Turn off inverter while at home

[clonkel]

@all thank you.

Without the search/standby options and based on the answers I will be turning it off when not in use which is easy via Bluetooth on the app. I believe I will lose the trickle charge on the vehicle battery but I drive it once a week so that is not an issue.

It seems then that the only draw will be the negligible amount to keep the Bluetooth active for the multiplus.

Thank you again

 

[clonkel]

Just to call back with the results of inverter off vs inverter on.

With the inverter on it was losing around 7% to 8% in a 24hr period. Nothing else was drawing anything from the battery.
With the invertor on it has increased by 1% over a 24hr period. The weather has been pretty static during this period with mostly cloud cover. The 260W solar is giving me a small amount to override the small amout out from the bluetooth on the Inverter. The vehicle batter won't get a trickle charge but we go for a run out once a week and go away every two or so weeks so that side is not an issue.

As a further note for any others viewing this.

I switched off the Inverter and lost the bluetooth connection to the battery on the Fogstar app. My phone is android and not having experience I considered that it happed because the inverter was off. When I switched the inverter on the app still did not register the battery. I spoke to Roger at OffGrid and he suggested I try an iPhone (as we have one). I saw the battery on the app so it was clearly an android issue. I deleted and reloaded the app but still nothing. I switched off/on my phone and it was once again working. Roger said it was a complete coincidence that the app stopped working at the same time. I knew there was no connection with the inverter and the smart dongle for the battery but the coincidence timing was uncanny. Hopefully this will help others.

thanks again for all the replies and the final answer is I will be turning off the inverter when not in use.

 

[autorouter]

I switched off the Inverter and lost the bluetooth connection to the battery on the Fogstar app. My phone is android and not having experience I considered that it happed because the inverter was off. When I switched the inverter on the app still did not register the battery. I spoke to Roger at OffGrid and he suggested I try an iPhone (as we have one). I saw the battery on the app so it was clearly an android issue. I deleted and reloaded the app but still nothing. I switched off/on my phone and it was once again working. Roger said it was a complete coincidence that the app stopped working at the same time. I knew there was no connection with the inverter and the smart dongle for the battery but the coincidence timing was uncanny. Hopefully this will help others.

It probably wasn't just a coincidence. This kind of thing happens a lot, and is the reason for all this 'electromagnetic compatibility' (EMC) testing that otherwise seems to be a waste of time and money. Probably the inverter produced an electromagnetic pulse just at the timing and frequency range that messed up the Bluetooth connection. That's why vehicles undergo extensive EMC testing to ensure their systems don't get zapped by something like this.

 

[Wanders from Glos]

@all thank you.

Without the search/standby options and based on the answers I will be turning it off when not in use which is easy via Bluetooth on the app. I believe I will lose the trickle charge on the vehicle battery but I drive it once a week so that is not an issue.

It seems then that the only draw will be the negligible amount to keep the Bluetooth active for the multiplus.

Thank you again

I'm not sure which inverter you have. My understanding with the Multiplus is it will continue to trickle charge even when manually switched off (it has a switch with a total of three settings). I was quite sceptical about that so asked OffGrid Solutions about five times!

 

[Wanders from Glos]

I checked the motorhome today and the lithium battery is sitting at 93.6%. The switch is set to off on the Multiplus and all other electronics are off at the control panel. We haven't been in the UK for the past few days so I'm not sure what the weather has been like, but the solar has drawn 290Wh in the past five days, about 24Ah I think. It was 100% 16 days ago so the combination of input from the solar, draw from the trickle charge and I assume blue tooth has reduced it by 6.4% over that period, which I am pleased with.

^{_{Subscribers  do not see these advertisements}}

 

[clonkel]

I was quite sceptical about that so asked OffGrid Solutions about five times!

I understood from Roger that there is no trickle charge when the multiplus is set to off.

I could have misunderstood but not sure how it would trickle as I believe there is a small 1.5mm cable from the
Multiplus to the vehicle battery and the multiplus is off. It is the multiplus that provides the intelligence to trickle and it is not just a 'pass through'.

Similarly if on EHU it has to pass through the multiplus and power to the sockets won't be available if the multiplus is off.

Of course my understanding could be wrong as I am not too experienced in this area

 

[Lenny HB]

I understood from Roger that there is no trickle charge when the multiplus is set to off.

The Multiplus will charge the starter battery all the time it has a 12v supply.

 

[Lenny HB]

I checked the motorhome today and the lithium battery is sitting at 93.6%. The switch is set to off on the Multiplus and all other electronics are off at the control panel. We haven't been in the UK for the past few days so I'm not sure what the weather has been like, but the solar has drawn 290Wh in the past five days, about 24Ah I think. It was 100% 16 days ago so the combination of input from the solar, draw from the trickle charge and I assume blue tooth has reduced it by 6.4% over that period, which I am pleased with.

View attachment 976787View attachment 976788

Doing better than I did on our recent trip. WE only have 300 watts of solar it couldn't keep up with our usage, we were using an average or 70ah a day some days over a 100ah.

 

[Wanders from Glos]

I understood from Roger that there is no trickle charge when the multiplus is set to off.

I could have misunderstood but not sure how it would trickle as I believe there is a small 1.5mm cable from the
Multiplus to the vehicle battery and the multiplus is off. It is the multiplus that provides the intelligence to trickle and it is not just a 'pass through'.

Similarly if on EHU it has to pass through the multiplus and power to the sockets won't be available if the multiplus is off.

Of course my understanding could be wrong as I am not too experienced in this area

Neither am I that experienced. The connection is as you describe. I too was sceptical and as I say asked both Roger and Nigel quite a few times, even by email. I haven't included all of the email conversation below but for context I had asked him about the three positions on the physical switch and to confirm the MultiPlus trickle charged on all of them.

By the way, I misled you earlier. Our Multiplus does not have a bluetooth connection unless you attach a bluetooth dongle so you can only physically turn it off at the switch on the side of the unit. We decided against the dongle partly because the shunt provides all the information we needed and it has to be on to use the dongle, therefore consequently having a much higher draw. I think via the dongle you can alter some of the Multiplus's settings but we decided we don't know enough to do any of that.

 

[Lenny HB]

With the Multiplus you are better off getting the Mk3 USB dongle and connect to a laptop and use Victron Configure3 app then you have access to all the settings.

^{_{Subscribers  do not see these advertisements}}

 

[Wanders from Glos]

I probably will in time. As I start to understand out all better it may be useful. In term of power saving I was advised to use the physical switch though.

 

[clonkel]

Wanders from Glos turns out Roger has a youtube video which explains it



From what he says (around 8:50 on the video) then yes even if the multiplus is off then it continues to charge the starter battery. This means apart from wear and tear I can't see any reason not to turn it off when not in use. Even on a grey day the solar was able to manage the discharge and even give me a little bit.

I have a Victron Energy VE.Bus Smart dongle but apart from turning on/off the multiplus via the app then I don't really need anything else as it is above my knowledge grade

Lenny HB thank you

 

[Wanders from Glos]

One final update. The motorhome hasn't moved for 22 days, during which time the inverter has been off. The lithium battery is down to 95% and the starter battery is 12.98V. In the past five days we have harvested on average 110watts per day. So I am really pleased with the Multiplus and the system installed by Off Grid. Thanks also Lenny HB for your advice before we went with it.