Awesome Off Grid Solar Power Then Catastrophic Failure
Posted: Tue Feb 17, 2015 12:53 pm
Hi troy im not new to your channel but this is my first ever comment to one of your video's. Love the video's and always have.
I know a thing or 3 about solar and as such i want to share some of the things regarding your setup.
#1 Battery temp is everything, 14F is way to low to get out or put in any reasonable amount of power, they ideally want to be around 70-80F.
#2 Battery setup in the Morningstar controller, i personally run at #6 Flooded cell, but it all pails in comparison to point #1 battery temp is most important.
#3 The alarm functions within the Morningstar controller activate when you get to the near the limits of its design,
Array voltage nearing max.
Battery under voltage.
Heat sink temp, I believe this may have been your problem as i have had the same problem, to get full power out of the controller the heat sink on the unit has to stay below 80c, after which it quickly ramps the current output down till its switches off the output at 90c.
If you have a point and shoot temp gauge i would check the temp of the heat sink under huge solar output with the ambient temp at its highest to see if its getting close to the limits.
If it turns out that it is the cause, i would buy a quality DELTA 120mm or 140mm 12v pc fan and attach it to the heat sink in a similar way to how a CPU cooling fan sits on its heat sink, via a switch or speed controller so you don't have to listen to a loud whine continually.
Hope some of this helps, if i was you i would certainly consider moving up to a 24v battery system.
I know a thing or 3 about solar and as such i want to share some of the things regarding your setup.
#1 Battery temp is everything, 14F is way to low to get out or put in any reasonable amount of power, they ideally want to be around 70-80F.
#2 Battery setup in the Morningstar controller, i personally run at #6 Flooded cell, but it all pails in comparison to point #1 battery temp is most important.
#3 The alarm functions within the Morningstar controller activate when you get to the near the limits of its design,
Array voltage nearing max.
Battery under voltage.
Heat sink temp, I believe this may have been your problem as i have had the same problem, to get full power out of the controller the heat sink on the unit has to stay below 80c, after which it quickly ramps the current output down till its switches off the output at 90c.
If you have a point and shoot temp gauge i would check the temp of the heat sink under huge solar output with the ambient temp at its highest to see if its getting close to the limits.
If it turns out that it is the cause, i would buy a quality DELTA 120mm or 140mm 12v pc fan and attach it to the heat sink in a similar way to how a CPU cooling fan sits on its heat sink, via a switch or speed controller so you don't have to listen to a loud whine continually.
Hope some of this helps, if i was you i would certainly consider moving up to a 24v battery system.