You guys are great!! Seriously
Okay here we are a couple of weeks later and FINALLY we have some results and I have some answers
The outback equipment is fine, the inverters are working well, charge controllers are good, and all wiring has been thoroughly checked.
------------------------> FOUND a dead short inside the wall <--------------------------------------
MICE
Yes that is right Mice had chewed up the insulation on one of the 240V inputs from the generator(s)
It was shorting against the metal box it was mounted in
There was ONE place inside the wall where the wire was NOT inside conduit
We took the entire wall apart to expose all of the wiring.
After living here for 3 years+ I now finally understand the system I have, the wiring, where it goes and why.
My neighbor (we have two neighbors back here full time/year around), well my neighbor and best friend his dad just happens to live off grid, has a similar outback system and he was an electrician for 40+ years. So he came down yesterday and went over the system and settings with me. SO many questions I had were answered it is like a huge weight has been lifted.
I am responsible for the power here, there are 6 of us who live on this homestead and they are all depending on me to sort this out.
I think we have a good grip on it now!
Many of the settings in the outback system were slightly off, some of the charging voltages mostly for the inverters, some of the settings in the PV charge controllers also
So some bonehead made a few mistakes here over the years, the majority of this system was built in 2005
Big mistake: not putting one wire run in conduit
Second mistake: a 30 amp toggle switch to swap between main generator and backup generator, this switch was 18" upstream of our dead short. This should be a true transfer switch (blade style)
The rest of it is just newbie setup errors, me messing with the settings, trying to get it setup for the Lithium battery upgrade, trying to understand how it all works together.
We have two stacked inverters, they are 48V battery chargers, and 3600W inverters. Each one is 120V and is fed by one leg of the 240V output from the genset. There is a isolation transformer inside the outback AC distribution box that balances the loads on the house side of things (Outback 240x)
We have two MX60 charge controllers, one for each solar array.
Our solar panels are BP 190W and they are from 2005, one or two panels maybe getting weak/dead, I am still working on that.
Anyways with the dead short on the AC IN side of things fixed and the inverters charge settings now set properly...we are back up and running! Yesterday I was able to get a full charge on the batteries.
The bad news:
1) I only have 200 amp hours, the way our Battle Born batteries are setup, 2 banks of 48V (8 total bats) we only have 200 amp hours. We need more batteries (I knew we needed more batteries, but I also thought I had 800 amp hours = whoops!)
2) Kohler 14,000 KW LPG genset is toast, the V twin engine for sure has a big internal issue. I suspect bad exhaust valves, will tear into that later
3) One or two dead solar panels
4) Mice had build a high rise apartment complex inside the wall next to the power system
5) Right now we are reliant on the sun and a Generac 15000 portable gasoline genset to recharge the batteries. (5-10 gallons of gasoline to fully charge the battery bank when there is no/little sun) remember one of our PV arrays is weak and not charging very much.
6) The outback inverters we have are obsolete, they are not compatible with the newer Outback inverters, so if one goes bad it will require repair or I will have to replace both of them.
The good news:
1) I do not need to buy another Outback inverter(s) ($1700+ each)
2) We have power!!
Today I plan to pull my truck around (with the 804B in the bed) and plug the diesel genset into the house, using just 208V and see how it does!!
Just for testing. I do NOT want to keep buying gasoline for the Generac
In the market for:
1) 3 phase to split phase transformer (to make 804b happy and work with our system) This will step down the 3 phase output from the genset and feed the 240V outback inverters.
2) 8 more battle born batteries
3) New solar panels, 16ea, 350 watts or so.......still designing this/wiring, etc
Since the 804b cannot easily be converted to single phase, the way I see it I have 3 options:
1) sell the 804b and get an 803. I like this idea, getting the correct generator for our system would be a smart way to go. However getting the 804B out of here would require me to sell it, move it (our road is now in spring thaw, no way am I driving a big truck back here for another month or so = mud) I would have to find a buyer and then buy the correct unit and get it here, this could take months where we live
2) Upgrade the house to 3 phase power. We do not have any equipment right now that runs on 3 phase, we really do not need 3 phase. I would have to scrap my two current inverters and buy 3 new ones ($1700+ each), pull new wire, etc etc. This is also a good option, but it is just not in the cards right now. I need that $$$ for solar panels and batteries
3) Use a step down transformer (I think its called a step down when you use it this way) to convert from the 3 phase generator output to the 240V single phase system we have. Apparently I can get a transformer like this for about $8-900? Still working on this too
Option 3 seems the most viable for us now.
Here are the pics, thanks for sticking with me this long, as I said you guys are AWESOME, I seriously cannot thank you enough!!!!
Found dead short, this is the plug on the side of the house where the backup genset plugs into the 240V AC IN
Mice!! This was shorting out on the metal box it was mounted in
evidence of mouse house
mouse high rise
The system exposed, mouse house cleaned up, toggle switch bypassed, no more red light events, no more errors, filters/fans cleaned and we are up and running!! Now the cats have direct access to any mice that come in. Also found the hole where the mice were coming in, will fix it ASAP.
I am off to "the depot" to get more gasoline and some 240V wire so I can build a temporary cable, pull the 804b around and test it out!!
After testing we will be building a CMU pad to hold the 804b, it must be elevated 24" off the ground since we are in a flood plane.
Plan is to build a small pad/shed to keep the 804b in, the backup genset, and the new step down transformer
If anyone has any advice about what transformer I need, please help!! I have been researching this and when I found one online that seemed to suit my needs it was $32,000!!!!!!!!!!
WOOOOO HOOOOO!!!! more later
