Growatt SHP5000 inverter - settings for partial ac battery charging

[wytco0]

I know there are a few other Growatt inverter users here and some also have SPH hybrids like me. My inverter is a SPH5000.

My inverter has been connected for many months but until recently I didn't have any PV so I had it set to charge the batteries from ac during the Octopus cheap rate period.

Now I have PV and with the longer days I want to set the inverter so that the battery is mainly charged from solar. However I also want to ensure that if the batteries get fully discharged (SOC 10%) that the inverter will charge them up to say 50%. I thought I could do this by setting the 'ac charge' to 'on' and the 'Charge Stop SOC' to '50' however I made this changes yesterday and my batteries still charged up to 100%.

Does anyone else know how to do this.

 

[johnb2713]

I know there are a few other Growatt inverter users here and some also have SPH hybrids like me. My inverter is a SPH5000.

My inverter has been connected for many months but until recently I didn't have any PV so I had it set to charge the batteries from ac during the Octopus cheap rate period.

Now I have PV and with the longer days I want to set the inverter so that the battery is mainly charged from solar. However I also want to ensure that if the batteries get fully discharged (SOC 10%) that the inverter will charge them up to say 50%. I thought I could do this by setting the 'ac charge' to 'on' and the 'Charge Stop SOC' to '50' however I made this changes yesterday and my batteries still charged up to 100%.

Does anyone else know how to do this.

In a word NO.

It looks like it should work in theory but didnt work for me. What I did was during the summer I restricted the off peak charge time to achieve in a different way the same result. The charger runs at 3kW so 1 hour charge would around 50% of the 6 kWh battery assuming you start with a low SOC.

 

[wytco0]

In a word NO.

It looks like it should work in theory but didnt work for me. What I did was during the summer I restricted the off peak charge time to achieve in a different way the same result. The charger runs at 3kW so 1 hour charge would around 50% of the 6 kWh battery assuming you start with a low SOC.

Thanks John, in that case I will probably do the same as you. Its not ideal because the ac inverter charge could still charge it to 100% from the grid, I would prefer to leave some capacity in case I have excesss PV production early in the day, at the moment I have to export and excess which I dont like doing ;-)

 

[johnb2713]

Thanks John, in that case I will probably do the same as you. Its not ideal because the ac inverter charge could still charge it to 100% from the grid, I would prefer to leave some capacity in case I have excesss PV production early in the day, at the moment I have to export and excess which I dont like doing ;-)

You could consider a work around using Home Assistant. You can control the charging via HA and it can see the SOC you could achieve your 50% that way. I'm also looking at HA taking in the weather forecast and adjusting the overnight charge on both Growatt and Victron inverters, I havent got very far yet, still a work in progress.

 

[Tomr182]

That would be amazing John

I’ve done similar in throttling the charge % using the time window for AC charge.

I think I’ve struck a happy medium for now but would be great if HA could change it based on weather.

 

[johnb2713]

That would be amazing John

I’ve done similar in throttling the charge % using the time window for AC charge.

I think I’ve struck a happy medium for now but would be great if HA could change it based on weather.

I'll keep you updated, if I get it sorted I'm happy to share the programming with you.

 

[Figrol]

In a word NO.

It looks like it should work in theory but didnt work for me. What I did was during the summer I restricted the off peak charge time to achieve in a different way the same result. The charger runs at 3kW so 1 hour charge would around 50% of the 6 kWh battery assuming you start with a low SOC.

I also wanted to charge my batteries from cheap overnight electricity and followed John's advice from many weeks ago on setting this up. It worked and I've selectively charged my batteries overnight to 90%, 70% and 50% depending on what I thought the weather the next day would be. So in my case, the overnight charge charges the batteries to 90%. They stay at 90% until 04.30, when my Octopus Go day rate kicks in. I can see that once the 6.6 kwh batteries reach the set SOC overnight at about 02.30, my overnight house load is fed by the grid until 04.30. At this point, the battery SOC starts to drop as they feed my house until the sun is up and then depending on the cloud cover, etc. the load is fed by a mixture of battery and grid power. My panels are west facing, so that on a sunny day by late morning/early afternoon there is enough PV power to feed the house and start to recharge the batteries, but now the batteries will go to 100% SOC. the only difference between my set up and John's is that my 'Power Harvester' is set to 'WiredCT' and John's was to 'Meter'. However, I can't see how this would affect the battery charging limit points.

 

[wytco0]

Well my second attempt to handle partial charging was a major fail. Last night I set ac charge but limited it to 0001-0130, what I completely forgot was that it would then start using the batteries at 0130 so I ended up draining the batteries during my cheap rate period and so I now have empty batteries and it looks as though there will only be minimal solar today ;-)

I am surprised that the growatt cant handle this sort of configuration better I am sure more people are looking for this sort of thing now that home batteries are more common.

For now i will go back to ac charge set for the whole octopus cheap rate.

 

[wytco0]

That would be amazing John

I’ve done similar in throttling the charge % using the time window for AC charge.

I think I’ve struck a happy medium for now but would be great if HA could change it based on weather.

Tom would you mind sharing how you have done this maybe posting your inverter charge settings, I tried playing with the charge% but it does not seem to work.

 

[wytco0]

So in my case, the overnight charge charges the batteries to 90%. They stay at 90% until 04.30, when my Octopus Go day rate kicks in. I can see that once the 6.6 kwh batteries reach the set SOC overnight at about 02.30, my overnight house load is fed by the grid until 04.30. At this point, the battery SOC starts to drop as they feed my house until the sun is up and then depending on the cloud cover, etc. the load is fed by a mixture of battery and grid power.

Hi can you let me know how you have set your inverter to do this, I tried to do something similar but as soon as the charge period ended my batteries started to discharge, how did you set you so that they did not discharge until your cheap rate period had ended?

 

[johnb2713]

Well my second attempt to handle partial charging was a major fail. Last night I set ac charge but limited it to 0001-0130, what I completely forgot was that it would then start using the batteries at 0130 so I ended up draining the batteries during my cheap rate period and so I now have empty batteries and it looks as though there will only be minimal solar today ;-)

I am surprised that the growatt cant handle this sort of configuration better I am sure more people are looking for this sort of thing now that home batteries are more common.

For now i will go back to ac charge set for the whole octopus cheap rate.

Well the good news is that I've just updated the firmware on my inverter to latest version and both % charge and %charge current now work, I've just tried it. Update the firmware and away you go

 

[Figrol]

Hi can you let me know how you have set your inverter to do this, I tried to do something similar but as soon as the charge period ended my batteries started to discharge, how did you set you so that they did not discharge until your cheap rate period had ended?

Below is my SPH5000 set up from the Shinephone internet version, not the phone app. The only thing I have changed from how it was set up by my installer is the 'Battery First' section. Let me know if need to know how to access these settings in the internet version and send you instructions (that I think I originally got from John).

 

[wytco0]

Well the good news is that I've just updated the firmware on my inverter to latest version and both % charge and %charge current now work, I've just tried it. Update the firmware and away you go

That is excellent news, how did you get and install the firmware update, I am IT literate so happy to do this myself but there doesn't seem to be much info around about upgrading firmware on growatts.

 

[wytco0]

Below is my SPH5000 set up from the Shinephone internet version, not the phone app. The only thing I have changed from how it was set up by my installer is the 'Battery First' section. Let me know if need to know how to access these settings in the internet version and send you instructions (that I think I originally got from John).

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That is exactly how I did it on mine, but the 90% thing didn't work, I assume your cheap rate is 0030-0430. My inverter seems to ignore the max charge soc and just charges to 100%. John has just posted something about newer firmware which hopefully will also help me.

 

[shaunuk]

Battery first setting, ac on and 50% works for me. I’ve not done a firmware update, but it was a mid 2022 inverter so potentially just lucky, It’s a bit of a balance as we move into the lighter days bringing it down from 100% over night to 75 and now 50, hopefully switch it off all together come May.

 

[wytco0]

Battery first setting, ac on and 50% works for me. I’ve not done a firmware update, but it was a mid 2022 inverter so potentially just lucky, It’s a bit of a balance as we move into the lighter days bringing it down from 100% over night to 75 and now 50, hopefully switch it off all together come May.

Interesting, my unit is late 2021, yesterday I emailed the supplier and asked about a firmware upgrade, he hasn't replied yet but he has access to my inverter. However last night I tried again and it changed it to 70%, when I did this before it did not work , the only thing I did that was differently was an 'advanced set' and 'read' of the 'battery first' settings, as far as I am aware this should not matter.

So I can think of 3 possible reasons:
1) User error possible but the settings seemed fine
2) Supplier did something, unlikely he is not normally that quick and he hasn't replied.
3) The Advanced Set/Read process made a difference, I don't think this is very likely either

Whatever the reason it seems to be working as I want at the moment.

 

[Tomr182]

Tom would you mind sharing how you have done this maybe posting your inverter charge settings, I tried playing with the charge% but it does not seem to work.

Apologies. I’ve been away. The subsequent messages may have superseded this.
But on basis it charges at max 3kwh a 2 hour time slot will see it full. So I just throttle by having say a 1hr20min time a lot to get it upto about 70% as it doesn’t go lower than 9/10% on discharge. Then it allows me to run on cheap night time energy but still some space for when the sun comes up to capture the self generation as opposed to exporting straight away

 

[wytco0]

Apologies. I’ve been away. The subsequent messages may have superseded this.
But on basis it charges at max 3kwh a 2 hour time slot will see it full. So I just throttle by having say a 1hr20min time a lot to get it upto about 70% as it doesn’t go lower than 9/10% on discharge. Then it allows me to run on cheap night time energy but still some space for when the sun comes up to capture the self generation as opposed to exporting straight away

Thanks Tom as you say things moved on a little, incidentally I also tried limiting my charging to a shorter period and while this did stop the battery getting fully charged, as soon as the charge ended the inverter started to use the battery to power the house even though I was still in the cheap period. How do you ensure yours doesn't use the battery before the end of your cheap rate?

 

[Tomr182]

I set the window for the back end of the cheap period so it starts using battery as soon as the price goes up. Ie I charge 2-4pm as I’m keen to have 100% and if sun hasn’t already filled it, cheap grid power will. Then runs off battery when it rockets between 4-7pm. And just avoid having multiple things on as anything pulling in total over 3kwh will then draw from grid as inverter capped to 3kwh in/out

 

[wytco0]

I set the window for the back end of the cheap period so it starts using battery as soon as the price goes up. Ie I charge 2-4pm as I’m keen to have 100% and if sun hasn’t already filled it, cheap grid power will. Then runs off battery when it rockets between 4-7pm. And just avoid having multiple things on as anything pulling in total over 3kwh will then draw from grid as inverter capped to 3kwh in/out

Of course, I should have thought of that, instead of doing it at the start, thanks Tom.