Morningstar Charge Controller support

tallgirl

Greets,

This post almost certainly belongs under "Scams" since it falls under the heading of "vaporware" at the moment, but I'm wrapping up support for the Morningstar SS-MPPT, TS-45 and TS-60 charge controllers.

Next up from Morningstar will be inverter support -- look for something about those devices in the next week or three.

Then I get cracking on a number of other Modbus capable products from other vendors.

This support will allow you to integrate Morningstar products with gear from APRS World, OutBack and SMA, all in a single software product.

Cariboocoot

Re: Morningstar Charge Controller support

"Vapourware"? Nah; you we trust.

mike95490

Re: Morningstar Charge Controller support

Huh ? meaning you are abandoning them ? vaporware ?

tallgirl

Re: Morningstar Charge Controller support

mike90045 wrote: »

Huh ? meaning you are abandoning them ? vaporware ?

Nah, it means the support isn't shipping RIGHT NOW.

I have a SS-MPPT-15L on a 60 watt "lab" array right now, but there is so much other product support -- using an APRS World Wind Data logger to instrument an entire system -- in Version 1.00.9 that I have no clue when it will actually ship, other than "it must ship In October".

If you want to see some of the instrumentation, click the "Phone" link in my signature. The click port "3" for the charge controller, and then "Input" for the array. The panel temperature sensor is from an APRS World Wind Data logger. Wind speed actually comes from a weather station, not the APRS World logger, but the wind sensor from it could be used. Clicking port "1" or "2", for the inverters, will give you the current frequency. Watch it long enough and it will change from 60.0 to something else. My AC meter provider, Watts Up? Meters, will have some new products (that I can't describe -- sorry) that will improve inverter sensing, and I'm working on support for other vendor products, but Watts Up? Meters support is in right now.

tallgirl

Re: Morningstar Charge Controller support

Not sure how long I'm going to leave the pyranometer where it is, but for the time being, there is a pyranometer hooked up. From everything I've read, "plane of the array" is a better orientation than "plane of the earth" since it avoids correcting for the array's azimuth and inclination when calculating predicted (insolation-based) versus actual (measured) output.

The expected output on this page -- http://julie-world.mooo.com:8080/?port=3&array=y -- is based on the sun's position in the sky, with an orbital (yes, orbital) correction to predicted insolation included, then corrected for back-of-panel temperature.

(And as an aside, while the charge controller is the old and venerable MX-60, the output current on that page is provided by a shunt being monitored by a FLEXnet DC, so that number is as correct as a FLEXnet DC can be.)

tallgirl

Re: Morningstar Charge Controller support

And just to keep shamelessly plugging my kit, I should have a version that ships with PentaMetric support -- that is, a PentaMetric with RS-232 adapter-thingy -- ready in a week or two and then you get to configure the three shunts (and I can explain how to monitor three separate shunts if you like -- default PentaMetric is "shunt 1" is the net battery shunt and normally can't be monitored separately since the PentaMetric reports it as the "net" current) as three different devices (inverters or charge controllers) and they show up looking like they should look. Support for SOC and RTS reporting is included. The "Days Since Full" seems to have a bug, and perhaps now I'll have an excuse to figure it out.

You get all the same reporting, logging, etc. support as with other equipment, except you don't get any device errors because the devices don't really exist.

(Edited to add this link -- http://www.greenhousepc.com/docs/pentametric.html )