Backup Mode".

After changing these two settings I tested the AC Charge and Forced Discharge Start/End times and now the inverter is correctly applying those times. I've re-applied my original start/end times and we'll see this afternoon if the inverter behaves as expected.

I wonder if the "Start Quick Charge" changed some settings (i.e. Battery Backup Mode) to charge the battery but then after the hour of charge it perhaps didn't change it back? I've never used that button before, but perhaps I'll try it again this weekend and document the changes it makes to settings (at least the ones I can see).

Starting quick charge should not have done this, however, please keep us posted if the issue returns.

 

[jlee24]

Starting quick charge should not have done this, however, please keep us posted if the issue returns.

Thanks Jared. My forced discharge start time just passed at 3:45 CST and the inverter switch to battery power as expected. This is great news. It would have been nice to know if one specific setting fixed my issue, but at this point I'm not going to change anything. Maybe in a few weeks I can test individual settings.