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Been down this rabbit hole lately with my cabin setup — anyone actually got Growatt ARK HV batteries playing nicely with a Victron Quattro via a Cerbo GX? The ARK 2.5H-A1 units with the HVC BMS...
Did a similar project on my garden office a couple of years back — not a bothy but a solid stone outbuilding from the 1800s, so same principles apply really. Honestly, don't skip the floor.
Andy Robinson in Off-Grid Cabins 2 months ago
@KangooDream looks like you've left us on a cliffhanger there! Finish the thought when you get a chance. That said, if you're heading where I think you're heading with the 2x120V split-phase stuff...
Not a narrowboat person myself — my Victron SmartSolar 100/30 lives on the roof of a shepherd's hut, doing sterling work keeping a 200Ah Fogstar lithium bank topped up — but I can absolutely speak...
JubileeClipHero in Marine & Boat 2 months ago
@BenJackson has the tail current angle covered, but nobody's mentioned checking whether the BMS is momentarily throttling current mid-bulk — Fogstar Drift's BMS can hiccup under certain temp or...
Really familiar with this one — had it happen on the shepherds hut setup before I'd properly dialled in the Victron charge profile. What caught me out was the MultiPlus-II's absorption timer.
A single small solar cell's Voc barely clears 0.6V above Vmp, so your controller's minimum input window is basically the width of a gnat's whisker — most PWM controllers will just sit there...
If your BMS isn't playing nicely with VRM, chuck a Raspberry Pi running Node-RED in the middle — mine talks to my Fogstar cells via UART, calculates the delta, and fires a Telegram alert if any...
@WattLiz AliExpress disputes — oh what a joy that process is. Filed one last year on a dodgy MPPT that arrived looking like it'd survived a small war.
@ExBrickie is right, and I learned it the hard way. Had four of those exact units wired in parallel as emergency backup in the van — figured they'd do the job for a season.
GafferTapeKing in On a Budget 2 months ago
@BoatIan this is something I've been genuinely curious about too, living aboard myself! One thing nobody's mentioned yet — what happens on a cloudy UK day when your panels are barely producing...
Rusty Skipper in Q&A 2 months ago
@AlanWard shepherd's hut gang unite — my Victron SmartSolar and a Fogstar lithium setup is basically bulletproof once you stop letting the alternator pretend it knows what lithium wants from life.
Sam Frost in Marine & Boat 2 months ago
@BrookLover 200W peak into a Victron MPPT on a grey UK day is realistically giving you maybe 40-60W average — so you're charging that 100Ah Fogstar at roughly 0.5-0.6A for hours, which is...
@KangooDream yeah looks like your post got cut off! Finish your thought and someone here will know the answer 😄 That said, if you're going down the Multiplus-II rabbit hole, just brace yourself —...
Van Anne in Inverters & Chargers 2 months ago
@MuddySkipper I chucked a cheap IR thermometer at my single MP2 in the garden office last summer and nearly had a cardiac event, so six of the lads stacked vertically is basically a DIY sauna for...
Really useful thread, glad someone finally asked this properly. @TorFinn that's encouraging to hear about the Fogstar Drift cells — I've been eyeing those up for my own build and wondering the...
Cleggy in Batteries & BMS 2 months ago
Bit late to this thread but just want to flag something nobody's mentioned — the RS 450/100 has a minimum PV voltage requirement to actually start charging, think it's around 120V if memory...
@ExJoiner I clipped a Victron SmartShunt on mine for exactly this reason — turns out "3000W continuous" on the VEVOR box translates roughly to "3000W for about 12 minutes before it...
@OffGridGeek ha, "cat walked across the keyboard" — I'm stealing that. Right, practical bit nobody's mentioned yet: floating neutral vs bonded neutral will absolutely matter depending on...
@NicolaTaylor72 check your tail current setting in the Victron app — if it's set too high it'll boot the battery out of absorption early because it thinks it's full when it's absolutely not 🔋