Nalced
Free Member
- Mar 28, 2023
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- Funster No
- 94,866
- MH
- just-looking
Hi All,
wondering if anyone has some advice with inverters and rcd's.
I'm doing a van build soon and while a few places are having spring sales I've picked up a renogy 2000w inverter , setup a test bench with a consumer unit and tested the RCD functionality as I have done quite a bit of research regarding earth bonding and I wanted to test if the Renogy 2000w inverter has a floating earth. it does.
My plan is to connect the inverter to all mains sockets in the van, through a consumer unit with rcd, and then utilise the UPS functionality when EHU which will take over the earth neutral bond. When on battery the RCD does not trip ,as expected, because there is no earth. If I bond neutral and earth at the consumer unit everything works as expected. However i believe this setup will not work when EHU because I will have 2 bonds and potentially cause a bad accident .... from what I understand.
My question is what steps do others take to prevent this ? do you buy an inverter with rcd compatibility such as https://www.sunshinesolar.co.uk/Item/VP2500 or the very expensive victron? do you setup some sort of relay to disconnect the earth neutral bond when EHU ? if so does anyone have an example of how this would be achieved? or does it not matter when "off-grid"? 99% of the inverters out there are central tapped and there are lots of articles/videos out there of people just installing them in the van and off they go. am I thinking into this too much? do i need the RCD working when "off-grid" as the inverters built in protection is good enough or will the fact I'm not connecting one device but many sockets require a functional rcd as the inverter in-build protection will not work correctly with multiple devices?
help!
wondering if anyone has some advice with inverters and rcd's.
I'm doing a van build soon and while a few places are having spring sales I've picked up a renogy 2000w inverter , setup a test bench with a consumer unit and tested the RCD functionality as I have done quite a bit of research regarding earth bonding and I wanted to test if the Renogy 2000w inverter has a floating earth. it does.
My plan is to connect the inverter to all mains sockets in the van, through a consumer unit with rcd, and then utilise the UPS functionality when EHU which will take over the earth neutral bond. When on battery the RCD does not trip ,as expected, because there is no earth. If I bond neutral and earth at the consumer unit everything works as expected. However i believe this setup will not work when EHU because I will have 2 bonds and potentially cause a bad accident .... from what I understand.
My question is what steps do others take to prevent this ? do you buy an inverter with rcd compatibility such as https://www.sunshinesolar.co.uk/Item/VP2500 or the very expensive victron? do you setup some sort of relay to disconnect the earth neutral bond when EHU ? if so does anyone have an example of how this would be achieved? or does it not matter when "off-grid"? 99% of the inverters out there are central tapped and there are lots of articles/videos out there of people just installing them in the van and off they go. am I thinking into this too much? do i need the RCD working when "off-grid" as the inverters built in protection is good enough or will the fact I'm not connecting one device but many sockets require a functional rcd as the inverter in-build protection will not work correctly with multiple devices?
help!