Solar PV Monitoring/Automation Thread

silver_sky

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119220409#Comment_119220409

Is there any way to keep the solis stick and have local data?

I'm just thinking on terms of updates on the solis inverter.

championc

Modbus from the RS485 interface

reklamos

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119226733#Comment_119226733

Yes, there is. This is what all of us are doing at the moment using pysolamanv5 protocol. The data is pushed to solis cloud and also we pull and store data locally. I think @Jonathan has HA integration for it. I do not use it soe I cannot comment on that.

Jonathan

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119228011#Comment_119228011

I think @silver_sky is referring to the new Solis (as distinct from Solarman) logging stick which doesn't listen on TCP/8899. Haven't seen any discussions yet on if/how to pass through Modbus commands using that.

silver_sky

@Jonathan is correct. Mine isn't a solarman stick. It's a Solis one.

Metric Tensor

@silver_sky I am in the same boat as you and I'm working on a plan. In general a modbus slave (which the Solis is) can't have two masters. So either the stick can talk to it, or another device can. But not both simultaneously. However there are devices on the market that act an an intermediate unit and can be installed to fool the solis into thinking that one master is connected when in fact it's two. They are not particularly cheap though. I need to do a lot more research before I purchase but something like this unit might work:

https://www.icpdas-usa.com/tsh_735.html

I am also working on a plan to acquire an older model logger stick though.

So we'll see which pans out first.

silver_sky

Thanks for the info. I'm not sure it's worth to do all that. I may just look into how I can get it setup in homeassistant only. I suppose if I needed to update the solis I could just plug in the solis stick.

reklamos

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119228679#Comment_119228679

You can have 2 masters connected at the same time you just do not want for them to talk at the same time as this is when problems occur.

As regards to device I had it done similar way for 10Euro but with esp8266 and relay that was switching the power between 2 masters and it worked fine for over a year.

Metric Tensor

Thanks @reklamos

I would like to do that but I'm not sure I'd have the skills to cobble something together like you described. Could you post a link to the parts you used - it might give me enough of a starting point to do the research and reading.

I'm holding off for exactly the reason @silver_sky described - I think it's probably too expensive to do it the way I described for the benefit.

Jonathan

@Metric Tensor Any luck with that Solarman scan script I added to GitHub? Unlikely to work, but worth trying before committing money to Modbus equipment.

I would agree with @silver_sky you definitely need to keep some sort of official device for firmware updates but hooking up occasionally is probably sufficient.

Metric Tensor

@Jonathan Will be trying that this evening hopefully and will let you know!! Thanks a mill.

reklamos

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119235924#Comment_119235924

Here are the links to esp8266 board and relay that I've since I had planty of them from other projects. Yuo could also use all in one device as it is essentialy the same but you need seperate device to flash them. The other device you need is modbus RTU to TCP like elfin. There are ethernet and wifi versions and that should be it. The relay sits in between Solis inverter, wifi stick and elfin. With automation relay powers powers wifi stick or elfin device. When wifi stick is powered on it automatically pull modus data and sends it to the cloud. When elfin is powered, your automation(HA, NodeRed) needs to pull modbus registers.

TheWonderLlama

moved to other thread

championc

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119237697#Comment_119237697

Question - Does the Solis not have an RS485 port - to take a cable into an RS485 to USB dongle, into a Raspberry Pi (or whatever) ? This is how we initially got the data out of the Sofar Inverters

reklamos

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119238478#Comment_119238478

it does, this is where wifi stick or elfin device would be connected to but you still need to be able to switch between the 2 masters.

reklamos

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119237764#Comment_119237764

Wrong thread for this problem. If device is dead than installer or Solic support is your best bet.

TheWonderLlama

ok, moved to other thread,

silver_sky

For those connected directly to the inverter for local automation, are you able to get info on alarms?

reklamos

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119239030#Comment_119239030

Registers 12501-12595 are for faults/status. So yes you can get info but I do not use them myself.

scuzzie2k

Has anyone been able to get the data from the 3rd Gen Solis Wifi stick? as the Serial number is 15 Digits long, numbers and letters.

mag

starting to get the system up & going and already some basic issues.

i have home assistant runnning, installed HACS (& restarted HA).

then installed myenergi integration in HACS (& restarted HA).

as i understand it the next step is to install the myenergi integration in HA integrations, the problem being that its not showing up. ive re-installed myenergi integration in HACS several times but it still will not show.

any tips or anything obvious that im missing here?

Tree

The other thing you can do with HACS is drop the github repository into it. https://hacs.xyz/docs/faq/custom_repositories

Jonathan

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119264115#Comment_119264115

It should be there. If you open the terminal, within your config folder, is there a custom_components folder? This should have a myenergi folder within it. /root/config/custom_components/myenergi

mag

I cleared the cache, reinstalled again + it appeared. Will get on the APIs next

scuzzie2k

OK, got all my systems almost working, can I ask advise from you guys?

1. My tesla-style-solar-power-card I cannot get to display the correct figures for my Solis 5g, would someone kindly share there config please?
2. Solismon, pysolarmanv5, python etc how do you get it run on the HA Raspberry PI? I have SSH installed can install Python3 ect. copy the scripts across to it and they run manually, if I reboot HA, they are removed including the install of Python, this is the 1st issue, 2nd how can I get them to run without manually running on a SSH session and leaving it running on my PC?
3. How are people auotmating the change of charge time and ampage depending on the my Home forcast, mine seems a little off, I have have 10.2kw of batteries connected to my Solis, how can I work out if I wanted to charge them 50% ready for the morning?

Sorry for all the questions, all new to me, almost there... very clever stuff so thanks to everyone on here for your hard work.

connesha

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119266089#Comment_119266089

1: Here is mine. You'll need to change the entities to match your own, and can remove appliance1/2 to start with.

type: custom:tesla-style-solar-power-card
house_entity: sensor.house_power
grid_entity: sensor.meter_in_power
battery_entity: sensor.battery_out_power
generation_entity: sensor.solar_power
generation_to_grid_entity: sensor.meter_out_power
generation_to_house_entity: sensor.solar_to_house_power
generation_to_battery_entity: sensor.battery_in_power
battery_to_house_entity: sensor.battery_out_power
grid_to_house_entity: sensor.meter_in_power
grid_to_battery_entity: sensor.grid_to_battery_in_power
battery_extra_entity: sensor.battery_soc
generation_extra_entity: sensor.today_generated_kwh
house_extra_entity: sensor.today_house_load_kwh
grid_extra_entity: sensor.today_exported_kwh
appliance1_consumption_entity: sensor.myenergi_eddi_1111111_heater1_load
appliance1_extra_entity: sensor.myenergi_eddi_11111111_heater1_used_today
appliance1_icon: mdi:bathtub-outline
appliance2_consumption_entity: sensor.myenergi_eddi_11111111_heater2_load
appliance2_extra_entity: sensor.myenergi_eddi_11111111_heater2_used_today
appliance2_icon: mdi:radiator
threshold_in_k: 1
change_house_bubble_color_with_flow: 1
hide_inactive_lines: 1
house_without_appliances_values: 1

2. For interacting with the inverter, some have python scripts running outside HA and posting via MQTT (I do this) and I believe some others run within HA. (I'm not aware of any public code repo that that has pysolarmanv5 running inside HA.)

Many are using this for reading from inverters (including Solis), it should be a good starting point for you, and I'd imagine other here have used its entities for their Tesla-card setup: https://github.com/StephanJoubert/home_assistant_solarman.

For running your own code in HA, you could do a new integration, or add to solarman, or my personal preferences is to do it in AppDaemon. Its easier get setup and running some random code in AppDaemon as you can more-or-less drop it in with a basic wrapper, you don't need to have a huge understanding of HA, and you're not limited by dependencies.

For running outside HA and posting via MQTT, see the start of this same thread for some code by reklamos, and also I posted some a couple of months back.

3. for night charging, it'll be easier if you manually set the charging times on your inverter and leave them set. Then, via automation you can just turn charging on or off, and set the charge current. (set holding register 43110)

Lets say you are charging for 3 hours, you want to put 6kwh in, and your charge voltage is 52v.

That means putting in 2kwh per hour. So your current will be 38.5A. (2000 / 52)

When writing to the solis via automation, the units are deciAmps, so you'd write 385 to holding register 43141

There is a lot of info all through this thread, so I'd recommend taking some time to go through from the start as it'll explain a lot more than 1 post here can, and if have questions, just shout.

scuzzie2k

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119266260#Comment_119266260

Wow thanks, I have got the tesla mod working now, i just had to work out what was what so thanks.

I have alot of the HA setup done along with My Home Forcase.Solar for predictions.

I Have the home asssit homesolimon working great, I am after getting the solismon, pysolarmanv5 etc working so its all contained in one Box, so that I can change bit on the invertor. I will have a play, dont really want two RPI running it. You dont know why any application I install or files copied across via SSH on the HA on RPI are removed on reboot do you?

Night charging I guess would be a set time, manage to get it to talk to the solis via ssh, need to solve the above issue, can you advise how I know tell my battery charge voltage? I have 2 x Fox ESS lV5200 Batteries

I see peole use Node-Red where would this come in handy?

Thanks for your help very greatful

connesha

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119266330#Comment_119266330

Great.

Not sure why you've got 2 RPis. The standard setup is a single always-on "computer" (RPI/NUC/Other) running HA and talking to the inverter via pysolarmanv5 / logging stick.

As for clearing on reboot, perhaps look at your local setup, are you using docker, where is it using for persistent storage... Can't say for sure, but have a look in that area.

A quick google shows nominal voltage as 51.2v, so its going to be somewhere close to that. Why don't you set a charge of e.g. 20A for 3 hours (when your battery is low), see how much your SOC changes, and then you can calc backwards for your ratio of amps to SOC/kwh per hour

Node-red. Many use it and prefer it. Many use HA and prefer that. Its a personal preference. Personally, I do all in HA and have one system for everything.

scuzzie2k

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119266407#Comment_119266407

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119266260#Comment_119266260

Sorry mayb I was not clear about the muliple RPI's. I have a RPI 4 running HA, on which I have HACS, MQTT, SOLARMAN and FORCAST.SOLAR. I have all setup with the information and its talking to the Solis. So be able to send commands to MQTT I need to use SOLISMOD is that correct? which is a python script that runs needed PYSOLARMANV5 plus a few other Programs. As I can only get these to run on HA manually on installing everytime it reboots and runing the script hense I mention another RPI to run this, this is where I am stuck. Read all 18 Pages cannot get my head around this but.

connesha

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119266464#Comment_119266464

If you have SOLARMAN running, you may not need SolisMod. They do much the same thing for your purposes: they read registers from the inverter. You should be using one or the other.

Solarman provides these as entities directly in HA, and it runs inside HA (quick and easy setup).

SolisMod publishes to MQTT. So you need an MQTT broker running for this, and then need to define each MQTT entity in HA (register for MQTT topic and map an MQTT element to a sensor). (its a more advanced setup, may give more flexibility especially if using prometheus/etc._)

So, if you already have Solarman running, and you can use it read whatever inverter registers you need, then you can stick with that. And if it doesn't give you all the registers you need to read, you can modify it easily to add more registers.

Once you are more comfortable with everything, you can always switch to SolisMod at some point in the future if it suits you better.

As for why you're losing your setup every time you reboot: I think you need to sort this out before you go any further. It doesn't sound like its anything to do with any Solar integrations. Probably more on how you have HA setup/installed, and what way its using persistent storage (docker?). Perhaps you need to start again, reinstall, take it step by step to see and verify stuff is persisting properly, and only then worry about adding any integrations with Solar.