Rogue 3024 MPPT Charge Controller Issues

solarguy

Installed this charge controller to govern my battery banks and has worked well, however, there are times when it apparently disengages, stops working, most recently noted during a visit today (wintertime in New Brunswick, Canada). My alarm system had indicated an interruption in power at some point since our last visit about a month ago. It was about noon when I checked my Trimetric meter it indicated my banks were fully charged at 101%of capacity. Sun was shining, my array was at the winter tilt, so the reading was not surprising. I went upstairs to check the Rogue controller, thought it was sleeping but when I touched the button which normally would show me the daily readings, the light came on, but no one was home, there were no digits or anything on the screen. I tapped a few of the other buttons and a bunch of mumbo-jumbo came up which appeared incomplete and, in any case, I could not make it out - never saw that kind of display before. I shut off the breaker running from the controller to the battery banks, waited a couple of seconds and flipped it back on. After a minute or so, the normal display came on the screen. I checked the history on the controller to find that my bank has been regularly charged to full during our absence.

When I contacted Rogue, the technician had heard of similar problems supposedly in winter, but didn't know for sure what the issue could be, possible causes blamed on poor sun, low voltage, undercharged batteries, essentially they don't have any idea.......Did my research before purchasing this unit, thought it was high quality, has been in operation for eight months with no real problems until now. Technician is telling me he thinks if the unit was not booting up when I got there, it probably was not functionally properly or protecting my banks??????????????????????? Not a good situation if you want to avoid overcharging.

Does anyone have any similar experiences, advice, opinions, any help would be appreciated, thanks.

Cariboocoot

Re: Rogue 3024 MPPT Charge Controller Issues

The Rogue has a V max in of about 60 as I recall. Depending on what panels you've got and how they are configured it is entirely possible that the Voc of the array in cold temps exceeded the maximum of the controller.

I'm not sure how the Rogue would perform under such circumstances. Most MPPT controllers shut down and need to be manually restarted. Too much Voc on any of them = fried input components.

icarus

Re: Rogue 3024 MPPT Charge Controller Issues

I know that Marc had some problems with the LCD displays on some production runs. Is it possible that the display is bad? He replaced mine for me, perhaps another call?

When the display fails, the controller continues to work fine.

Tony

lorelec

Re: Rogue 3024 MPPT Charge Controller Issues

In discussing this via email with Giles, he mentioned that his inverter's overvoltage protection has been kicking in. I'm thinking that the 3024's battery temp compensation is automatically raising the charging voltage beyond the OVP threshold of the inverter (which is 30.6v) during colder winter months when the system is unattended an unused, possibly causing a disruption in battery voltage when the inverter's protection is activated (crowbar?). This spike may be infiltrating the controller, causing issues with its microprocessor.

Some things to try would be unplugging the battery temp sensor, lowering the charging setpoints, and disconnecting the inverter before periods of absence.

I've heard of similar problems several times in the past and they always seem to occur with unattended systems during winter time in colder climates. I've been unable to duplicate the problem here.

Marc

Arion

Re: Rogue 3024 MPPT Charge Controller Issues

I've had that happen with mine before. Take both the negative lead and the negative meter lead off to power down the unit and reconnect both negative leads simultaneously and the controller should reboot and go through setup again. When the unit is powered up without the meter lead at the same time I get garbage on the LCD.

lorelec

Re: Rogue 3024 MPPT Charge Controller Issues

I think the core problem can be traced to major power disturbances, which cause a brown-out reset of the microcontroller. The LCD does not reset, however, and the microcontroller tries to initialize it again. I believe this is why you see the garbage on the display. I can make this happen on the bench if I dip the (simulated) battery voltage way down for a brief moment and then back up again. I use two of these controllers here on separate systems (one 12v, one 24v) and I've not seen it happen in the couple of years that they've been in operation. I think the key is to avoid the power disturbances that cause this, which also means using a clean means of disconnecting/reconnecting the controller from the power source (breaker or disconnect).

I should be able to do a workaround in firmware for this if it becomes a big enough problem, but to my knowledge it isn't at that point. As Tony mentioned, on the first version of this controller I had a few bad LCDs crop up, too, but that shouldn't be a problem with the second (black) version.

Marc

Dill

Re: Rogue 3024 MPPT Charge Controller Issues

mine is installed in a similar setup, off grid cabin, and it's cold right now. Mine has not been doing what the OPs has been, but sometimes when I get there, the LCD screen has gibberish all over it. Usually pushing one of the buttons fixes it and it's always charged the batteries despite the weird display.

alyaz

Re: Rogue 3024 MPPT Charge Controller Issues

FWIW.... When I had a Rogue, the display went out too... bad solder connection apparently.

lorelec

Re: Rogue 3024 MPPT Charge Controller Issues

Al, if I remember correctly it was not a bad display on your unit. There was a small solder bridge across two pins on the temp sensor jack that QC apparently missed when the boards were soldered, so that the battery temp was not registering on the display.

Marc

alyaz

Re: Rogue 3024 MPPT Charge Controller Issues

You are correct. I should have been more specific/accurate.

jigbon

Re: Rogue 3024 MPPT Charge Controller Issues

Hi All,
I am calling in from Oz- mid north cost four hours north of Sydney - where I have an off grid house running one of the 3024 MPPT units.I had the gobbeldy gook issue as well but Mark, who is always incredibly helpful and supportive BTW, sent me another LCD screen. I didn't replace the screen immediately and cant recall if the problem went away before I did replace the screen.Winter here gets down to a really cold zero Deg C at the worst (which is like summer to you guys) and I am also note sure if the gobbeldy gook happened in winter or not. Any way the batteries remained charged and since I installed the new LCD screen it hasn't happened since. When it did happened just rebooted it and it went way.I have found this unit to be bullet proof and effective and after trying two other well known USA brands that failed and offered poor service and a crappy Chinese one I am sold on the build strength and efficacy of Marks units. I have had it for at least two years if not longer.
I am looking forward to the new model coming out .