Install stand-alone charge controllers. That is the only way to get
redundancy.

Eric Smiley (he/him) - Design Manager

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 e...@vecoop.ca
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On Thu, 10 Oct 2024 at 14:59, Lou Russo via RE-wrenches <
re-wrenches@lists.re-wrenches.org> wrote:

> Aloha All,
>
> Thank you Jason. This is a huge and surprising issue. So much so that I
> dropped what I was doing and called Sol-Ark to confirm. Mind you this was
> level 1 support, but I was told this is what the Sol-Arks are supposed to
> do and it is a feature not a bug. Their take is if there is any fault on
> any one string, the Sol-Ark assumes the worst and shuts everything down.
>
> I wonder what solutions could be implemented on future installs to prevent
> this from happening?
>
> Aloha,
>
> Lou Russo
> Owner
> l...@spreesolarsystems.com
> Office - 808 345 6762
> Spree Solar Systems LLC
> CT-34322
>
>
>
> On Thu, Oct 10, 2024 at 11:45 AM Jason Szumlanski via RE-wrenches <
> re-wrenches@lists.re-wrenches.org> wrote:
>
>> I think it's more likely water in a J-box or possibly physical damage,
>> but someone passed by the property and did not observe any physical damage
>> to the array.
>>
>> Jason Szumlanski
>> Principal Solar Designer | Florida Solar Design Group
>> NABCEP Certified Solar Professional (PVIP)
>> Florida State Certified Solar Contractor CVC56956
>> Florida Certified Electrical Contractor EC13013208
>>
>>
>> On Thu, Oct 10, 2024 at 5:41 PM Jay <jay.pe...@gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>>> Jason
>>> What’s the possibllity it was a lighting strike?
>>>
>>> Jay
>>>
>>> On Oct 10, 2024, at 2:57 PM, Jason Szumlanski via RE-wrenches <
>>> re-wrenches@lists.re-wrenches.org> wrote:
>>>
>>> 
>>> We have been talking a lot recently about all-in-ones. I just had a
>>> massive fail during Hurricane Milton with a quad Sol-Ark 15K off-grid
>>> system that deserves some discussion about whether AIO is a good idea if it
>>> can't build in some resilience to errors. I'm not sure if the new Midnite
>>> unit is better in this respect, but this is what happened to the Sol-Ark
>>> system...
>>>
>>> Four inverters, each with 4 strings of PV paralleled to 2 MPPT per
>>> inverter. One of the slave units developed some sort of PV DC fault during
>>> the storm. This caused the slave inverter to shut down and throw an error,
>>> which in turn caused a parallel fault across all four inverters. Power
>>> output ceases at that point. Apparently the system keeps resetting because
>>> I have a cell modem that uploads data to Sol-Ark, but that cell modem is
>>> powered by the inverter outputs, so it must be getting power at least
>>> intermittently. The rest of the loads are basically flatlined according to
>>> the Sol-Ark data. It's mostly air conditioners, so they probably can't turn
>>> on fast enough before the PV fault causes another shutdown.
>>>
>>> So, in essence, one of 16 strings of PV develops a fault, and that
>>> causes all four inverters to malfunction? What is the point of redundancy
>>> if a fault of one results in a fault of all?! If there is a true PV input
>>> fault, shouldn't that just shut down that MPPT, or perhaps all of the PV DC
>>> input to that inverter? And why can't this inverter continue to invert
>>> power from the batteries and charge from a generator when there is a DC
>>> input fault that could be programmatically isolated and ignored?
>>>
>>> This is a bad design in my opinion, and something I hadn't considered.
>>> If the faulted inverter can't function with a DC input fault, it should
>>> just take itself out of the game. (This is 120/240 split phase, BTW). Is
>>> this how all AIO inverters work? One inverter fault on the DC side kills
>>> all paralleled units' AC output? Not good.
>>>
>>> This is a completely off-grid system on a remote island with no vehicle
>>> access, so it's not exactly easy to do a "truck roll" on this one,
>>> especially post-hurricane. To make matters worse, the generator was running
>>> at the time of the fault, as it was being signaled to run because the
>>> battery had reached the assigned charge voltage. The fault also killed the
>>> 2-wire start signal from the master, so the system also stopped passing
>>> through generator power to the loads. The house is dark.
>>>
>>>
>>> Jason Szumlanski
>>> Florida Solar Design Group
>>>
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