Is it just me…

Within inverter settings for a ‘timed charge’ from the grid (ie for a cheap rate overnight period) the sliding ‘maximum battery charge’ scale also appears to fix the maximum battery charge capacity outside this period. So if the AIO battery is set to take a percentage charge (say, up to 60%) from the grid overnight, then this setting has to be reset every time before the battery will begin to import PV energy to a reach a higher charge level. This is nonsense. The timed charge setting is specifically labelled against ‘grid import.’ What am I not seeing?

Is anyone able to comment on my experience please?
Is it just me…but why is the control of a battery, PV array and an EV charger, via an integrated App such a non-stop challenge?

I’d be grateful for any advice.
Rob

RobV I don't recognise that behaviour. The only thing I can think of is that the charging end time is set too late: once it reaches the target SoC, it will hold that until the of the charging time period. I think my system won't charge from PV in this state, but other systems will.
Not sure what AIO would do here.

DD Thanks DD, although I’m deliberately setting the charging period from the grid between midnight until 05:00 to charge up to 60%. So by mid-morning, I would expect the PV array to be topping up the AIO (any battery, for that matter) beyond 60% up to 100% automatically without having to change App settings!

The App should be more intuitive - partially charging a battery from the grid during the cheap overnight rate and allowing the modest sun at this time of year to do the rest seems to me to be a reasonable expectation of an integrated system with a single controlling App. Oh well…

RobV So it's not just something silly like accidentally setting 5pm rather than 5am ?

DD I don’t think so, and I’ve just changed the timed charge period to see what happens. I’ve spent some time reading through a number of your other posts and this has helped my knowledge (for example battery staying idle until end of charge period (now I understand some of the graphs rather more!) plus eco / discharge / export settings). I think many of the people you interact with suggest, in many of their cases, that buttons need to be reset daily to achieve what they want. Surprised that App developers appear not to have missed what appears to me, as a home owner (and if I’m right), to be a logical demand of the system.

RobV “….appear to have missed…”

RobV I think many of the people you interact with suggest, in many of their cases, that buttons need to be reset daily to achieve what they want

I think that's perhaps mostly an issue with gen-1 devices, where forced export behaves very differently. I thought that AIO behaved more like the newer hybrids, but I've never quite groked how AIO manages solar, being primarily an ac-coupled battery.

(That's not to say my system requires no intervention: when in eco mode, I want no limit on discharge power, but when forcing a discharge, I tend to do so at reduced power, so I do have to keep fiddling with that setting.)

RobV without having to change App settings

Specifically which setting do you have to change? If it's to turn off AC charging, one possibility is that a second charging slot has been configured. The app only shows one charging slot, but if you go to the remote control panel, there are actually up to 10 available. I assume the flag to enable AC charging activates all 10. (So it's a bit redundant really - each slot can be made inactive by setting end time == start time.)

DD DD - I have literally just been back to the App inverter settings, via the top right-hand cog wheel entry point. ‘Timed charge’, which I ‘enabled’ yesterday from midnight to 0300, with the slider set to ‘charge to 60%.’ (Which it did).

So at 1100 today my AIO was at 60%, but my PV array generation was at 600W, with 400W of that going back on the grid and the rest essentially to house load. Disabling the timed charge via the button (which also disables movement of the slider scale) made no difference to the home dashboard picture. Enabling the timed charge period again and putting the slider back to 100% had an immediate impact. I could see the 400W previously lost to the grid tubing directly to the AIO. The setting is specifically about charging from the grid; there is no inference here that the slider has an overall impact on the upper level of charge notwithstanding source of input. I thought the gateway was the brain that integrated all the pieces - it’s all GE gear! Odd.

Because I have a top rate of feed in tariff (FIT) from an older array, I cannot benefit further from anything that I put on the grid. The Govt assumption was that 50% of that generated would be paid as a FIT so it’s calculated from the generation meter. But I cannot amend or alter my FIT agreement (and it would probably be disadvantageous to do so). Nice, but my working assumption is to harness what I now generate from a second array…into the battery.

I’m grateful for your advice - thanks.
Rob

RobV Enabling the timed charge period again and putting the slider back to 100% had an immediate impact. I could see the 400W previously lost to the grid tubing directly to the AIO.

Does that also make it charge from grid ?

Did you look to see if there were additional charge slots enabled. I think my next suggestion would have to be to do a reset-to-defaults - there's a button on the app or the portal. Failing that, you'll have to wait for someone with an AIO to chip in.
(Will the forum let you edit the title ? a more specific title has more chance of attracting the right people.)

DD On your first question, only during the set period. I’ve sighted the other 9 slots and none are set. A reset might be a useful step, although I can’t recall how I got this far, so it might be like starting over! There’s one inverter setting in the portal which I have not encountered before which is: ‘Enable AC charge upper % level.’ It is currently off. It’s in the same enable/disable section. I wonder how this differs from the sliding scale (which is enabled)?

I was positive I saw a way of changing title, but I cannot see it now! I’ll keep searching.

RobV A reset might be a useful step, although I can’t recall how I got this far, so it might be like starting over!

That is really the idea, if something you've changed has caused this.

Just to check - is the eco flag on (or dynamic discharge) ? Having the eco flag turned off does inhibit solar charging, and it leaves eco mode temporarily during charging slots, for example.

DD Yup - Eco mode enabled throughout. Of course, not much opportunity to observe solar charging detail during my charge slot! But you are pointing at the key issue, that solar charging appears to be disabled after the charge period until I reset that slider to 100%.

At least my array is being cleaned, even if it isn’t working very hard!

RobV I've just remembered something... you haven't configured a timed-discharge have you ? On my gen-3 system, that just does a timed export, whereas on gen-1, it just covers house load, but it also disables solar charging.

See https://community.givenergy.cloud/d/4284-confused-about-export/65

I don't think I've seen anyone mention the equivalent behaviour on an AIO. (I had hoped to collect the different behaviours in https://community.givenergy.cloud/d/3654-timed-discharge-behaviour-survey but never got any responses.)

Check via the cog in the WEB portal. I seem to remember that using the app to set a timed charge on my AIO to a % actually set the main AC Charge Upper limit (near the top of the settings page under General) rather than just the AC Charge 1 Upper SOC % Limit.
I use power level and durations now because of it catching me out