Schneider XW+7048E and Lithium Batteries

conz

Hi, I hope this is the correct place to post this message.

I am wanting to replace my lead acid batteries (400ah) with lithium.  I have the Schneider XW+7048E inverter, Schneider MPPT 80-600 charge controller, with a Conext Combox.

I purchased four Pylontech US3000C lithium batteries, which are 3.55Kw each.  I am having some difficulty finding the correct settings to add into the inverter and charge controller for this setup.

Have been told the communication between the battery bank and the charge controller will need to be open loop. I am still learning what exactly this means.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you.

Dave Angelini

Pylontech US3000C lithium batteries will have to provide with the settings for open loop config. for your XW system.

They also will be the ones who interface thru the Conext Home device to run the system closed loop. I do not think they do this but check as more are being added.

Combox was replaced 5 years or so back with Conext Home. It allows a battery manufacture BMS to communicate with the XANBUS network Schneider uses.

You are welcome and welcome to the group!

conz

Hi Dave,

Thank you for the advice and I will be following it to see whether I can achieve a closed loop communication or not, and will add to this post on what I find.

conz

Following up on last post.

If the Insight Home is this device

Then I will have some difficulties. Below is  the response I received from a helpful technician at Schneider;

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Hi Mike

Thank you for contact Schneider Electric Solar Technical Support

The Pylontech US3000c Lithium batteries will work just fine with the XW+ in an open loop configuration - there's no need to have them talking to each other. Closed loop would require the insight home  device , but closed loop batteries are not supported with XW+, only XWPro.

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So my thoughts now are, do I get a Conext Bridge, or a Conext Battery monitor.  These I need to research more into.

  

I also asked the technician at Schneider to explain in simple terms for me the difference between open loop and closed loop communication.

Here is the reply which was very helpful;

Opened-Loop Communication
Most batteries in the market only support Opened-Loop Communication, which means the BMSs of the batteries are unable to send and receive data, it doesn't allow the BMSs to "Talk" to the inverters. In Opened-loop communication, the inverter/charger can only calculate the SoC in a way that detects the voltage of the batteries. Other than the voltage, there is no other information transferred between the inverter/charger and batteries.
As mentioned above, the inverter detects the voltage of the batteries and calculates the State of Charge. Considering there are so many SoC calculation algorithms, the opened-loop communication is not accurate enough to get a realistic result, since it is only the basic method. The Opened-loop communication results in an incorrect State of Charge. For example, the SoC indication on the inverter could be 50% while the real battery SoC is 30%, and the limitation is obvious.
Closed-Loop Communication
Commonly speaking, Closed-Loop Communication is the process of receiving and confirming information between batteries and inverter/charger. In other words, the loop of communication is closed, in comparison, in Opened-Loop Communication, the information can only be sent and received, but not confirmed.
The form of Closed-Loop Communication is kind of like the early radio interactions. Sending short codes like “low voltage”, “start charging” and “roger”, but there are several specific codes to close the loop, for example, “over”, “roger” and so on.
Currently your Inverter XW+ only allow to have a open loop, if you want to create a closed loop communication you will need to get the inverter XW Pro

Graham Parkinson

The main advantage of having a Conext Battery Monitor in an open loop Li battery system would be that it has more accurate battery voltage and current sensing than the inverter alone has.   Li batteries are notoriously hard to estimate SOC for from battery voltage alone due to the small difference in voltage between empty and full, thus the need for a more accurate voltage reading with open loop.  Once the monitor is calibrated to your battery type it can also roughly estimate SOC by counting current in and out of the battery as well as from voltage.

However, the Battery Monitor was really designed for lead acid battery strings, so itonly helps a bit with an open loop Li situation.

Open loop is not as efficient in terms of fully utilizing LiFePO4 battery technology as a fully closed loop charging setup.  Closed loop systems read SOC etc. from Li battery's BMS systems which are optimized for each batteries characteristics so are much more accurate. With closed loop systems you don't need a seperate battery monitor (however you often do need an battery type specific interface box to translate BMS data into the inverter's network command format).

Sell XW+ to someone running a lead acid system, get an XWPro and closed loop interfaced BMS Li setup (Fortress, Discover etc.) to properly utilize the full capacity of your new Li batteries without fussing about all the open loop complications of getting voltage setpoints exactly right, battery cell equalization margins, keeping battery monitor SOC calibration up to date?

Open loop = complex battery management guided by user settings.  Closed loop = equipment basically takes care of itself.

conz

Hi Graham and Dave.

I have done some more reading and it seems the Conext Bridge will talk to the XW+ and the Pylontech batteries. (according to the manual for the Conext Bridge)

I will email Pylontech and ask them for the correct settings for the XW+7048E inverter.

As I am still learning about this please tell me if I have anything wrong or anything else I should be doing.

Thanks.

Dave Angelini

I would say your info source is very out of date.

The Conext Bridge is long dead and never really got to market.  I know this because I did the field test here for offgrid. It is well documented in the forum here. It was a good product but the partner LG was not ready for a 48V nominal battery. Their BMS was NQR and they got cold feet. The battery was good but again it was NMC Lithium and not as safe as LFP Lithium.

XW Pro is built to run Soc BMS systems.  XW+ is voltage only.  It is not cheap but if you run a Genset it can pay in fuel savings.

conz

Hi Dave.

You are right.  For some reason I had the Conext Bridge on the brain when I wrote the last post.

I should have written Conext gateway. The picture is a Conext Gateway and the manual I was reading from was for the Conext Gateway.

I would be interested in feedback regarding the Conext Gateway working with the XW+7048E with Pylontech US3000C batteries.

Dave Angelini

As Graham and I have told you ! XW+ is voltage only. 

 Conext Home (the old Conext Gateway, same thing) will only work with XW pro for closed loop. XWP has been designed to work with all of the features that the Home, Facility and Gateway edge devices add to BMS and many other forward looking requirements that may be needed. 

 XW+ will work with the Connext home in a open loop voltage controlled system.  It is a very stable monitor platform with cloud/smartphone and future developments. The combox is long dead and out of all support! Again read what Graham wrote about this.

 He gave you good advice, get rid of XW+ ! Last of my general advice. Become a client and I will guide you further with specific advice to your power system.

Good Luck !

conz

Hi Dave,

Thanks for explaining this clearly for me.  Unfortunately due to a tight budget I cannot right now change over to the XW Pro.

I really appreciate the advice from Graham and yourself.  Thank you.

Dave Angelini

I updated my last post #9. 

 Below is what you can monitor from anywhere on a phone or tablet/laptop. I can see you also if you allow me to monitor. Insight cloud is one of the really great monitors anywhere right now. You can see the weather at the site and more data than anyone could want.