Status of Bench Testing of GS inverts.

[The Blind Wolf]

Was wondering how the test are going.  I know Sean posted a teaser vid, and not seen one after it.  Be my luck it'll be this afternoon when he post the next one.I want to see my babies make sweet, sweet home made power lol.

[Sid Genetry Solar]

Last I heard he was working on the bench supply for high load testing...but I didn't leave him enough hardware, so he was off to the hardware store to pick up some carriage bolts.

[The Blind Wolf]

I'm going to go into the coner, and pet my GS and keep saying my preshis. . . Preshisssssss.  slowly turn into the goblin. . .  My Preshissss.  *Evil toothy grin*

[The Blind Wolf]

I got the fog machine ready, the lighting balls setup, the operating table in the power room setup, the heavy duty jumper cable wires with clamps ready, jsut waiting to bring my GS Monster to Live!!!!. . .

[The Blind Wolf]

Well just saw a video from Sean, looks like he had a power supply go up in smokes. . .

[The Blind Wolf]

Okay, Any update?  I figured Sean would have done a load test by Friday.  Did we end up with another smoked power supply?

[Sid Genetry Solar]

@The Blind WolfHandling over 60 phone calls a day plus unexpected challenges take time.  Please, a bit of patience here 😉...Rome wasn't built in a day.

Latest challenge is the cold-rolled steel bars that I used for the main power bus bars on the server PSU power supply thing I made for Sean: let's just say they got hot enough on a load test this morning to cause the plywood frame to start smoking.  Guess I shoulda used aluminum stock...not sure if the specialty metal place has some of that, though.

Wasn't much of a challenge on the other load tests we'd done, as they were mostly at 48v.

[The Blind Wolf]

WOw, so he over heated the bus bars at 24v?  Was he running both GS or one?  even at two GS that would be 600a.  Luckly its not 12v, 😛 or that would really have smoked them.

[The Blind Wolf]

Acutally, come to think about it, luckly this happen before he try doing the 12k at 48v it would pull the same amount of amps as the two gs 24v inverts did.

[The Blind Wolf]

Never mind at 12k at 48v would be 300A, but if he went to do two of them then he would ran into the problem.

[The Blind Wolf]

So any luck on finding a better bus bar to handle the load, good thing it wasn't 3 gs inverts at 24v lol.One Man, one more bug to go.  Wonder if Sean going to find something that can handle all that amprage lol.  If 24v did it the 36v would probley had done the same, and good thing hee didn't do 3 gs inverts

[Sid Genetry Solar]

Seems to have largely been a loose nut--and you know a loose connection is going to generate a lot of heat.  Seems to be doing OK so far.

[Waterman]

38 minutes ago, Sid Genetry Solar said:

Seems to have largely been a loose nut--and you know a loose connection is going to generate a lot of heat.  Seems to be doing OK so far.

There's a joke there somewhere.😉  I think I know whose Inverter it was that caused the problem if it was on 24 Volts. 🙄

As for buss bars, copper tubing filled with wire, hammered flat, filled with solder.

Edited March 29, 2021 by Waterman

[TheButcher]

30 minutes ago, Waterman said:

As for buss bars, copper tubing filled with wire, hammered flat, filled with solder.

I think just buying copper bars would be easier all round. 

[The Blind Wolf]

1 hour ago, Sid Genetry Solar said:

Seems to have largely been a loose nut--and you know a loose connection is going to generate a lot of heat.  Seems to be doing OK so far.

Oh heck yes, I know what a loose nut can do, I had one that was on my 12v in the house and I kept hearing something screaming sort of singing.  Stuipd me was dumb enough to put my finger on the nut where I thought the sound was coming from and well, yes it bite the hell out of me, and it was on the negative side.  I forgot to tighten all the nuts that time, learn my lesson.

[Waterman]

22 minutes ago, TheButcher said:

I think just buying copper bars would be easier all round. 

But costs more if you have lots of wire laying around. 😉 I have some 2" copper pipe, think of what that could handle if copper wire filled as I described. And what a solid copper bar that size would cost.

[The Blind Wolf]

31 minutes ago, TheButcher said:

I think just buying copper bars would be easier all round. 

That what I did for my 24v system I bought stock copper bars, and use a drill press to make my holes, then stainless steel bolts and nuts .  Used two copper bars per bus.  I hope it works, if not then I can order more and make it even thicker.

[Sean Genetry Solar]

So I am uploading a video on this topic. 

 

Testing just a single inverter at 24v with sids setup made them too hot to keep running, so imagine running two inverters side by side.

 

I had to go back to the drawing board and make a setup that was powerful and efficient and the video will explain all. The goal is to have our daisy customer inverters start shipping by the end of thr week.  I have everyone's info and will provide it when they ship.

 

Thank you 🙂

[The Blind Wolf]

Sweet. though, thing is, if you had gone to the 12k side of things and bench test thme as daisy or three phase, as well even if they were at 36v, you would have ran into the same prbolem, and luckly nobody order 12v, and had you done a dasiy with that lol.

[Sid Genetry Solar]

4 minutes ago, The Blind Wolf said:

Sweet. though, thing is, if you had gone to the 12k side of things and bench test thme as daisy or three phase, as well even if they were at 36v, you would have ran into the same prbolem, and luckly nobody order 12v, and had you done a dasiy with that lol.

Most all of our testing has been at 48v, and it's super easy to connect the inverter(s) to a 48v battery and away we go.  But for customers wanting 24v or 36v...we need to properly test them in that configuration--and that's when the overheating problem was discovered.

[The Blind Wolf]

Yes, but, if Sean was doing more then one order, and use the bench at the same time, it probley would have happen even at 48v.

[The Blind Wolf]

Oh where, oh Where is that videio?  I ain't seen it yet lol.

[Sid Genetry Solar]

10 hours ago, The Blind Wolf said:

Oh where, oh Where is that videio?  I ain't seen it yet lol.

Not released yet 😉

[AquaticsLive]

Reading this thread in case someone else stumbles on it and needs a suggestion on some bus bars.  I am using 1/2" x 2" aluminum bar stock from Online Metals works great increased battery bank efficiency no warm cables signaling large amounts of lost power.   Good old Ohm's Law for the win for the efficiency gains on big buss bars.  P (watts) = I² (amps) x R (Ω)

Don't think Sean is worried about power loss for that power supply.  For large battery banks its a fun math experiment for even small differences in cable length.

 

[The Blind Wolf]

Just saw my GS invert being load tested on you tube.  Looking good, at 1500w only useing 74 amps I think he said, that isn't bad, thats about 25a to every 500w.  and I stay under 600w most of the day.  So my 60a and 40a solar chargers might have a chance on recharging my bank.  Will still have to top it off maybe once or twice a week untill I get enough panels up to make up the diff of lost during the night.

 

88% isn't bad.  He mention something about some kind of update, must be some numbers off, cause he said the inverter saying 1300w and his thing is showing 1500w.

 

Frankly having two inverts is going to be over kill for me during the summer time, unless I really push it.  Looking at putting my current water heater on a timer, though will look at the data and see how much it runs during the day, might be best to just leave it, and save up for a heat pump model, I just blown the money for that yesturday for those 250a battery bank. couldn't pass that deal up.