Battery SNAFU This Morning / Yesterday - Red Light / Lost Settings

Hi just a situation for folk to check if you get this situation.

Yesterday my main 5.2 battery decided it did not want to be the master anymore and dropped off the system after getting to 100% charge. the 2.6 was visible but the 5.2 showed in red.

I checked the battery and saw it had a red light and after checking the forum I saw in the past a simple turn it off and on would re-set it.

I had previously tried re-setting inverter - that did nothing.

So hold the button down for several seconds - peep and then it re-set and came up green.

After some time and another inverter re-set it appeared on the system. - All seemed OK and it was discharging as expected.

So went to bed and left it set up ready to charge early morning...

Upon on waking the Battery was constantly charging and failing to discharge...

Long story short - via the great Inverter App created by a user here on the forum I finally noticed that Eco Mode was off and that the charge window was now till 4pm and not 4am.

These values shown on the App were actually in play but the $odding GivEnergy App showed Eco on and 4am for the charge window!!!

So don't rely on the GivEnergy app and download the user created one.

I then did a change of time and Eco mode on the Web Portal to re-set to the correct values.

I have asked GivEnergy support as to why I lost my Master battery yesterday via e-mail and I await any news from them. So if you do lose the Master Battery I advise check that the values are correctly set - maybe do a Re-set of the Web portal Values?

GivEnergy responded today saying your battery firmware is likely cause..

Want me to upgrade to 3015.

I doubt it's the firmware but as with any company they will use that as an excuse until I am on the latest firmware.

Due to other people's experience I have avoided the update but will undertake it at the best Agile time and when GivEnergy has support available if it cocks up...

M_J Due to other people's experience I have avoided the update but will undertake it at the best Agile time and when GivEnergy has support available if it cocks up...

one trick: whilst you can’t stop the discharge then charge cycle when it starts, you can set the discharge and charge rate to zero to effectively delay it to more favourable agile rates. I did this for my last recalibration

Nice trick...

Agile rates are pretty good tomorrow and at a time when support are available if it goes wrong.

At least I am on Agile export rate so the discharge pays me a bit...

Not sure 2015 is going to help especially if folk are getting over voltage warnings, which I have suffered maybe once or twice...

As feared the firmware update has froze at 90% I am having a coffee before I phone GivEnergy support to send me the files and manually do it.

At least this time the usb is not glued so I should not have to spend 30 minutes with a knife trying to undo it with out damaging me or the battery circuit board...

If you have the option of not doing the firmware update - take it ..

My batteries had to be manually updated via the USB sticks which delayed the process and then recalibration was kicked off just after noon.

It looked to be going ok and I made the mistake of going out.

The process hung after the batteries were zero and they failed to recharge!!!

So now we are into peak agile rates and I have sod all capacity and buying it at the most expensive rate!!

Support have finally gotten the charge process started but it's going to be gone 6pm for the process to be finished.

Joy of joy a battery BMS over voltage error seems to have killed the recalibration process and another phone call to GivEnergy to try and get it sorted...

7pm support disappears...

Arggghhh

So I guess support has been nobbled by the App being updated and folk phoning about that.

System is drained and not sure what state it is in. No one got back to despite promises of keeping an eye on it...

I am going to have to phone in the morning to try and get it sorted.

I should have just not bothered with the firmware update.

OK this is more for anyone who stumbles across this at a later date, although if any experts can comment I would welcome an alternate view to what I have been getting from the GivEnergy support desk.

Summary of events on Wednesday...

I was on Battery Firmware 3012 – Master 5.2 and a slave 2.6 – Old Gen one for Master battery.

In the morning I attempted a Battery firmware upgrade myself via the web portal button – Failed

Support sent me the 3015 Arm file and I followed the instructions to place the file “BMS_ARM.bin” on the USB sticks in the two batteries.

Support at 12:41 started the Recalibration process.

It did the discharge but never started the re-charge process. - Hung

So I sent an e-mail and then phoned support as I was fast approaching expensive Agile period for usage.

Different Support team members tried to get the process re-started which it did seem to start but then stopped.

I phoned again and Support got involved at 16:28 and told me that he would update me via e-mail. The last action he applied was at 16:45

I had no further updates and was left in the dark as to what to expect.

So last night I reset the values via the mobile app and then did a schedule charge to 100% over night during the cheap Agile rates – Scheduled via the App. - It appeared to fully charge batteries OK.

The battery showed 3012 firmware and the update button was still available.

During the course of yesterdays attempts to recalibrate I had numerous over voltage alerts which I am not sure if they caused the failure to recalibrate.

So Today I was told to only contact a certain person via e-mail and not involve anyone else.

I was told to re-do the process but put 3068 bridge firmware on first - get confirmation that was OK and then reload the 3015 software which I did.

After waiting beyond lunch time I was then told to wait an hour after the system was turned off and re-do the 3015 firmware all over again!

I have now been told all is OK yet my inverter shows that I am not on 3015 but on 3068!!

No recalibration has taken place and I am told all is OK?

Colour me sceptical but I am in supports hands...

3068 does not look like an official release and I am wondering how important the recalibration process is...

I have asked the support team to clarify what firmware I am on and if Recalibration is required.

M_J No recalibration has taken place and I am told all is OK?

Colour me sceptical but I am in supports hands...

... I am wondering how important the recalibration process is...

I believe that if you are only doing a battery firmware upgrade then you don't need a recalibration. The recalibration is when you upgrade the inverter firmware and its so the inverter knows what the upper and lower limits of the battery are. Changing the battery firmware doesn't affect this thus no recalibration required

geoffreycoan Changing the battery firmware doesn't affect this thus no recalibration required

Thanks for that tidbit I wish I knew that yesterday...

So wtf did I get forced to do a recalibrate yesterday. I am feeling less than impressed with the support I have had.

I asked support the following questions

What firmware is my system on? Why did we not need to do a recalibration process? Did the system recalibrate after me charging it to full during the early morning after failing to complete the process yesterday?

and just had back the following reply.

Your battery is on 3068 currently. As 3015 did not successfully upload, we can offer a P2 site visit and have an engineer have the firmware rectified for you from site or we could happily back track the firmware to its original state to save you more trouble.

So from checking the forum 3068 is a beta and no idea what it has in it.

3015 has failed to work.

Not sure if I should just stick with 3068 as I don't want to go through the process again.

If a recalibrate is not necessary I have the old firmware on my PC and I am guessing I can just manually stick it on the USBs without need for the tech team to do anything?

M_J I would ask if 3068 is newer or older than 3015. I wouldn’t worry about it being a beta, I’m on inverter firmware 191/193 on my gen 1 which is ‘beta’ in that its not formally released yet, but it’s absolutely rock solid stable and much better than the GA release (more features and fixes the 3015 BMS alerts).

If 3068 is newer than 3015 then it will contain bug fixes for 3015 which might be worth having.

My experience of having an engineer on site is it took about 3 weeks from booking for him to turn up.

I guess I would ask about the stability of 3068 and whether your battery is working now or not. If it’s working then I’d be inclined to leave it.

geoffreycoan If it’s working then I’d be inclined to leave it.

Thanks for your sage advice. It's always good to have input from someone who has had useful experience with the GivEnergy crew.

I am concerned that they seem to use that firmware version number as the general id for the next release. It has been mentioned several times last year.

But those configuration management concerns aside your points are spot on and helped me work out an approach.

Thank you.

So I have asked the Support team what the differences are between the two firmware 3015 vs 3068.

I just got told this...

3068 is just bridge firmware - it allows other firmware to be uploaded to the battery simpler. 3068 is not available for automatic download for the public, there are no firmware revisions or fixes on our Knowledge Base because of this. However, 3068 can function perfectly fine on the battery by itself. Please let me know if you would like 3068 to remain on your battery or if you would like to backtrack to 3012.

I feel I might have ended up with the wrong person looking at this?

I am truly getting quite frustrated with GE support...

I have asked to be told the exact differences between 3015 and 3068 which I think is not an unreasonable request if they truly know what is on 3068...

M_J this is an odd response, as far as I can tell all the current range (and even the older Prime ones) have the ability to load all the latest FW (3015)
Quite what 3068 is (hopefully its code for code the same as 3015 whilst it was in Beta as they count down from 3099) a mystery. Although why they can seemingly update to that one and not 3015 I'm not sure.

hoggy

Thanks I have the latest response..

The frustration grows..

We cannot explicitly say what the benefits/ negatives are of the 3068 firmware as there are no firmware revisions in our Knowledge Base for this - we cannot compare this to 3015. 3068 is just "bridge firmware" it allows firmware to be uploaded easier when being uploaded beforehand. This is not intended to be used as a standard firmware despite it still working fine on the battery. I will attach our firmware revisions page here: https://kb.givenergy.cloud/article.php?id=22

M_J quick search on here would suggest 3068 is around the era of 3012? Doesn't on the face of it sound anything more than just (another) beta (of which there were a lot around then) so by bridge I think they mean it's somewhere in the middle of 3012-3013 (which is on the KB but quite how similar to 3013 I've no idea)
https://community.givenergy.cloud/d/2491-battery-voltage-high/10

What frustrates me is that someone knows what's on it and I am getting brushed off by 1st line support who just want to close the ticket.

In fact I don't think there is a ticket as someone is helping out technical support and I had hoped was technically adapt.

I will pursue with GE as I don't like to guess what is on it.

Ultimately I will stick with it because I have had enough pain dealing with GE support and if the firmware behaves and batteries behave then all is that matters.

Thanks hoggy for looking into it.

3068 is a beta version that GE had to load onto my AC3 when moving back from 3015 to 3012. I think 3015 has encryption, 3012 hasn't. 3012 works better than 3015 with my 2 x 8.2 batteries using A0 203.