Off The Grid

…aaaaand best poundcake recipe I’ve ever found… https://divascancook.com/pound-cake-recipe/

I think we've got a good surprise for homeschoolers tomorrow on the off grid kids channel. Have a look at 7am Eastern time. t.me/OffTheGridKid

Pretty good video about the military 80xA diesel generators. I have the 5kw version, a neighbor has the 10kw version that this guy has. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6ChQhIzUXr4

3 "big boy" systems.... one making almost 25kw.... mine making 22kw and the new guy making 13.2kw. I can almost hear him with a falsetto baby voice saying "hey guys wait for meeeee.... I'mma solar system too". Also note that two of these systems have EVs. Making 25kw, charging car at 8kw, running house at 2.8kw and still has 13kw for batteries.

Power bill is killing me.

When you initially connect an inverter to a battery system, or you connect a battery to an inverter system, you need to pre-charge the capacitors in the inverters. I recommend using a 50ohm 10w resistor on a 48v system. Install alligator clamps on the resistor with a short length of wire. In my system I always have a 125amp breaker on my batteries. What I do is turn off all breakers on my batteries. I then jump around one breaker with a resistor and watch for the inverter to light up. Might take 10-30 seconds. Once you see signs of life in the inverter, you can turn on the battery circuit breaker and then all the other battery circuit breakers as well. If you don't do this you will most certainly damage your breakers or even the BMS. I can tell you that trying to cold start a victron inverter by simply turning on the battery breaker will cause so much inrush current that the BMS will shut down with a "short circuit protection" error. "Precharge resistor"

So if your BMS has charge current limiting like JK BMS, then you can add a new battery to your system if its voltage or SoC is LOWER than the rest of the batteries. If your BMS does not have charge current limiting you'll have to charge the new battery to 55.2v and wait for the others to get close before letting it join the "herd". Never connect a battery that has more than a 0.3v difference to another battery. Current can easily go over 400amps. If your batteries are over 55.2v then you can connect a new battery to the "herd" with a 0.5v difference. The reason is that when you get over 55.2v-57v, there simply isn't much extra energy in the batteries and they level out with each other pretty quickly... usually within 20-25 seconds.

A serious conversation about a BMS safety feature. Many batteries you can buy that are assembled contain a BMS that is not JK BMS. Caution here... as far as I know JK is the only one with charge current limiting. That coil in the upper right can be switched on to limit the battery to 10amps charging. Imagine one of your batteries is charging and a cell gets out of balance. The BMS will stop charging while it balances the cell. Then it will reconnect to the other batteries to continue charging. If the other batterie have increased in voltage then that mismatch can cause hundreds of amps to rush into that one battery. If that happens the JK will flip on the 10 amp limiter until all batteries reach the same voltage. IT is important!!

How to open a bag with string ties.

In case any of you need to know this... most generators in the US use a NEMA L14-30 plug. These are the ones with the locking tang facing IN. The 20amp version has the tang facing outward. L stands for locking since they twist and lock. The connector with the tang is ground, the one opposite it is neutral. And the other two are 120v/120v. A good place to emergency connect them is on the HVAC outside disconnect. But make sure you turn off the main breaker first. You really shouldn't do this but.... desperate times.... Make sure you connect neutral and ground toegther if you do this... you must feed neutral and two hots into that disconnect.

This is a peak record for me.... The sun suddenly burst through the clouds and I briefly put 17.6kw (327amps) into my batteries. I try not to run more than 250amps, so my system curtailed the power.