Posted by: @iradiate

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what if I configured it to charge as much as it could during the cheap tariff period (00:30 to 05:30) in winter and switch to charging by day in summer.?

That tells me your highest priority is cost per kWh, rather than "being green" for example.

Charging a storage battery in the small hours of the morning means that you'll predominately be using electricity generated by a Combined Cycle Gas Turbine (CCGT) plant.

When a CCGT starts up, it's basically a jet-engine with an exhaust running at over 1000°C.
It takes a few hours before that exhaust heat has raised the temperature in a boiler to a sufficiently high temperature and pressure to rotate the turbine in the 2nd stage of generation.

Once the plant moves from Open-cycle to Combined-cycle the efficiency will increase to about 50%. That's not great, but it's cheaper than throwing wasted heat into the atmosphere.

CCGT managers therefore wish to keep operating in Combined Cycle mode throughout the night. To do so they lower the price to something very small, possibly even operating at a loss. But at least they're supplying electricity which might otherwise have been generated by an offshore wind farm.

As you can imagine, the Cheap-Rate overnight period isn't going to be with us for much longer.

It's not going to pass anyone's idea of Net Zero.

Do you have an inherent objection to installing a hybrid inverter and storage battery on L2 in addition to the Powerwall on L1?

That could use a CT clamp to provide Zero Export to grid, whilst still allowing the battery to be charged using what's being generated from your solar panels.

Whats the model of 3ph inverter which you already have?

Posted by: @transparent

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The whole point of 'plug-in solar' and 'plug-in storage' is that it doesn't have the Current Transformers and control interfaces which you'd expect to see on a hard-wired installation.

Every plug in solar/battery product on the EU market I can think of supports some form of CT clamp/wifi CT setup, even the cheapo stuff from Lidl. It's also a very important feature for the many markets people install them on the sly where grid tying is not necessarily legal and it's important with bigger battery setups to get the efficiency high enough to be worth bothering with, as you don't want to export stuff you are not being paid for.

@transparent I don't have any objection to a second battery on L2 with CT clamps etc. in fact I've had a quote of around 5k for a sigenergy 10kwh battery/inverter and was thinking of going ahead with it in September but then yesterday I came across the video about the indevolt and thought this might be a short-cut. Inverter is Solis S5-GR3P5k

@iradiate if you’re prepared to wait, I think indevolt will release pricing and availability in the next couple of weeks, as well as specs and info in the 3000 unit which will hopefully help steer you into the correct decision for your home.

@editor thank you. Yes I'm prepared to wait. Don't need to do anything until winter approaches.

Will be interesting to see what they manage as it's becoming a pretty brutal market. German prices (which are vat exempt unlike ours) are down to €400 for 2.2kWh plug in battery with 2 x 500W MPPTS, wifi, bluetooth and app (€300 on special offer) plus another hundred and a bit for the matching microinverter that sits between it and the plug socket . Okay its not exactly premium brand but it's in German Lidl so that's store not even direct-to-customer pricing they are getting into the €500 range for 2kWh.

Posted by: @etchedpixels

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Every plug in solar/battery product on the EU market I can think of supports some form of CT clamp/wifi CT setup,

I have used two types of solar PV inverter at my own house which did not use any CT clamp.

Neither required the use of WiFi either.

To be fair, I've been experimenting with a wider range of solar & storage technologies than most people would meet.

Based on what I've read in the Indevolt manuals, the PowerFlex 2000 storage battery doesn't use a CT clamp.
The reference to a clamp here by @editor is for the solar inverter.

Indevolt have a range of products (in Germany) and some do have CT clamps to measure current flow at the meter.

I can't see why a plug-in solar or plug-in storage device of the type which DESNZ is considering would need to have a CT clamp.
The legal framework currently being considered would restrict output to 800w.

Posted by: @iradiate

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I've had a quote of around 5k for a sigenergy 10kwh battery/inverter

Check:

If SigEnergy were to enter administration, as has just happened to GivEnergy, would that storage inverter still provide the functionality you'd require? Or is it dependent on data being transferred to their dedicated server?

Have you viewed what YouTube has available about SigEnergy products?

I haven't. But if I were considering one, I'd certainly want to check out this clip which suggests a problem.

If you view those and wish to discuss further, for the benefit of others, then please start a new topic. No one is going to look inside a topic on Indevolt to discover comments on sigEnergy!

Posted by: @transparent

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I can't see why a plug-in solar or plug-in storage device of the type which DESNZ is considering would need to have a CT clamp.
The legal framework currently being considered would restrict output to 800w.

Because lots of people in small houses and flats have a base load in the tens of watts so they don't want to be exporting excessively. Having a wireless ct or similar means that there's no waste of power out to the grid which isn't revenue earning. Also in some countries so nobody notices they are doing it because it's not legal 8)

The only case no CT or similar make sense is a system with no battery.

Thus pretty much all the systems support ct of some form (usually the Shelly kit in Germany).

Hi Mars,

I saw your review of the Powerflex-2000 on YouTube: thank you very much. Very informative, helpful and inspiring.
I'm very keen to keep updated on this and the upcoming powerflex-3000.

4 years ago I installed a tiny PV setup, 4 panels, Victron inverter, 2 batteries. We get a very long way with it but not yet 100% off grid. So I was thinking to invest in a larger Inverter and add extra batteries. However, living in Scotland means that we could do with a tat more sunshine. We live right on the coast so do have enough wind (too much, sigh), and so I have been looking into small Wind turbines. I have installed all that myself. Although technically minded I have very little real electrical knowledge nor real affinity for it.  And so I have been dragging my feet on the upgrade.
It looks like the Powerflex-3000 could just be the ticket for me. I have the following questions which I hope you can help me with.

1- As mentioned, I have 4 panels, two pairs in series (24V);  how many more input can I plug in alongside these two?
Specifically, can I plug in a 24v Turbine (with additional hard/software for dump loads and what have you)?
2- What support can (do you think) Indevolt give me to help me wire up my panels and hopefully a (tiny) turbine.
Again; thank you, and thank you for running this forum!
Regards,

Hi @hanno - good question.

The range of hybrid inverters from SunSynk have a mode which can be configured to take input from a wind turbine.

Whilst the power would be input to the inverter using the same physical terminals as those usually accepting output from PV solar panels, the algorithm is very different.

SunSynk have allowed the user to configure the power/wind-speed curve within the Advanced Settings configuration menu. But information in the manuals is scant. Earlier editions of the instructions actually contained more detail.

The issue with wind-turbines is that they can't simply be turned off if the storage battery becomes full.

The turbine must always be presented with a load. Even if you understand the concept of a dump-load, you still require a fail-safe mechanism to switch it into circuit in the event of the inverter failing as well as the battery being at max capacity.

Users with domestic wind turbines invariably have very large energy stores... well beyond anything you'd consider implementing with Indevolt's technology. For that reason alone, I can't see them wanting to spend R&D time to design a wind-turbine option.

See this existing topic which discusses a proposed 2.5kW domestic wind turbine

and buy yourself a copy of  "A Wind Turbine Recipe Book" by Hugh Piggott. He builds wooden turbines (incl the PMG) on the Scottish island of Scoraig.

If you'd still like to develop these ideas further, then please do so in the Wind Turbine section of this forum. No one else is likely to find comments on wind turbine generation in a topic about Indevolt Powerflex batteries. The two technologies are at opposite ends on the domestic energy field. Attracting helpful input from others is an important part of your ideas-development process!

Hi Guys.   Like a lot of people I have solar which rent a roof scheme.  So can the Indevolt batterys be setup to disable discharge when lose of connect to real time data from wifi connect grid export clamp.   This should allow this to still be used with the G98 as the system would not be able to export the grid more then 3.6 kWh.