Inverter 'upgrade' again, 2x 4kW solar charge controller and final decision for the PowerWall

[@excillisbank2611]

Superbe avancé ! enfin de retour pour continuer cette belle expérience avec vous Andy

[@rikdehaas6398]

Its a real pleasure seeing this all getting shape. Thank Andy!

[@OffGridGarageAustralia]

Glad you enjoyed it

[@theoff-gridhouseinrome3598]

Great Video as always pay attention when connecting the battery to the battery shelf; and pay attention to the frog because during the night they can be very loud. Bye from Italy.

[@wayne8113]

Thanks Andy

[@TrevorFraserAU]

Great progress!

[@IanSHarrison]

Although you appear to have used good sized cable for DC, it is good practice to not bundle them tight but allow airflow between cables for cooling. Not an issue if cables do not even get warm at Max load. Agree option C, better to keep DC cables short (as there are more Amps) and AC do the longer runs. Love your Frogs, show your garden is a healthy ecosystem. Much better than Cane Toads.

[@OffGridGarageAustralia]

Yeah, these cables won't get warm. These 16mm cables from the incoming solar will see only ever 50A max but are rated for 75A. We have toads too but far more frogs thankfully.

[@ЛюбославАначков]

He got us in the first half. Not gonna lie xD You are great Andy!!

[@OffGridGarageAustralia]

Thank you! 🤭

[@solargarage]

Looking good.

[@rainerflesch8148]

For the connection of the solar chargers I am using these connectors: Stiftkabelschuh Kabelverbinder unisoliert Nennquerschnitt: 16 qmm Kupfer galvanisch verzinnt, zur Kabelverbindung 50 Stück

[@habana7638]

Yep .. those are the right ones, I always use those too..

[@jonasgranlund4427]

Really nice and clean install, if you will do a full schematic over all components sometimes now in V3(4, 5??) :) it would be super. Great work!

[@OffGridGarageAustralia]

Thankyou Jonas. Once everything is installed and working, I'll do one.

[@edwardvanhazendonk]

Hi Andi, nice progress! You can also wrap a tiny wire around the wire ends to keep them together, it will overcome the issue that wires are somehow misplaced after taking them apart next time

[@Stoffe46]

Nice weekend 😊 Nice film 😊

[@OffGridGarageAustralia]

Nice late night show. Even the dog just passed out because it was so late already 😁

[@gregb1714]

Awww, C'mon Andy. Sticky conduit would be great, just press in place, no hole drilling required! lol

[@runebjrge6828]

Great to see a new video from you. For 16 square cable, you can get long ferrules, atleast over here. Short length ferrule is 12mm, long is 18mm...

[@OffGridGarageAustralia]

Yes, the double length ones. So far I had them tested in the MCBs and they seemed OK but these charge controller terminals are huge!

[@wiedapp]

Crimp the ferrules and cut off the plastic isolation. Because you are using heat shrink anyway, there will be no problem. I do that all the time, professionally.

[@OffGridGarageAustralia]

Yeap, that's a good idea, just using the ferrule part. I may even order the double length ones as these terminals are deeeeep.

[@unimog404]

Nice update! Looks really good 😁 building 12v/24v/48v is so much fun. I really enjoy it. I wired my 12v system further yesterday. So it is now ready for the 2x Aolithium batteries. 😁 And finally all the 230volt Items arrived. But the fuse box has 1 position to less 😅 So no 230 install on Sunday 😂

[@OffGridGarageAustralia]

Thank you. It takes so long to get all your equipment and there is always something missing!

[@houseofancients]

starting to look sweet there andy !

[@OffGridGarageAustralia]

It's coming along nicely now. More and more work gets done. I just need more time...

[@houseofancients]

@@OffGridGarageAustralia we tinkerers all need more time in a day andy, but unless you can tinker on how the universe works, there's just 24 hours in a day ;)

[@pmacgowan]

Red heat shrink … ah I feel much better now :-)

[@OffGridGarageAustralia]

Glad you picked this up 🤭

[@SzymonHawlicki]

Hi Andy I would like to give you a little advice how to fit a "feril" if its too big for the terminal. This is not a professional and easy solution, but sometimes it is a necessity. Cut the feril insulations off and then crimp it. Greetings from Poland Good luck 💪

[@OffGridGarageAustralia]

Thanks for the tip! That will work.

[@BajanAlan]

Crimp on the ferrule then squash plastic with pliars. It will come off!

[@jamest.5001]

Awesome!! 😜

[@DIYwithBatteries]

It's good to watch your video after a long time sir 🙂👍(I took so long;)

[@martehoudesheldt5885]

👍

[@holgerj7520]

For the solar charge controllers: next time, remove the plastic ends from the ferrules and crimp the bare ferrule on the end of the cable (to still protect the strands). Just a personal ting, great video though.

[@OffGridGarageAustralia]

Great suggestion. I did this with other ferrules but forgot all about it. Thanks!

[@davidpenfold]

Cool frog (toad?)!

[@OffGridGarageAustralia]

Could be this one: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Striped_marsh_frog

[@marcelprivat]

Sehr gut. AC mit längeren Kabel, spielt ja in Deinen Längen keine Rolle. Wieder schönes Video, Danke.

[@OffGridGarageAustralia]

Vielen Dank!

[@dredre9484]

Andy I noticed the holes in the tray I think you can use thin small zipties to keep the cables neat in the tray

[@OffGridGarageAustralia]

I was thinking of using slim Velcro strips though these holes in the duct for that so I can undo it and add/remove cables. Keeps them organised.

[@Christian76S]

The MPPT terminals with pressure plates are supposed to be user bare wire. NO FERRULES. Actually, they even reduce the contact surface.

[@OffGridGarageAustralia]

The ferrule will flatten when tightening the terminal and spread across the area. Ferrules will make sure that all strands of your cable have contact to the terminal. This may not be the case without ferrule. So I would argue the opposite and say without ferrules the risk of not having all stands making good contact is greater.

[@Christian76S]

@@OffGridGarageAustralia On the other hand in the manuals Victron doesn't demand to use ferrules.

[@awesomusmaximus3766]

Awesome

[@BajanAlan]

May be a Striped Marsh Frog (Limnodynastes peroni)

[@OffGridGarageAustralia]

It could be!

[@markusviel6440]

I was thinking always , could it be not possible to work with Magnets as they are are now so "Bombenfest" but rougher "flexibler" for further changes ( at least for the Cable Channels ) . Seems like Change is the Constant in the Offgrid Garage ?

[@OffGridGarageAustralia]

Once the cable duct is in place we should be flexible enough for the future 🤭

[@russkubes]

You paid extra for that stickiness on the conduit, last time. Lol. It must've been some kind of an upgrade (jk)

[@OffGridGarageAustralia]

It would have stuck to the wall just by itself. Maybe that was it :)

[@russkubes]

@@OffGridGarageAustralia or if there was a cable you forgot to route inside the conduit (or even a new one from a future upgrade), no problem, just stick it to the glue on the outside.

[@OffGridGarageAustralia]

@@russkubes Hahaha, great. If the duct is full no problem, the outside can cope with more cables...

[@andrewradford3953]

Such a big project put together so well. Can't wait for the next episode! 4:16 wish I could sleep that well. Is Betty deaf? (I think that is your dog's name, or maybe the pony)

[@OffGridGarageAustralia]

Thanks Andrew, No he's is not deaf at all but was just waiting for me to finally finish up for the day. They are usually with me in the garage for the late night shows 😊

[@BobHannent]

I know it's unlikely, but have you checked the continuity to ensure there's no attachment between the shelf metal and the conductors?

[@OffGridGarageAustralia]

With conductors you mean the battery pos and neg?

[@BobHannent]

@@OffGridGarageAustralia yea, although I didn't want to restrict the comment to just saying battery side of any connections incase that didn't mean connections after breakers or such. More that, ensure that everything that's supposed to be carrying power isn't somehow, accidentally, tied to ground/shelf/structure.

[@CollinBaillie]

Andy, all the comments about soldering your bare battery cables going in to the SCCs for "safety" 😳. Have you covered this before? Maybe an idea to explore in a tutorial video?

[@russkubes]

I'm pretty sure he covered this just a few videos ago. Soldering will keep the cables round, which reduces the contact area. Moreover, the solder adds another material between the terminal and cable, which increases resistance, which isn't good in such high current applications.

[@CollinBaillie]

@@russkubes I'm pretty sure he covered it also. But people (not me) seem to have missed that. I'm well aware of how bad of an idea it is. You more or less reduce the available surface area in contact with the terminal, because the cable cannot form to the shape of the terminal. In a ferrule, as Andy uses square shaped crimp, the surfaces all meet up pretty well, and they're that tony bit impressionable, so they will still form to the shape of the terminal. I have seen many videos covering the issue, just wasn't confident I had seen Andy do one. As for "another material", the ferrule is another material, so that's probably not a legit claim. It's all about the solder rigidly holding the shape of the copper strands in a round form, which reduces surface area of the contact between cable and terminal and this is the reason the connection has a higher resistance.

[@OffGridGarageAustralia]

Yeah, had this in my videos at least twice. Maybe I should do a dedicated show for that problem.

[@ronny7380]

Super Video. Welches Datum hat dieses Video. Weil bei uns is Winter.

[@OffGridGarageAustralia]

Mitten im Sommer hier unten. Mache 450kWh mit der Anlage jeden Monat. Der Tiefpunkt kommt be uns im Juni/Juli 😑

[@Victor-ut4zp]

The tiktokfrog sound just like the clicking relay from your BMS...

[@OffGridGarageAustralia]

It's the QUCC frog!

[@Victor-ut4zp]

@@OffGridGarageAustralia talking about the QUCC bms, I want to parallel two, perhaps three 48V packs, but they say not to use qucc bms's for that. I don't see any problems as long as SOC is equal when connecting them together. What do you think about this? And I had the same clicking relay, that had something to do with the equalizing voltage (which is a fixed parameter and cannot be changed...) Greetings from the Netherlands and keep on going with your video's!

[@OffGridGarageAustralia]

@@Victor-ut4zp Thank you. I don't see a problem either. You should be able to use any kind of BMS for your packs. If the settings are not the same, it should not matter either as the BMS with the lower settings will just shut off earlier. In saying that, the solar charge controller should be responsible for charging and there it uses the same settings for all banks anyway if they are in parallel. The BMS is more for safety if one cell gets too high or low..

[@resleem]

Andy- Nice and neat wiring of your cables in the plastic wire ways! Where did you get the plastic wire ways? Are they called wire way?

[@OffGridGarageAustralia]

Thanks Rodger. 'Cable Duct' they are called. Or cable trunking in some countries.

[@markstemmett5296]

Are those DC breakers ? What make did you use

[@OffGridGarageAustralia]

Yes, all breakers are fully DC rated. See the video here: kzbin.info/www/bejne/n4vIoaerodl_eNE

[@Shep5847]

C4YT 🐸🤘

[@Tezza66]

i think you need the inverters around the other way, as in the small 1 continuous an the multi to macth the frequency an boost the output, when it exceeds what you set as a limit for the mains, this is on the ac side not the dc. i say the wrong way around as the small one is closest to the ac distrobution

[@OffGridGarageAustralia]

Well, that depends how we setup the system afterwards. We can have it the way you described it or we can have the Multi requesting the small one from turning on and boost the input of the Multi. Both is possible.

[@jamest.5001]

I would be nice if someone made furrels with the plastic heat shrinkable

[@OffGridGarageAustralia]

Yeah, what a nice upgrade!

[@stevedutcher3875]

What is it that you don’t like about the smart Daly BMS?

[@OffGridGarageAustralia]

I made videos about it. I don't like the balancing feature at all. It's useless...

[@adrianchiriac4129]

I also bought a JK BMS and now I am working on a system using Victron MultiPlus II, Victron MPPT 100/20 and Venus. I'm using Li-Ion car batteries and due to the higher risk of them igniting one way or another, I keep thinking how I can make sure that a cell monitoring circuit (JK's circuit) does not give an error or short circuit and thus overload a cell that could lead to fire. So I was thinking of using another additional BMS with the only role of monitoring the cell voltages and cutting the battery if needed - the other one would be responsible for doing the charging/balancing alone. This way, I'd be introducing redundancy in case the charging/balancing BMS somehow fails. I'm curious if you've tried this and what your advice would be? I'm open to sending you a diagram of the system as I'm seeing it now.

[@johthe]

It is possible to monitor most jkbms with serial and maybe bluetooth later. I will do this later. That in turn can control some alarm or mayby extra safety. And a suggestion is also to plan for the worst, if they go up in smoke how do you protect the rest, almost airtight capsulation, fire insulation and outside ventilation. Just in case also special fire supression siuted for litium.

[@OffGridGarageAustralia]

If one BMS does just the charging/balancing and the other one the cell monitoring, there is no redundancy. You can only ensure that if both BMS do the exact same and if one fails, the other one is still there to protect.. I would not charge higher than 4V with Li-ion. I case something happens you still have a buffer.

[@CristianBarraza]

hola

[@Jsak666]

Why did you not just cut the plastic off the ferrule and still crimp a straight shaft to your bare copper? Be a much better connection

[@electrojessy4270]

You can solder the wire on the solar charge controler. Or does it have some cons?

[@jebw]

No solder because it flows resulting in a lose terminal connection and this will generate excessive heat.

[@dahuaba9558]

1st 😂 Didn't want to participate in this but whatever... 😁

[@OffGridGarageAustralia]

🤦‍♂️🤭

[@JH-zk6dk]

😂😂😂frogs

[@carlbrown5150]

Tin the bare wires and you don't need a Ferril.!!

[@OffGridGarageAustralia]

NOOOOOOOOOO! That's the worst thing you could do. You will create hot spots. I mean really hot spots!

[@peterwalker7869]

At the rate you are completing this project you are going to have to buy all new cells for your batteries as the ones you have will have died from old age. Will Prowse would have done this in only 3 videos. One on the wall setup, second one on the batteries, and last one showing it all working. All done in under a week. I guess if I come back somewhere around 2025 I will be in time to see it finally get switched on for the first time.

[@OffGridGarageAustralia]

Maybe he does not have a day job and has unlimited (financial) access to supplies and goods.

[@offgridstuff]

@@OffGridGarageAustralia Nobody wants 'only 3 videos'. We all enjoy the 1. frogs, 2. Dogs, 3. Humour, 4. More frogs, 5. Instruction!, 6. Andy!

[@defjamsgreen]

YOUV'E REALLY BEEN DOING SOME RETHINKING ON THIS WALL AND I THINK THIS WILL WORK OUT PRETTY WELL , LETS SAY AT100% PROGRESS TO PERFECT . WALL MASTERPIECE AT ITS FINEST .☺ MAY THE SOLAR BE WITH YOU .

[@bramsoff-grid]

👍