What's inside the Fronius Primo residential solar inverter?

You may have heard about Fronius's residential solar inverter the Primo, but odds are you haven't had a chance to see what's inside! Solar Power World editor Kathie Zipp teams up with executive editor and engineer Lee Teschler to see what makes the inverter tick. Teschler is notorious for his Teardown Corner KZbin videos, and together these two editors take a deeper look at how the inverter achieves dual MPPT, arc-fault interruption, revenue-grade metering and more.

[@MurrayWayper]

Thankyou for the detailed technical breakdown of the functions of circuits

[@stevenfirst8222]

Love that he got into the electronics level of the inverter.

[@emmittjmuckles109]

Goodpresentation Katie and Lee, The revenue grade metering option is a specific inverter which has a specific part number. Not all Primo's are Revenue Grade Metering ready, but inverters with that feature must be requested specifically. The small pug in board Referred to @ 5:42 is an extension portion of the Power Stack PC board. RGM is an overall function, between hardware and Firmware.

[@GerardsCorner]

I have had the Primo 5.0-1 installed now for one month and have had no issues. The WiFi connect is great and I can monitor it from home or elsewhere at any time. Great product so far.

[@AustinPetDetective]

Do you have an issue with fan noise ?. We have ours in the garage and on hot days the fan noise is quite noticeable ?

[@vm667]

Thanks for the detailed explanations. Much Appreciated.

[@aranbekas8825]

Excellent video

[@martinonumero]

Hey, what kind of connection do you use to plug it into your grid?

[@Bianchi77]

Nice information, thank you for sharing it with us, keep it up :)

[@AustinPetDetective]

I find on hot days the fan or fans noise can be quite noticeable especially if inside the garage. Is there anything you can do about the Fan noise ?.

[@engineerirfan]

Nice

[@edgaraskorsakas5703]

Girl: I am speaking the script Guy: I could talk for hours as I know the unit inside out.

[@wecare7020]

Hi friends please send me both cooling fan specifications thanks

[@Swenser]

Can you guys comment on anything about why a lot of roof top solar feeding into grid would cause the need for infrastructure upgrades on the grid.

[@listlessviewer153]

Because if the energy is going back to the grid then there needs to be infrastructure in order to deal with the increased load.

[@Swenser]

@@listlessviewer153 but the increased load is the cause of the problem not the solar panels that feed in the extra power. Without solar the extra load ( more houses, extra air cons etc) would still exist but the extra power would come from burning more coal. So solar is being blamed for more power demands? Seems unfair?

[@chada472]

What happened to the galvos?

[@JAKUB1972]

fronius symo...had a surge in a line ...... came with a fault 401 509 574 108 could you please what could be wrong and how much would be for part ?

[@matthewdower5383]

My brain hurts after watching this 🤯

[@usmanumer9871]

this is very cheap and high quality products making company . i used once .

[@MrPowercon]

Can these types of inverters handle inductive loads?

[@SolarPowerWorldOnline]

Yes, the Fronius Primo grid-tied inverter can handle inductive loads (power factor 0.85 -1). If there are further questions, you can contact Fronius Technical Support, they will be happy to help! [e-mail]

[@henriquetannus10]

They are grid connected inverters... They arent for load supply...

[@dankollars4501]

I would like to tell everyone my experience with a Fronius inverter. Paying a premium, I thought I was getting a quality inverter with a 10-year warranty. After 2 years of use the inverter stopped working but I thought it will be ok, the inverter has a 10-year warranty. I called Fronius and they told me a code came up that one of my solar panels must have got wet and shorted to ground and fried the inverter or it’s a bad install and they don’t cover that. They told me I could test this by measuring voltage to ground and it should be no more than one volt to ground. I measured the voltage and only had one volt, so I did not have a solar panel shorting to ground. correct me if I am wrong but isn’t the purpose of a ground is to direct the current to ground so no one gets shocked? Before installing a new inverter, I had someone come out and inspect my system to make sure there was nothing wrong and they said they couldn’t find any problems. I installed another inverter and its been running great with my same solar array that Fronius told me was bad. Fronius does not honor their warranties. Don’t get screwed like I did, buy something else.

[@larryem523]

If there was a ground fault at the array, it is due to a bad installation or panel, neither of which are Fronius equipment. The inverter manufacturer should not be responsible for faults outside their control. If a technician poorly installs the inverter, e.g. allowing water ingress to the inverter, the inverter warranty is voided. This is true of nearly all electronic products. If you misuse/abuse it, or do not follow installation instructions, you void the warranty.

[@dankollars4501]

@@larryem523 i would agree with that but please explain to me how an inspection after the failure turned up no problems with my solar array. i have since put in a new inverter and i have not had any problems at all. i think your fronius uses excuses to not honor warranties.

[@leotheevinci]

Oh my goodness gracious! Why use those low quality popping capacitors, and noisy 30-40mm shrieking whining fans?

[@bobocrina2643]

The old school inverters with transformers lasts longer and less electronics.