Sofar ME3000 alongside solis hybrid inverter

insular1

My system has 2 inverters, solar only on main house and hybrid in the garage with battery. Was looking at ways to increase the charge rate of the battery and the cheapest option seems to be to set up a Sofar ME3000 next to the solar inverter in the main house with a separate battery. Would this create an issue having two separate battery inverters? Like could one system charge the battery of the other and vice versa or is there a way to set the sofar to avoid this?

Only other option I can think of at the moment is to replace the Solis with a sunsync but that's a bit more expensive.

graememk

Simplest option is the sunsynk by far.

Me3000 is doable but need to consider "fighting" but the me3000 does have a CT offset so it should be able to allow it to back off when demand is reached.

insular1

Cheers. I'm in no rush anyway. I'll see how the winter goes with just the Solis and see what makes sense next year.

unkel

Have you a smart meter? If so, exporting to the grid is always the most lucrative, provide you have enough in your battery to last you until the next night rate

You could get a second hybrid inverter, simply not hook up a CT to it and then use it to just charge the battery (on night rate)

But as @graememk said, it is easier, more future proof and won't cost any more to sell the Solis and buy a 9kW Deye / Sunsynk hybrid. Except you might need your cabling upgraded to be able to take the extra current

insular1

Yeah, I'm definitely leaning towards the Deye. Problem is at this rate it's looking like I'll need to upgrade the house supply to really maximise the 3 hour window but that's thousands so really hard to justify. Have the 16kVa supply which maxes out at 70amps but has a 63amp trip. Even without a full electric car yet i am hitting 15kW almost consistently over the 3 hour Pinergy window between the plug in hybrid, battery charging, heat pump and dishwasher/washing machine.

Think it's 3-4k to upgrade the supply though so very hard to justify unfortunately.

unkel

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121465507#Comment_121465507

If you are hitting 15kW constantly, I will hazard a guess that you are only on a 12kVA connection. Same as myself. And yes I use full whack for the 3 hours myself too, and I am nearly running out every night in the last few nights, probably will run out several times until the days are getting longer again with more PV towards the end of next month.

I wish I had a 16kVA connection, then I would be laughing all year round. The upgrade from 12kVA to 16kVA costs just over €2k incl. VAT

insular1

No definitely 16kVa. Had it confirmed with ESB recently. Standard for 16kVa is 80amp main fuse protected by a 63amp breaker. I was quite annoyed at this as assumed I'd be able to run closer to the full 80amps but seems this isn't the case. Really doesn't seem like much of an upgrade over the 12kVa supply.

I could probably push higher than the 15kW but would be afraid of tripping the main breaker.

unkel

@insular1 - "Standard for 16kVa is 80amp main fuse protected by a 63amp breaker"

No, that is standard for a 12kVA connection. I have the same.

graememk

A 16kva is a 100 amp main esb fuse with an 80amp consumer MCB

DC999

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121465728#Comment_121465728

So what happens if we go over the 63 amps? '80amp main fuse protected by a 63amp breaker'. Gonna be a lot more people hammering the short night rate in time. And it's something I don't best understand.

I know it was explained before but can’t recall. Do ESB need to call to reset something meaning you’ve no juice to the house? Or is the risk to damage or fire?

I get running it close to the limit for hours is pushing a lot of heat through the wiring. Is fire the risk?

I know people said it seems to allow a little above the breaker limit for a short time. As in unexpected spikes within some tolerance are ok. 

unkel

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121465770#Comment_121465770

Fuses don't pop until they go a bit over their rating. 63A * 230V = 14.5kW (on a 12kVA connection). You can run this continously without the fuse in your CU popping

And should it pop, then any electrician can replace it for you. The ESB fuse is 80A and won't pop at any time, unless there is something else dodgy going on (like people replacing their 63A consumer unit fuse with a much higher rated one and then drawing more current than they are supposed to). You'd be in trouble if the ESB fuse popped...

unkel

Oh and for anyone interested, I did the break even calculation on the 12kVA to 16kVA upgrade. It would take me 3 years of maxing out the extra current available every single day between 2AM and 5AM, for it to have paid for itself. At my current very generous delta between 5c night rate and 27c FIT, which is not guaranteed. No thanks. I am hoping there will be a rollout of free or much cheaper upgrades over the next few years as the country transitions from using fossil fuels to renewable energy.

insular1

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121465728#Comment_121465728

We're in a relatively new build and this is also what I thought. However I contacted the ESB about it only a few weeks ago as finished building my DIY battery and wanted to be sure I wasn't going to damage anything drawing higher loads at night. They told me 80amp was standard and put me on to the local office who did our installation who confirmed the same. We can't actually see the main fuse as it's in a fully enclosed box.

Do you have a source for the info on the 100amp as I feel fairly hard done by having paid for the upgraded service and would love to go back to them on this and make them upgrade my fuse.

graememk

https://safeelectric.ie/contractors/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2019/07/July-2019-Newsletter-Final.pdf

https://www.esbnetworks.ie/docs/default-source/publications/national-code-of-practice76cf7c6b-4890-4c39-87fc-a2d6692ef2d3.pdf

If you have an 16kVA supply, confirmed by ESBN, Maybe your electrician just put in the standard 63amp consumer unit and thought nothing more about it.

My parents do have a 16kVA supply, ive seen it on letters from ESBN, But still only a 63 amp MCB/fuse.

We didnt change it to 80 as they were still on 16mm2 tails. (possibly was a legacy thing.. possibly when the transformer went on fire when esb done nothing about complaints about brownouts...)

insular1

Thanks a million. I already have a copy of that second document but I thought the 80A was in reference to the main ESB fuse? Is this actually referencing the MCB?

I'm gonna get on to them again after lunch with this!

DC999

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121465786#Comment_121465786

Ta for explaining. An electric shower alone can be close to 10kW when the incoming water is cold. Add a kettle and tumble dryer on at the same and you're at 15kW.

Going off topic but in our 80 year old ex council house, they had probably 1 socket per room when built. Mad how far we've moved on but house power supply is now lagging.

graememk

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121465914#Comment_121465914

It's the consumer protection, the one that we own,

insular1

Waiting for call back now from local office so will let ye know how it goes. Will definitely make sense to jump to a sunsynk hybrid if I can get that 100A main fuse. Thanks for the help all!

insular1

Just to update this thread in case anyone else is having the same problem. ESB have agreed to upgrade my 80A fuse to 100A. Initially local office said 80A was all I'd get for a 16kVa supply but after getting in contact with the New Connections department and discussing the documents @graememk linked above the local office capitulated and I'll have a technician out in a couple of days to upgrade the fuse. Thanks for all the help!

slave1

Did they visit you for the 12 to 16kVa upgrade?

johndoe11

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121700786#Comment_121700786

I'm the same, 16kva with an 80A fuse. Just contacted them.

insular1

They are coming out on Friday to replace the fuse. Local office never actually admitted that they should have put in the 100A originally but agreed to come replace it so I'm counting that as a win.

Jonathan

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121703337#Comment_121703337

Get them to fit an isolator if there isn't already one so your sparks doesn't have to work live.

johndoe11

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121701789#Comment_121701789

As an update, ESBN changed out my 80a fuse for a 100a fuse last week.

insular1

Great news! Same for me the week before. I'm waiting on electrician to see if my tails need to be upgraded before upgrading MCBs.

On a separate note my Deye inverter arrived Tuesday from China. I was not expecting it for another month or two so now have to get to work upgrading my battery and inverter cables.