SW Shutting off Power When "Transferring" from Grid to Charge

MrM1

This has happened 3 or 4 times now in the past few months. I am in Grid pass thru. AC in from grid is connected. There is a load of about 300 - 500 Watts that i can see from the display passing thru the SW from grid to loads. The inverter portion of the SW is Enabled, but Load current is being supplied from the grid and Nothing is being supplied from the battery bank. SW reports Inverter Status = Enabled / AC Pass Thru, Charger Status = Disabled / AC Good.

Now I Want to run a charge or EQ for the batteries, so I set all the charge parameters, set the Recharge Volts to a voltage higher than the current bank voltage, and then Enable the SW Charger from the Combox and a LAN Computer.

Bam !! As soon as the charger is enabled, I am sitting in the dark for a few seconds. Clocks start flashing, refrigerator starts doing it's "Power went out and I am restarting" dance. The "black out" lasts all of a second, give or take a millisecond.

This has never happened in the past, but is happened more and more frequently lately. Why is the SW doing this? Is this a Mechanical Transfer Switch thing or a programing glitch. Kinda has me worried after the post I read yesterday of this guys SW catching fire.

Same thing has also happened when I enabled AC support mode once or twice, but I thought that was not big deal because (for whatever reason - I don't recall) I had the Inverter Disabled. So when AC support mode kicked in there was no inverter to invert power. But still odd.

Thoughts? (@Dave Angelini )

Solfyr

According to the owner's manual , it has three different levels of logging :

• faults
• warnings
• events

To view device info logs:

1. From the device Setup menu screen, use the up or down arrow buttons to 

highlight View Device Info.

2. Press Enter. The Dev Info screen appears.

3. Use the up or down arrow buttons to select which information log you want to 

view then press Enter to confirm a selection. The log screen appears.

4. Use the up or down arrow buttons to scroll the list then press Enter to view 

the particular log entry.

5. Press the Exit button to return to previous screens.

My guess is , that at least the "event" of switching on charging mode , would be logged . Likely also some "warning" level notices may be logged . A lot of Linux computing programs issue "warnings" though , that are "unnecessary" ....

MrM1

No warnings or faults, Not Active or Historical. Looking into how to find the "Events" you noted, as an Event is not in the drop down list for Warnings or Faults. (or perhaps an Event is the general name for the first 2)

MrM1

Looking at the combox screen, Events is the general menu heading term used for Warning and Faults. So an event log would be either a log of warnings or faults? Yet there does appear to be an Event log somewhere. I see it in the manual listed for the System Control Panel (SCP), but have yet to find it in the Combox screen. But as for Warnings and Faults, There neither. I can also install an SD card into the Combox and log more info. I need to find my SD card, start logging and see what I get.

MrM1

@mcgivor don't you have an SW? Ever see anything like this?

MrM1

Ok found a log file by date in the combox. Events for yesterday only show that it was disconnected and restarted / reconnected at the time of the shut down. In the Faults warning file there is no data.

Estragon

I was wondering if maybe the charger kicking on pulled grid AC out of spec and caused the reboot, but you'd think that would be logged somewhere.

MrM1

Yes that is what I was thinking / hoping ... but no good. No faults or warnings recorded.

@Solfyr I did look at my SCP and it does not have the Events page listed as the manual I looked at online shows. So what you found must be using a newer firmware. I have not done firmware updates of any of the Schneider devices (SW inverter, Combox or SCP) So I may do updates, but looking at the inverter update list, There does not seem to be any changes that would indicate what I am experiencing as an issue. I am 1 revision behind on the SCP and Combox and 2 revisions behind on the SW Inverter.

Does the latest firmware contain all revisions? Or does one have to walk thru each successive firmware revision one at a time?

mcgivor

https://forum.solar-electric.com/discussion/comment/397502#Comment_397502

Being that I'm off grid I have no grid input, since the LFP install I've not needed the generator, when I did, I never experienced anything abnormal. The only issue, other than firmware, have been the failure of both fans, axial play causing interference with the housing, the cheap replacement fans have been far more reliable.

Thinking about your issue, I wonder if it has something to do with the settings creating confusion, if there have been numerous changes, it might be wise to default and start from scratch. Just a thought.

MrM1

Yes I guess a full factory reset would not be a bad idea.

I was just mostly concerned that it might me something mechanical like a contractor that was malfunctioning.

Estragon

Seems to me a transfer switch contactor is at least a "person of interest", if not the prime suspect. Would be nice if it was just a tweak in settings though.

I wonder if there's a test (eg resistance across switch) you can do to rule out a problem with the switch?

MrM1

Would be nice if I know of such a test. It is under warranty - I think the SW carries 2 years? Which would take me to October