Givenergy problem after firmware update

Good morning people, I have a 3kw inverter and 9kw battery. A week past Tuesday my battery was not being charged overnight. I notified support and they did firmware update on the inverter. She mentioned that the battery would be done after the inverter. I believe the ticket system sends you back confirmation that the ticket is done? Since the firmware done on the inverter, my system has gone crazy. Battery being charged/discharged continuously from 0500 to 10pm. The app says I’m pulling upwards of 9kw when I usually only use 3kw. I’ve shut down the system and restarted it again several times but no go. The telephone number lady doesn’t help. Anyone out there can help? My installer says the problem is in the software.. The Health check in the app does not indicate any problems… TIA

Stewartlang I had a similar problem when my inverter was loading a firmware update at about 1am on mid February. The grid graph showed the a series of spikes and some unusual data and about 1 hour later I lost all communication with the inverter via the GivEnergy app. A burnt out PV connector was observed when a technician from a local firm arrived to re-connect my system. After almost a whole day - no success. 4 emails to GivEnergy over a month and absolutely no reply from them. Phoning GivEnergy was of no help whatsoever and I have a system which is close to useless over a month later.
I accept this doesn't help much but shows a similar problem relating to a firmware update.
How wide spread os this problem?

Stewartlang after a firmware update you need to reprogram all of your charge/discharge slot settings, so maybe they are set wrongly?

The app misreporting does sound like maybe the CT clamp is misconfigured, but try the slots first

geoffreycoan Thanks Geoffrey, ill check the slots….

Stewartlang Hi again Geoffrey, The slots,,, battery charge 0200 to 0500. That’s my octopus times for cheap rate, Discharge 10am to 1800 export 0800 to 8pm.. is that a correct setup? That’s values I submitted after the firmware update was done. But, when I went back into the settings the values were 0000 for all …. So I’ve just put in the above settings…. What else to do? What’s the CT clamp? Sorry for my ignorance. You sound like a chap with the finger on the pulse.. thanks again so far..

CT clamp goes around electrical cables and records the current flowing through them and the direction of flow non-invasively through measuring the electromagnetic field created by the current.
It is how the GivEnergy system knows if your property is importing or exporting and how much. It is also how the battery knows how much to discharge in order to meet house load.
The CT itself is probably located in the main Consumer Unit (fuse box) and in any case will be near to the meter that they fitted, which will look a lot like this. Yours may be an older EM115 model with a green not blue backlight, but will have the same function.
This meter must be powered and connected to the inverter in order for it to work correctly.

In any case it sounds like reconfiguring your charge and discharge slots is the first order of business.

pwdst Hi I’ve just set the slots but changed the discharge to 1600 to 8pm …. How can I upload pictures to this forum? In my original post am I correct regarding support tickets with Givenergy…? At this time my dashboard shows Panels charging house with 1.15kw, not charging the battery which is at 5%, grid supplying 906w………. What to do?

I think we need to agree on some common terminology - you cannot "charge" a house, charging infers that it would be later possible to "discharge" that energy. I presume that you mean the panels are supplying the house. If you are also importing 905 watts from the grid that infers that you have a fairly substantial load running, maybe a dishwasher, washing machine or oven. If you are exporting to the grid, that is to say the energy from your panels is leaving your property to be used elsewhere in your neighbourhood then your house load is a pretty typical base load and there is excess energy which could be used to charge your batteries.
In order for this to happen outside of a registered charge slot you will want to make sure that Eco mode is switched on, which will prioritise self-consumption and storage of energy from the panels before exporting it.

Agreed - I think it is ECO mode not on...When I updated firmware for inverter on one occasion it returned to default and I had to enter all the slots and ECO mode - rest of the updates were no change in settings

Stewartlang The slots,,, battery charge 0200 to 0500. That’s my octopus times for cheap rate, Discharge 10am to 1800 export 0800 to 8pm.. is that a correct setup?

Really depends on what you are aiming for. Did you mean export 1800 to 8pm ? Otherwise it would be overlapping the discharge slot.

Stewartlang changed the discharge to 1600 to 8pm... At this time my dashboard shows Panels charging house with 1.15kw, not charging the battery which is at 5%, grid supplying 906w………. What to do?

Discharge starting at 1600 means you are not allowing the battery to discharge now. I'm guessing solar is supplying 1.15kW to the house, but the consumption is around 2kW which is why it's having to import from the grid.

Is there some reason for limiting the discharge times ? Preserve some power for a peak slot, perhaps ? (Which tariff are you on ? Not sure what gives cheap power 0200 to 0500 ? Ah, Flux perhaps. Which would explain a forced export from 1800.)

One some inverters (eg gen-3 hybrid) there's another way to reserve power for the peak slot. It's a little complicated to explain, and basically exploits what might be bug. (We're not sure - none of this is documented.)

Not sure why you would stop at 8pm - may as well allow discharge all the way through to the next charging slot.

@Stewartlang My setup sounds similar. So make sure you have eco mode enabled. That should be the norm. In the darker months I set timed charge from 02:00- 05:00 to utilise the cheaper octopus rates at that time. As the days improve I change or reduce the charge time. Then if I want to dump to the grid between the 16:00-19:00 time when I get max revenue for exported lecky I set timed export for the hours I want. Using that mode allows the system to still balance house need whilst exporting excess to the grid. It leaves the export to limit low. If you don’t then when the battery hits your set limit it stops and you will then have to use grid import to cover the house. Of course you have to decide whether you want to use all your battery reserve at that time and if you don’t then you have to manually keep checking it and disable timed export when you reach the battery % you want.

I wouldn’t use timed discharge unless there is only a specific time you want the battery to cover your house load.