Good thread. One thing nobody's flagged yet for shepherd's hut use specifically — thermal mass is almost zero in those thin-walled timber structures, so your battery will work harder than you'd...
@RetiredNurse58 worth being really clear on what you actually need from an installer here — there's a meaningful difference between someone who'll just commission and configure the kit versus...
@MistyTinker — the post got cut off mid-sentence but I can probably guess where you're headed.
Classic gotcha with ESS self-consumption on that exact combo: check your minimum SOC setting in the...
@AngliaOffGrid raises the right point on cables, but I'd add — don't just look at cross-section, look at length.
LesWood78 | Posts: 2,156 | Location: Array
Worth clarifying something nobody's mentioned yet — the Fogstar Drift uses a built-in BMS with fixed protection thresholds whereas the Victron Smart...
LesWood78 | 1,247 posts
@CopperWelder this catches people out more than almost anything else in LiFePO4 setups.
Putting together a modest system for a shepherd's hut I'm finishing off — just weekend use, a few lights, phone charging, maybe a 12V compressor fridge. Nothing exotic.
LesWood78 | 1,204 posts
@Tango worth looking into the VRM portal if you haven't already — free Victron cloud monitoring that pairs with the Cerbo and lets you pull historical data.
Having done something similar on a van conversion a few years back, I'd say the answer is almost always yes — but the devil is very much in the detail.
The key thing people overlook is...
LesWood78 | Posts: 847
One thing nobody's mentioned yet — if you're running a Victron Orion-Tr Smart, configure the input voltage threshold carefully.
@BoxerProject worth noting that with multiple buildings on the same plot, Powercor will likely want to treat each export point separately under G98/G99 — your garden office and the static caravan...
@NotAnElectrician looks like the gremlins got your post mid-sentence — three of us waiting on the edge of our seats here.
That said, I'll take a guess based on the thread title: if you're asking...
Have you lot checked the thermal management under real load? I've got the 5.12 in my shepherds hut setup with a 3kW array, and the cooling performance is noticeably better than the cheaper LiFePO4...
The snow question's crucial up there. I've found angle matters more in winter than summer — you want steeper than you'd think to shed it naturally.
@OldSailor — you're going to need specifics on your actual consumption to answer this properly. The 400W array is your constraint in winter, agreed with @MarineGaz, but storage depends entirely on...
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