Multiplus shows Low Battery warning and won't turn on.
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- Опубліковано 28 вер 2024
- I knew, the test would be tight and I may run out of battery during the night. I had only 41% state of charge and still let the load of 2kW running over night. In theory (and what the smart shunt calculated), it should be possible. So, I gave it a shot... and lost. But not as expected....
And now, the Multiplus is in some sort of deadlock and won't start anymore after it shut down in the morning.
I'm investigating and troubleshooting with not much luck. I cannot figure out what exactly happened and why the Multiplus is locked...
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Andy pls consider making a follow up Video on this ... keen to know the final outcome ... thanks A
Hello Andy, please check the assistents that you use. For example the ESS Assistent uses his own parameters of voltages.
I'm off-grid, not running ESS Assistant. I just use the generator start stop assistance to trigger the second inverter. But even that seems buggy now...
Hi Andy
I made a test on my 3 phase Victron Mulitplus 2 System. Firmeware 500 installed.
All 3 inverters switch off by 37 Volt and start simultan a soon the DC voltage is back over 43 Volt.
Works perfekt without a Issue.
Regards from Switzerland
Samuel
Hi Andy, all,
great video and info as all of yours, many thanks!
interesting update fresh from this morning (2023-11-07). Had low batt error, too.
being offside, VRM portal only. running V506 on MPII. (V3.12 on Cerbo)
as known, MPII does not reset lowbatt automatically. Remote console and switching off/on again didn't help.
BUT: used the VRM switch for same off-on and guess what? the error is not shown anymore..
Off-On seems different from VRM portal, than from remote console.
But managed to get rid off the error remotely, finally.
BR
Joerg
That's not great, the MP should come back to life as per settings. It's the essential product in each system. Definitely a software bug. Still!
I have set mine to 38V now so it won't shut down any more unless all BMS have shut down and battery is completely empty.
I can estimate the load over night and turn off non-essential load to ensure battery does not go that low. No problem since.
You should try to go in the Cerbo (or rasperri pi) to the "notifications" and acknowledge clicking the "V" at the bottom
never change a running system!
victron wrote „It is not required to keep your Victron equipment updated to the latest firmware version. Stable systems should be left with their current firmware“
Lolz
It had this issue long before the FW update
They also say that mRNA vaccination would protect us against infection and be free of side effects. Or wearing a mask would protect us.
@@mbr8981 was hat das mit dem THEMA (Multiplus and los battery) zu tun ? ohne Worte !!!
@@helmo5663 das mich eure Obrigkeitshörigkeit ankotzt...
Updated all my three 3000 MPII to firmware 500 three hours ago. I really hope it's not buggy , up to now I have no Problems. Please keep us informed.
Hi Andy, thanks for the Video. I am facing the same problen (low voltage and cut off) on my autaek solar car "filling Station" as well. Even when I duscinnect the Mk3 from raspi. The MP 3000 did run on Pylontec fine but now wirh 16s JK BMS the problem starts 😢 thanks a lot for a possible part 2 😂
From 12.15 to 13.30 on your screen you have the warning, al, you had to do, is to acknowledge it by clicking on the tick on bottom bar, then alarm disappears if values are within parameters. Or, on the 3dots in the VRM, once you acknowledge the lv alarm, it resets, and MP resumes.
Yes this is what I encountered too.
This! you have to clear/acknowledge the alarm. to get things back up and running.
I don't have to acknowledge any other warnings or alarms. They all clear once the conditions are not met anymore.
So, you reckon, confirming the alarm would have started the MP again?
@@OffGridGarageAustralia yes.
I just ordered my two MP-II 48v inverters, so, you can imagine I’m wondering if there is a way to configure this to have a more automated recovery.
Perhaps your low voltage shutoff of 37 volts is out of range for the inverter so it gets disregarded and a system default value is used to trigger shutdown. Granted it should notify you if that is really what happened, but it would make sense why your setting was diregarded.
Did you ever explain this fault Andy ? Am having similar issues with a brand new Quatto-II. Shuts down with "Low Battery" and stays shutdown, but only when I have the MK3 plugged in. Mmmmm
I've had the same experience with the ID. Also, I've had quirky low battery alarms when I remove the battery's can bus. Although the settings of the multi are ok, it behaves very strangely without a CAN connection.
Hi Andy
I can say from experience that the MP II shuts down when the battery is on low voltage, after some time it recovers back, but after the third time it has shut down it will not turn on automatically, witch means that you must do it manually. Same thing it happens when you short circuit it 3 times in a row (or overload more that it can handle)
I have no idea why it keeps showing low alarm after manual restart!
Can't wait to see more of this issue!
Hi, I have a similar issue. Im on a boat. Multiplus II suddenly showed a low voltage alarm. Solar, Shore power and generator work fine but when I isolate all systems the Low voltage alarm activates and no power. I've checked the voltage and all seems to be fine as are the batteries. Any ideas welcome...
Thanks Andy 🤔 🎄
I had something similar with an error 'Low battery Voltage' and had to turn off and on the multiplus. That happened when my raspberry went down during a restart of my system. The multiplus couldn't get the battery voltage from can bus on the raspberry and wen in 'Low battery" mode and off. My solution was to disable "VE.Bus error" in Device List>Multiplus>Alarm Setup. That way, if for any reason the multiplus can't communicate with the can bus because of a VE.Bus error, it does not go anymore in 'Low battery Voltage' error. But you didn't seem to have a VE.Bus error. I'm not sure it help, but i'm going to keep disabled the VE.bus error, because like you, I want the multiplus to be always on, even if it loose the battery or the raspberry (i'm grid tied with ESS). I had as well a different id for the multiplus and it went back to the same id. I never understood why!
Andy. Sometimes the Firmware/software gets hung up and the only thing you can do is completely power down the system,remove the DC, wait for it to totally discharge and restart. Remember the precharge resistor. Now go back and look at all your settings to make sure they are yours and not the defaults. Yes, you are correct, you need to do a repeat of the scenario to make sure it doesn’t repeat. It should restart automatically and it should never change it’s address on its own. I’ve found with a lot of devices that after updating software, it’s always a good idea to completely shut down (zero power) and reboot. I sure hope that’s all it was.
I can only agree with that I also had problems after the update to 5.00 and have the entire system de-energized. after that it worked again (phu scare minute) greetings from dark cold austria
Generally the Venus OS has been extremely reliable but during the previous round of updates, the SCC was reported as receiving a batt temp of -1°C from the BMV which does not have any temp monitoring. After rebooting the system the SCC picked up the batt temp (and voltage) from the smart battery monitor as it normally does.
Andy, I went through all the comments, and I'm still at a lost to resolve the same issue as yours. Is it a firmware issue? Can you do a follow up video? Bob H.
Suggest you read configuration and check settings then re-write. There have been some changes between firmware updates recently and you have to do this if it is not done automatically to migrate your settings to the new parameters. If you don’t settings are set to default and can throw some things out
The settings have all been reset after the FW update. I always have to do that and it's also recommended by Victron.
Not 100% sure but the problem of the changing ID is most likely related to the RasPi. It’s an known behavior that the Pi changes the USB ID for an plugin adapter so the the overlay system things that it’s a new device. Don’t know what the exact reason is for that but could be that it is caused by a not 100% perfect power supply ( not possible to deliver enough current under high load conditions etc) Maybe worth to have a look there.
Yeah, could be the MK3 adapter to USB, or better the Ve.Bus to USB adapter which causes that. I will see once the Cerbo is in place and the MP is directly connected with Ve.Bus
I looked it up again on Google and you are right. It’s not a problem of the PI but of a lot of the USB to serial adapters. Manufacturers of those adapters using cheap clones of usb to serial chips. Normally such ICs should have a prober manufacturer name and a unique serial number, but the clones often don’t have a unique serial number. Most of the times the serial number is set to all zero. If you have more then one of such adapters plugged in on the PI the PI gets confused cause it finds devices with the same serial numbers. This causes the behavior that suddenly an device is detected as other or new device and gets a new ID.
Jens Ritter thanks for the comment. And
Andy would like to give you one or more beers if a solution is found. 🥹
it has now robbed me of almost five days to work around the problem, unfortunately with sluggish success. Yes I have three same cp2104 usb to uart converter idvendor "s**t" + idProduct "f**k" . but the serial numbers are not the same. After realizing this, I started via ~ # udevadm info -a -n /dev/ttyUSB1 | grep '{serial}' | head -n1 to find out the usb0 usb1 … serial number then in the directory. sudo nano /etc/udev/rules.d/10-usb-serial.rules set up rules with the serial number.
SUBSYSTEM=="tty", ATTRS{idVendor}=="s**t", ATTRS{idProduct}=="f**k", ATTRS{serial}=="012345678", SYMLINK+="tty*".
Once you've finished, use Ctrl + x to exit. And save the changes by entering “Y”.
Enter the following command in the Terminal to let the rules from the saved file take effect:
sudo udevadm trigger
Check the new USB port names
You can check the new names you just created by entering the following command in the Terminal :
ls -l /dev/ttyUSB*
reboot
same problems or more Felix
Do you have DVCC still active ? I have no experience with this feature, but this may have overridden the multiplus features, and suddenly stopped communicating right?
Yes, I have this still active. Hmmm, that would be a huge bug though...
@@OffGridGarageAustralia I have that always on, never happen something like that. But as i wrote, I still run 296
Hello Andy great videos I enjoy your testing. In this video you forgot to look at BMS info. Veconfigere was a wrong road to take. You have DVCC on, thus multi ignores its charge and discharge and low battery cut off settings. It will only listen to the DVCC messages. Likely DCL was 0Amps till the BMS updates his info. Not Victron software was to blame as many comments do. BMS communication was the problem here
@@ancovanbergeijk4766 Thanks for the tip. My Multiplus works as an inverter only, no AC or charging. I also don't have a smart BMS connected, just the Smart Shunt. So, DCL should not be activated or valid in this case.
@@OffGridGarageAustralia Ah yes DVCC on and no BMS is very possible option to run on. Seeing all your BMS testing I assumed there had to be a bms in this system too. And almost always when I see a low voltage alarm on Inverters, Multi's or Quattro's it is because of DCL 0 amps as we work 95% with BMS connected batteries. Next tip take VE-Bus rj45 cable off and restart the inverter. It now goes back to Ve-configure settings. If the inverter works fine this way than search for the problem on the raspberry pi. As soon as you connect the RJ45 VE-bus and DVCC is on and your Raspberry pi might still have wrong BMS info from a recently connected smart battery than that may switch of the inverter right away. That has happened to me as I was testing and writing my own BMS python scripts....
I had something like that but because my grid tension went above 250V ... I think I have in the settings to not recover in case of fault... but I also think that is for shortcircuit... I have to see because it happens twice, above 250 shutdown ( what is ok) but don´t recover... ( my multiplus is in the 552 version of firmware)
I have a new rack battery and see where others are complaining about the MP II doing a low battery disconnect and the battery people have said to have the people check with Victron. ... I can't ever get a reply from Victron and I have been wanting to go into being a Victron installer ... anyway. I have yet to connect up the Muliplus II though 12V ... but I did have some issues and think I found out ... my readings and current settings in the smart shunt needed recalibration with known full charge. I did have an error of the rack not turning on with things connected but to fix it I connected the wall wart Victron charger and the rack would stay lit. ... I appreciate the approach here to figure the solution/problems and not just go off on a tirade rabbit trail.
Write in the Victron Community forum. Victron is very active in there too.
Have had this happen to one customer of mine, just threw the exact alarm as yours did only a restart and clear of the alarm log rectify the issue has not happened since I will keep you posted if I find outcome likewise with you
I just had this problem but it was reoccurring on a new system. JK BMS 100 / 20 multiplus II and venus on a pi. Very similar system as yours but much lower capacity. I noticed when i disabled dcvv (disconnecting the bms) the alarm went away. I reset the bms parameters and increased the RCV voltage .010 mv per cell and the issues is gone. Very annoying not knowing what fixed or caused it. Even stranger was my batteries were at 95%! Was there a follow up vid?
Hello ! I have the same problem as you with my 2 multiplus II. They work in parralel and charge a 15kwh Seplos battery. Sometimes i have to reset the multi' a few times until it runs againd as it should. And it only happens at night when the battery drops to around 80% state of charge.
If you are going to use it for your house I would use one of your old inverters as a backup that cuts in if the main multi plus fails
Interesting. I am using a non Victron inverter which does also have this issue, I have to power cycle the inverter. I wonder if there is a setting somewhere for both of us to recover from low voltage alarms?
Who doesn't love mystery/detective story? Stay Tuned!
Multi plus II 24V3000 good day Andy and thank you for this video I had my system shut down this morning low voltage shut down vicron is reading 26.4 volts but the overload light with no load refuses to go out in the inverter refuses to turn on even by toggle in it I run into this before the solution at that time plug in my generator to the vectren I know what I just said makes no sense at all as soon as I hooked it up it's showing 26.8 volts 1% battery in other words the battery is dead I got up to 4% at 27.8% that bs to get the inverter turned back on again I went through all my settings I've been having this problem for some time. i missed it but there was an update 5:10 the number if I remember correctly I installed the update immediately the system went to working properly I do not know if it would recover after a low voltage shut down but at least it'll work now again I follow a lot of your channel I was searching for an answer a solution because I don't have any other power source this is my power source saying some pretty strong profanity at the multiplus 2 it's giving me way more headaches than my multi plus ever did . As soon as I had it up and working again I've been babying the hell out of it since I got it turn on the air conditioner cuz I need i needed to cool down then I went and got a space heater mind you everything in the house refrigerators fans they're all still running and cranked it up to 2850w before I got an overload error immediately turned it down the system did not shut down everything went great . boy this has been a rough road with this unit I have had it in the past shut down and then try to come back on again this morning it shut off its stayed off
Do you have any assistants running in the VE configure ?
Yes, the gen start/stop assistant.
@@OffGridGarageAustralia some of these settings override some other settings in ve configure dashboard ( would be nice if these were highlighted )
@@OffGridGarageAustralia Yes I was wondering about the "generator" also having no power and the Multi relying on it as a backup could have thrown a spanner.
At 13:14 you show a VRM instance 292. That was no longer the correct instance. At this time it was reporting as 289. When you turned it off and on it reset to 293 for a second then went back to 292.
I don't know why this would cause the system to not work. If it's just for monitoring it shouldn't interfere with operations. It may not be the cause but another symptom.
Is it adjustable on that screen? If it is, I wonder what would happen if you changed to 289 at that time? Would the inverter start working? When the inverter reset, would the reporting have gone back to 292 like it did and stop the inverter from working and required another manual change back to 292 to continue working.
I think , you should check cables , one of them may be loose
Hi andy, the exact same thing happened to me 2 times today when I was changing settings with the mk3 to usb interface, took it off after the changes and it didnot happen again. Let you know if it happens again, did you find something else in the meantime?
It happened only once to me. Some folks in the Victron forum have advised to change some settings in regards to the low voltage shutdown which I did now. A few weeks back, I managed to discharged the battery to 1% before the BMSes shut down but the inverter was still running at this point. But there were also 2 FW updates for the MP in between, so don't know if it was the settings or the new FW.
@@OffGridGarageAustralia Oké, it has not stopped the last two days now, you are talking about a firmware update? Mine has version 498 in it, I’ll usually don’t do firmware updates on the multi’s when everything is running fine, but in this case, it could solve the problem. Cheers
@@wilvandendoel6782 Yes, FW for the Multi. I do them all the time as they fix sh!t like this. 502 is the latest, I believe.
I had the same problem with a 12v/375w inverter had done the same, after 3 alarms of battery low had shut down and did not restart again. Only after manual disconect/reconect. The mppt charger It charged the battery but the inverter was off.
Firmware updates love em, where they take your old config, and load a default one anyways cos your settings file has something extra or something missing.
When upgrading firmware ALWAYS go thru and check all the settings, make a single change and back save to ensure its written cleanly
Yeah, I do every time. Not hard to do with my setup as I use the MP mainly as an inverter.
@@OffGridGarageAustralia Except you didn't this time, I know you didn't because you're facing the same error I had with mine, and it took me 2 days to notice the problem in the patch notes. And about 8 seconds to open up my config, remove the line that was in my current config but not available in the new one, restarted, and she's been good since.
I don't have the massive solar input you do, but i do have 30 Kw of battery and 10Kw of inverters.
Once or twice a year these firmware updates cause errors
@@AnIdiotAboard_ nope, I did configure the MP again. Otherwise it would not work in my environment at all. The charger is turned on by default and would use the second inverter as AC in to charge the battery.
Hi Andy, have experienced the exact same issues, running two Multiplus same as yours, one a master and the other a slave. Also started after the upgrade to the 500 firmware mine started with errors, on the date I upgraded on the 6th or 7th Dec. I upgraded from V497 to V500. Started with High voltage errors and then Low battery errors. Now as soon as my Fronius inverter kicks in and reaches a certain number of watts the Multiplus will trip. How do you revert beck to V497 firmware. Anything to get my system back to normal. Neglected to mention am running two Pylotntech UP5000 batteries, total of 9.6 Kw/h. Thanks
I have the same issue when my MK3 is connected to my laptop using the config tool and having it "idle" for to long. So usually I connect the MK3, make the changes and immediately disconnect it again. So my first guess would be an issue in the MK3 firmware. Had this problem also with older firmware on the Multiplus. So I don't think it's related to the new v500.
Pool equipment sound like variable speed pump it should be on low speed pull 300 watt to 500 watts. Keep water moving. So if freeze it stop pipe freeze. Run around 1000watts to 1500watts on high speed. To get cleaner working to clean bottom pool. Like 2 to 4 hour depend on size pool
I’m currently trying to chose between buying 2 multiplus inverters or two Quattros. Why did you go with multiplus? Do you know anything about the Quattro
I would buy the old multiplus or old Quattro these new machine I don't like we have stopped buying them . The old technology machines are bulletproof
Yesss a new video!
Strange fault for sure - hope you can figure out why it happened.
Just looked at my logs, June/July/first of August, 4 low battery alarms, don't remember now , I may have just power cycled to clear. I believe it was somewhere around that time I went to 497 FW, no low battery alarms since, have not upgraded to 500 FW yet and, may now wait .... Mine is an original MultiPlus, not a II.
My issue with MP2: I have 3x MP3 for 3F. When MP3 discharging from battery, two MP3 invert from battery, but one doesn't want to. Has anyone any idea why? Any clue what could we check?
Hi Andy, Greetings from India.
i have gained a lot from you. All your Experiences & Knowledge let me Run my EV car with Diy LiFePo4 Battery & an Off-Grid Solar system at home at my own.
I have a query for a long time which you can please resolve if you find some spare time, Actually i have a 16s 150Ah LFP Battery Bank, i didn't Top balanced while building it, also all cells are now welded & can't be taken apart. Due to issues regarding resources i can't add a Balancer. Using Daly Smart BMS. Now the pack is not in a good Balance. Tried with your Lamp method, worked great but Is there a way to manually balance it properly ?? Because once they are in balance, small balance current of 100mA will take care of it.
Something similar happened to me when I overloaded the MP with a plasma cutter. VRM showed that the load was 4600 W before overload shutdown (that's the worst case protection when MP isn't able to maintain AC out voltage for 30 periods). I've read that MP should handle pretty big overloads and this was below 5k... wtf? Later, I found out that my MP powered server that hosts HA (and shut down too) was able to store some data in HA just before it died. DC current was -146 A, that's about 7.5 kW... so, the moral of the story is do not believe what VRM says. It logs data with slow periods and completely misses some. That was despite Cerbo GX did not shut down, still had a power, but nothing in the logs. If your system says the voltage was low and you don't see anything in the logs it does not mean it's wrong. Still does not explain why it did not restart itself. It did fine in my case
Yeah.... I would explain it with a phrase of the movie " I Robot " where James Cromwell ( Dr. Alfred Lanning ) came up with the fundamental truth :
............. there have always been ghosts in the machine... 🤣
121822/1511h PST 🇺🇸 121922/0921h 🇦🇺 Guten Morgan , Herr Andy. Such frustrations do happen to any intricate DC systems, as I’ve also experienced. In your case, I’d point finger to the “upgrades” . Hard booting (as you performed) set the system on track, once again. Typical….errr what was for breakfast? Have a wonderful day ahead. 73s…
Trying to contact you for a business proposal. Can't find any way...
Reset the inverter maybe Andy? I got home yesterday with a problem as well. Very sucky to have to work on it at 5 pm.
Take a Victron power charger and load your batterys full
@Off-Grid Garage Just a guess: You are having a off-grid situation, it seems the multiplus cannot guarantee that you have enough juice to run the device; it seems to me a safety to avoid any issues which can escalate because of instable/not enough power? The not having an auto-restart might be because of that, but kinda odd. You'd want a reliable system that will resume once there is power again.
You need to program your router or access point to use a static IP address for that devices Mac address. Problem fixed, no more new IP.
Has nothing to do with the router...
@@OffGridGarageAustralia lol, dude..... You don't know what you're saying. A new IP address is issued by your router every time a device connects. This is done for security. If you need an IP to remain static and not be re-issued then you need to set up static ip's based on the Mac address of the device. Yes victron could solve this but it is because of the way routers work, nothing else.
@@OffGridGarageAustralia what network is it that you me turned then? Is it not your lan? Is it some sort of 3rd party victron addressing?
@@QuantumMarmalade Yes it is a "Victron Bus". I am pretty sure Andy would have a fixed IP for the RPi which is the Controller/Logger for the system.
PS DHCP serving IP's has nothing to do with security. It is for ease of access and sometimes economy of limited subnets. It is quite common for DHCP servers to reissue the same IP when a device reconnects to the network as long as the expiry period for the original lease is not excluded.
Maybe, just msybe, jour low voltage disconnect setting is out of range and being ignored - should not allow you to - however this may have changed with a firmware upgrade - since part of the firmware does not know of the disconnect status it also cannot restart.
Suggestion - set a reasonable value for low voltage - and try again
Multiplus 2 range is Ingangsspanning: 38 - 66V?
@@lyrapkfvl4374 I have never seen a battery ranging from 38 up to 66 volts
@@fransvankralingen725 me neither, but this is the range of the inverter
so you can use different types of batteries on this inverter
Acknowledge the alarms first then reset
Should they not clear themselves after the conditions are not met anymore? It works like this for all other alarms...
@OffGridGarageAustralia I find that our plant that is attached to our BMCS likes to have faults cleared first then reset. I am talking about Chiller Units and large UPS systems. The Victron may like to see no current error codes as well
@@peterryan7340 If that’s the case then such a system would be unreliable if you’re not in attendance. Surely it should reset once voltage recovers.
@@FutureSystem738 safety is why.
@@peterryan7340 Safety? I do not buy that.
So the sun doesn’t shine for a few days, voltage gets low, inverter shuts down due low voltage. (Remember also that it hadn’t even reached Andy’s set low voltage cut off figure, and had then also risen way above his resume figure. That alone proves there’s a software issue here.
Sun comes out, voltage rises, inverter doesn’t switch on, fridges, freezers etc all warm to ambient and your food is all spoiled, pumps and everything else you have don’t run, and the batteries may then be chock full with no AC power available.
How is this “safety”? This is a firmware failure, period.
As the Great Paul Harvey once said, Now for the rest of the story.......... Good Day
My Victron inverter does this on a regular basis for no reason I can see Andy
Way too many cooks in the kitchen for a simple job. I personally (on a boat) have dedicated checks separated from the basic components to keep them inline. These do everything components can be a nuisance if you are in a situation. Better keep things simple on a small system like yours.
100% firmware bug (in the alarm case)
Victron look good but seems over complicated for what should be simple system. Marketing really know how to split apart and sell off something. I mean a few switches makes dc to ac, transformer to step up that voltage and Walla. Dc to ac, add few modules for measuring, a wifi module ya done. But they really manage to string it out so as to need so many seperate “devices” when really it’s just one split. Crazy
Nah not really . Victron makes an all in one unit for people who want that but rarely does that let you tailor the equipment for what you need . Every installation needs something different . No one comes close to making all the things Victron does to be able to power a shed to a ship .
@@onthelake9554 Your proof marketing works
Like# 25!
That's not good at all. If your house was connected and you were on holidays, everything in your fridge would be gone!
Well, it was a test after all and I would not have let this happened. But still, it is a bug somewhere...
@@OffGridGarageAustralia I hope Victron helps with a solution!
🐸🐸
Too complicated inverter system. Just use simple back-up inverter without fancy software
Could it be the the RsPi renumbers the USB interfaces ? Have not seen this Behaivior und Cerbo's or Color Controls.
Yes, it seems to be related to that...
In the video you said 2 days ago you updated the firmware every time I update my firmware it resets all of the settings on the inverter and I have to go in and change them all again back to what I want if you're viewing the file you're not doing what's actually on the inverter you're just viewing the file that you had saved of that when you update it resets them back because it changes the location in memory
So open the firmware settings from the inverter and make sure that those settings are what you intend them to be I think what happened is that it reset it to factory settings and you just happened to go below into the low voltage and pass the shutdown voltage but you never passed the factory set turn on voltage and you're still in the low voltage alarm from the factory settings
indeed , he is not connected to the inverter , just reading the file .
flashing the firmware , is also a factory reset !
Andy , reload your settings back into the inverter and all will be ok
Also while i am on here andy I wanted to tell you to check your cerbo GX many of them were assembled wrong at the factory victron knows about this there is a document sheet telling you how to take it apart to reposition the antennas internally because if you use the HDMI display that victron sells for them the Wi-Fi antennas are routed incorrectly and go directly by one of the data lines for HDMI and that interferes with certain Wi-Fi channels you can simply reposition the antennas internally and fix this they also allow you to send it to them to be repaired by them for no charge you don't need to do this at all if you're only going to use ethernet connection but if you intend to use Wi-Fi it's a good idea to check it I don't know if there's a way to look up the serial number to see if your model is affected mine was it worked perfectly for a year and a half and then all the sudden stopped working completely
Yes, I know, FW update resets everything including the assistants. Annoying.
@@OffGridGarageAustralia It save it and reload all settings, if not it would be not remote update able. I guess u did it in the web page
Hi Andy, this seems to be business as usual.
Have had a similar experience with my MP II`s a bunch of times:
whenever a low battery event occurs, the MP II stops working, sets an vrm alarm message and turns a red light on (Low battery)
It will never awake from this, remain in that state, to make sure your complete system is in a safe condition and you recocnize the problem.
So first check the whole system state and clear the reason of the fault.
Then turn off the MP II, (wait a moment) and clear the alarm (the active alarm needs to be acknowledged on the three dots in the alarm log on the VRM portal)
After turning on the MP II again, it will just work fine as usual.
This seems to be a security procedure to save your system.
By the way: after fw update, your device ist set to the defaut settings again. You have to reconfigure it and you can not use the old configuration file from the past (before update), you have to create a new configuration file now.
(so don´t look to the values of the old file. Download the actually one and have a look to this settings)
You also might setup the generator-assistent for the Phoenixinverter again
Thanks Micha. I was under the impression, the MP will recover itself once the battery voltage rises again. Hence there is a recovery voltage to be set in the config. It clearly didn't do that even the battery and system was all fine again and in a safe spot.
I know, after a FW update it resets everything, even the assistants. Very annoying... can't really do this for a remote side, can you...
@@OffGridGarageAustralia I agree 100% Andy.
1. With your settings, it shouldn’t have shut down in the first place as the voltage didn’t get as low as you had set.
2. With your recovery settings, it should have restarted as the voltage went up again.
To me - this is a fault in the software.
@@OffGridGarageAustralia Yes, you are right. - Your valuable video may bring important input from the community to all of us.
And your power of mediainfluence may affect VICTRON to change this procedure.
Thnxalot for all your clear and analytical videos - they are really useful.
(You are a great solarboy and an impressive person, dear Andy)
And how does Victron expect this to achieved if you are 1000 km's from the home?
@@davidfrisken1617 Hi David! In the case of a serious fault or damage, you always have to maintain / repair the system personal.
It is better to shut down a system as to cause a fire for e.g.
Remote control is always more a monitoring option for a complex system then a real maintainance
Hi Andy
Since a firmware-update wipes ALL previous settings, I would say, you will have to reset EVERYTHING and it will continue working. If you really want to update your MP2 (Victron recommends not to), you should save all the settings before and play them back after the update. I once had a similar problem and looked it up in the same column like you, just where you expect it: "Inverter" (showing in your video at 4:45). But that was wrong. This is meant for the TOTAL shut down of the MP2.
You can use "Victron connect" and check the column "AC-Input ... something". It is called "AC-Eingangssteuerung", so I don't know what the exact wording in your system is, but it should be "AC-Input-regulation" or similar. There you will find the values which tell the MP2 when to stop inverting and when to start again.
Watching your channel from germany and really like your sense of humor!
All the best!
Yep, I know. I do this after every update. Because I use the MP just as an inverter and have only two generator start/stop assistants setup, it takes me a minute to set it all up again.
The AC-Eingangssteuer is only for AC input for the MP. I use this when my 'generator' starts (a second inverter) and I can adjust this value accordingly. This should have nothing to do with the MP shutting down far above the low voltage disconnect I set in the config.
Hallo Andy, Great channel you have here and very informative especially for a noob like me. I just wanted raise a suggestion for the next time this issue might occur. I have had one of my systems shut down on low voltage on a couple of occasions simply because .. well.. the voltage was low.. Winter time here in the Netherlands and several overcast rainy days in a row so the math wasn't that difficult. On most occasions the system started up again as soon as charging started but with some loads higher than the charging amount starting also the system shut down again as soon as the voltage became too low again. On one occasion the MS didn't restart only until I acknowledged the alarm in the remote console, local. The circled V at the footer of the alarm page. I noticed in your video that you didn't acknowledge and that the alarm was still active before you restarted the MS. At least it appeared that way. Could this have been a similar situation? Your advanced widgets didn't really show auto restarts before it remained off line. Please keep up the good work! Alles gute, Johann
We had notification like that in a porsche for "months" about exploding tires thinking it really needed to get looked at (porsches regularly demand maintenance, like one or twice a year they are towing the good porsche away), but in the end we just needed to acknowledge the message. The message was triggered by driving away on a very hot day. And since then it would pop up occasionally, scaring my wife: "your tires just exploded". Until I took over the "helm" and looked at it, and found a notification menu where exactly the notification was, and just needed to be acked to go away.
I think it is good to require acknowledgement before it restores operation.
The inverter shutting down is a low-stress event on the inverter. Just like any inverter, it is easy for it to simply stop pumping voltage without stressing components. The BMS's shutting down, however, is a high-stress event if maximum amps are running through it. In this case maximum amps were not running through the BMS, but it is something to think about. BMS's tend to blow MOSFETs when they try to shutdown while a lot of power is flowing through them (see explanation at the end of why this can happen).
For the DC paths, similarly, if the BMS would otherwise be pulling in excess of 50% during a shutdown event, it might be better to have a sacrificial low-voltage shutdown that operates before the BMS would otherwise kick-in. Saving the BMS to truly be a last resort.
In prior years not having internet during a power failure really bugged me. To the point where I now have power stations backing up my cable modem, wifi routers, and home server and switches. I use a little GoLabs in the garage for the cable modem since it only pulls 5W (direct DC connection, the GoLabs power stations have a bug where the AC shuts off after 8 hours of unattended operation). And I have two Oukitel P2001's backing up the security system, WIFI routers, home servers, and workstation. The two POE+ wifi routers burn around 20W in total. And one more for the fridge, soon.
However, every power station has its warts... I've almost given up even buying them anymore :-(. The Oukitel is no exception. Its firmware has a bug where the fan does not turn off soon-enough and that causes the AC to drop-out every once in a while. I had to hack the temperature sensor (added another resistor in parallel) to force the trigger temps to be lower to fix it. And the Oukitel... it has a great UPS mode, but the idiots also reversed the HOT and the NEUTRAL lines on the AC output and don't connect the GROUND line through. Sigh. Still, it works for the equipment it is connected to.
--
Physics explanation of why BMS's sometimes blow up their MOSFETs when they shut-down during high loads, but not during low loads. A certain amount of charge must be injected into or pulled out of the gate of a MOSFET to turn it on or off. However, the amount of charge required increases significantly while current is flowing through a turned-on MOSFET. BMS makers often do not provide enough drive current (particularly when driving many MOSFETs from a single MOSFET driver). So when the BMS tries to shutdown while a lot of current is flowing through the MOSFET, it winds up happening very slowly and it actually puts the MOSFETs into their linear region for too long a period of time which causes them to act like a transistor and directly dissipate the difference while turning off. In addition, the gate voltage trigger points for each MOSFET will be significantly different, so during a shutdown not all the MOSFETs will turn off at the same time. This combination can easily blow up one or more MOSFETs.
The solution is to ensure suffiicient gate drive for all the MOSFETs such that they shutdown as quickly as possible. But this is expensive so BMS makers often cost-cut the gate drive. And BOOM.
Hence why relying on the BMS for your first line of defense in a low-voltage shutdown situation is not a good idea just in terms of good practices.
-Matt
But you need to get your batteries to a low state of charge and have a predictable load let's say 25 amp load on the inverter and see how much your voltage sag is at the inverter because it's shut down will be based on its own internal measurement of the voltage so you'll have the losses in your cable that'll be different than what the shunt is reporting so if you have a maximum load the voltage sag will be more and it might shut down early just because there is a maximum load it would be better to shut down at a state of charge
@@Josh-b3c Yes, this makes sense, though with LiFePO4 the voltage won't sag a whole lot under the 1C load unless its already near empty. At that point you'd probably want to shutdown anyway.
The voltage drop over the cable itself with the thick cables Andy is using is probably negligible.
@@junkerzn7312 yeah that's what I meant though was the cable and depending on the length for instance mine is a pretty long cable run at full current I get quite a bit of drop across the cables but at low current there is no drop at all
@@Josh-b3c While I think it is uncommon, the inverter might have a separate voltage sense input that you can run a separate thin (essentially zero current) wire to, allowing the inverter to measure the voltage at the battery. But otherwise a thicker cable is needed if the voltage sense is interfering with the shutdown levels too much.
In a fully integrated system the inverter would be able to access the voltage data directly from the BMS prior to any significant line drops.
@Matt, great description. However if you’re relying on the Victron to shut down with low voltage, to me this reinforces the fact that the Victron should have then restarted as the voltage went up again.
How can you trust your system in your absence otherwise?
Hi Andy, I had a similar experience with a MP2 12/3000. In the VE config I had the "shut down on SOC" ticked, in the inverter section, which would shut the inverter down after a decent load.
Since the inverter does its own calculation of SOC based on usage and battery information, I decided to disable the "battery monitor" in the general section.
Didn't have any issues after those changes.
Hope this helps!
Yep, checked that and it was off. Never had this activated and always had the shutdown voltage really low (below BMS settings).
Exactly what I did and this as cured the multiplus.
@@pathfinder303 Hi PAthfinder, good to hear! just this autumn time, happened to me too.
means when it cured your problem, you are running on MP Version 50x I think?
then would try also later the day..
thanksJoerg
i m sure i changed the parameters to even lower to let it run idle consumption until morning sun hits.. 3 days later saw bms still awake but alarm showed on pc when connected.... i reset 2 times and everything ok.. i played with even more agresive parameters disabled the battery monitoring too.. i dont think it was that... no load for me on that test !!!! tomorow i m going to see if error exists
Too much blue paint in your garrage ! There is no place for chinese devices ? Blue is expensive, but worth ….. the money…?
Andy I have the same problem, did you find the answer?
I had the same problem once. It was a blown fuse but stil in contact to draw a lillte current. After replacing to a new fuse it works again. The active alarm needs to be acknowledged on the three dots in the alarm log on the VRM portal.
From my experience with dangerous machines: Some safety features are designed to enforce human interaction before powering a machine back up. Do you have to discard the alarm manually?
They clear automatically with all other Victron systems once the fault is no longer there...
Hi Andy, I had the exact same problem about a month ago. The firmware used was 498. Unfortunately, to this day I don't know why the Multiplus didn't start converting again....
Thanks as always for the great video!
Hello Andy, I also had a strange experience with the Multiplus that works as an ESS system. After the firmware update to V500, the batteries were no longer charged. The solar chargers could no longer recharge the batteries either. Even though I had the same configuration as before. I have reset the Multiplus to factory settings and
after several attempts to load the remote configuration into the Multiplus (via VRM portal) I still had no success.
When I went on site with the laptop and recreated the ESS configuration and loaded it, the Multiplus worked again as before.
I don't know whether it is due to the remote upload of the configuration file or some other cause, but I got it working by loading the configuration on site.
Maybe someone has had my experience too, I'd like to know.
I wish you and all viewers on this great channel a nice and pleasant end of the year and success in everything you do.
Greatings
Jean-Pierre
im having multiple problems after 500 update have spent 8 hrs with 3 people trying to sort faut after fault til our heads bleed from constantly bashing into the victron 2xmultiplus 2 5000 and 8 pylontech us 3000c batteries serbo gx brickwall problems
our problem is we have not got the fronius gen 24 and mppt 100 13.5 KW PV ,2 x multi II 5000 CERBO GX LYNZ DISTIB AND 8 X US 3000 C BATTERIES ACTUALLY PLAYING NICELY TOGETHER , even once yet
Hi Andy. I had that issue several times. Unfortunately I did not have the luxury of time to carry out a proper troubleshooting. Just jump off straight to turn it off and back up again, that is physically in the workshop. Fixed the issue every time, but defeats the purpose of a reliable system as you have to be there! I put it into the “bug category” for now. Cheers, Raz
PS My inverter is Multiplus II 24V/5000/120
Yes, hello. I actually had such an error today, low voltage battery, this morning, on a fresh, few days old, install as a newby. Together with an JKbms. It collided with changing some settings on the Victron, and playing around in general, last night. But it turned out I just forgot to turn on the Charge and Discharge, in the Control tab, of the JKbms app.
I had reviewed and also resetted my battery settings on the JKbms itself. And had not peeked at the Control tab afterwards I guess.
This is another good reason for me to choose the Quatro series of Victron inverters. Their fans are suppose to be a little quieter too.
@OffGridGarageAustralia Id Love a follow up to this one... I have jst had this happen to my Multiplus II 48/5000 but the difference is it hasn't had a FW update! Im at a loss...
Thanks to you i bought my first Victron. bad luck for me it seems to be faulty piece. The item is a Victron 100/30 Smartsolar. Yesterday I connected the battery to it, correct polarization. The terminal sparked, the lights flashed and went out. It only turns on when I connect voltage to the PV output. As it's my first Victron, I thought I might have done something wrong, but I checked and we really should always connect the battery first. Any golden tips?
Yeah, similiar wondering here also with MPII. Running bit older firmware (can't remember). But yeah, I have sometimes bigger surge of power and battery voltage goes low and alarm comes. Then what is pretty weird... like Andy show in video. When voltage goes back to up, over the "low voltage" treshold values (what has been configured into MPII) ... the alarm stays and sometimes a long time. It just uses grid loooong time, even the battery voltage is back to normal level. I kind of understand some sort of an victron logic here (under heavy spike/loads), that it cannot start to ping / pong with low voltage, turn off battery -> grid -> batt voltage comes back -> grid off -> voltage drops... and repeat this. But what I would like to know from Victron.... * what exact logic is behind clearing out low voltage warning * Why it sometimes takes ages, and sometimes never come back to normal (despite batt voltage and SOC is ok).... Great stuff Andy, hope you/we can get some answers from Victron.
i have the same prob,, i bought mine 3 days ago, i still cant get it up and running,,,, gerrr,, it says it can run on 38 to 66 volts,, my bats are at 49.00 volts,,but the light just keeps blinking,, i get nothing,, i dont want to have to buy a cable if its not gonna work for me
That is why you buy Victron, 'cause it should just work. Will be interesting to see if it a arcane config that you have got "wrong".
The low battery system is designed to avoid damaging the lead batteries and having to check the charges and the state of chargue of the bateries
One thing ive learnt over the years is never update firmware unless absolutely necessary. If it works, dont fix it.
Hi Andy, great video but a question comes to my mind. What happens to the MP when the BMS switches off under full load? Can this destroy the inverter?
My Quattro goes to low batt every day and it just switches to grid instantly, output stays on.
I changed the shutdown voltage then it worked fine
Hi where did you change toe "shutdown voltage" precise? I do have a MP II 3000 with JK BMS running a RASPI and on MPPT. The same behavior as mentioned by Andy...Thnaks for your help
@@jochenkayser4848 through settings on the VictronConnect app on your phone
I wake up every morning with my hot coffee ☕ looking forward to Andy's videos of the day..
Here it is..☕
@@OffGridGarageAustralia Awesome Andy.
I guess your voltage dropped really below some threshold for a millisecond, triggering all this fun, but this was not "recorded" in the graph due to an "averaging" effect before plotting the graph .. That would be very typical for systems that do a measurement let's say every 10 seconds and even average them for plotting afterwards. Very unlikely you hit the lowest point in a sharply falling curve. Don't know how the Victron works here - but I have seen this effect on other systems several times.
It should have restarted if this indeed was the cause once voltage got to restart voltage
yes exactly same problem with updated firmware , the id number changing is interesting ?
Hi Andy - Do you have an ESS (Energy Storage System) Assistant configured ? I was having unexplained VE BUS Low Voltage errors and random disconnects from my SEPLOS Battery, and found that it was related to the Victron ESS Dynamic Cut Off Config defaults. After tuning these values, I'm no longer getting disconnects (nor the VE BUS errors). Note that when Dynamic Cut-Off is used (which is a default), the "DC Input Low Shut-Down" Related parameters in VEConfigure are ignored.
No, I haven't as I'm off-grid. I have the PV-Inverter assistant installed, so can connect AC-coupled solar to my off-grid system.
I've not seen any random disconnects with Seplos. Only the QSO BMS does it randomly.
This bit me the same way. I have a BMV-712 shunt and when I tried to add the louisvdw serial-battery to forward the JKBMS measurements to the GX it triggers the low battery alarm that does not go away. After three alarms I had to restart the MP2s (3-phase) with a power-out of the house 😒(the MP2 being my UPS, yet for this reason useless as an UPS).
Once I got both BMV712 and JKBMS measuring at the same time (over bluetooth or rs485), it is possible to reset the LBV-alarm by changing the "System setup" -> "Battery monitor" away from the BMV712 to the JKBMS and clear the alarm in the VRM.
The bug seems to be in the Victron "serial-starter" handling that tries to reassign the ttyUSB devices and the BMV-712 gets briefly disconnected and forces the MP2 to go in the alarm state (probably thinks the battery dropped out), even if "VE.Bus DC Voltage and Current" log does not show anything but normal voltages.
I'm now trying @Nico's suggestion to disable the MP2 "Alarm setup" to ignore the "VE.Bus error".
The device ID [289] changes often when the RPI GX is booted. I have to reboot it one or more times, to get it back to the original [289] and keep the logs going.
Interesting, thanks for sharing!
Effectivement c'est intriguant ! merci du partage ANDY's.👍
Yes And its a problem when I put my Multi off and do not realized, that 49.9 V is to low and MPPT in the morning and all day gives only 30 - 50 W from 7000 Wp. So it was dark too.
I had same issue this week. I have near 100% charge and the inverter would shut down low voltage alarm. All connections are solid, i do not have anything connected to inerter to monitor at present as this was first test out of the box. It would run all ok on low loading but as soom as I put a heat gun high load on it would shut down. Battery voltage all show OK so not sure what is going on yet. not great for first time with this inverter
Yip have the same problem. BMS shows battery at 80 % and multiplys just shuts down on low battery
What does Victron say?
Do not have Victron myself, but it may be that Low Voltage Disconnect is outside the normal range and it is therefore the limit in the setup that is being reported as the problem.
The logic is not able to think in the equipment, but there are limit values that batteries should be within, same with BMS and inverters. If one sets up a value outside the inverter range - it may be the value itself that is the alarm cause.
Multiplus 2 range is Ingangsspanning: 38 - 66V
Inverters normally have a setting not to reset after a low voltage until alarm is reset or powered off and on to prevent damage of power constantly turning on/off and damaging connected equipment.
When all bms turn off discharging and the solar is supplying voltage direct to inverter the voltage will drop, if not enough sun to match the load. If there was no sun and bms shutdown and restarted the inverter would reconnect the load