Help with Charging

[misiekz]

Hi everyone

So I got a bit of a problem with charging. Not the car but maybe got same setup as me.
We have a solar panels and energy storage FoxESS and cheap night tariff with octopus.
When I tried to charge at night it drained the battery at 3.0kW and added 4kW from the grid.
Any chance to use only the grid?
Tried finding the options in FoxESS app but nothing there that I can see and charger Zappi haven't got anything that lets me decide the source of energy. During the day I can use excess energy that I would normally export for ? but how to work it out for night charging?
Thanks

 

[johnb80]

Hi everyone

So I got a bit of a problem with charging. Not the car but maybe got same setup as me.
We have a solar panels and energy storage FoxESS and cheap night tariff with octopus.
When I tried to charge at night it drained the battery at 3.0kW and added 4kW from the grid.
Any chance to use only the grid?
Tried finding the options in FoxESS app but nothing there that I can see and charger Zappi haven't got anything that lets me decide the source of energy. During the day I can use excess energy that I would normally export for ? but how to work it out for night charging?
Thanks

Normally your inverter would be set to charge your solar battery during the off peak time eg Octopus GO 00:30 to 04:30. If you set your car charging to the same time period it wont discharge your solar battery.

 

[misiekz]

I didn't charge the solar batteries from the grid yet so not sure about it. I only switched to Octopus 2 months ago and we had a decent weather so there was no need to charge the solar batteries at night.
Got the MG on Monday and tried to run charge but without charging the solar batteries and that is when it was using solar stored power to charge the car with adding grid power to make the 7kW.
Will try it tonight to run both charges between 00.30 till 4.30 just to see what happens.
Thanks

 

[benflugel]

When they installed your Zappi did they add CT clamps to the cables for the solar generation then separately for the house battery?

There is a setting in the Zappi for house batteries to "avoid drain" but that only works if your zappi knows about the house battery. If you can see input and output of the house battery on your zappi app, you should be able to fix it.

Sorry, just to add. I sync my house battery and car battery to charge during the entire overnight cheap window. When the house battery gets to 100% it holds it there during that window so the rest of the house usage is drawn from the mains.

 

[misiekz]

When they installed your Zappi did they add CT clamps to the cables for the solar generation then separately for the house battery?

There is a setting in the Zappi for house batteries to "avoid drain" but that only works if your zappi knows about the house battery. If you can see input and output of the house battery on your zappi app, you should be able to fix it.

Thanks for that. I checked the electric box and I only have 1 CT clamp from Zappi so it looks like it will not monitor the batteries in the house.
The white clamp is the solar installation and the black one is for Zappi.
Can this be added now and who will have to do it? I got the certificate from Octopus that Zappi has been installed and tested and not sure whether anyone can mess around with that.
Thanks

 

[benflugel]

I would definitely get an electrician to do this if you want it added. I'm sure it can be added but I suspect it would be at a cost. You could always ring up Octopus and see if they'd come back out and do it.

 

[DBedford]

I would definitely get an electrician to do this if you want it added. I'm sure it can be added but I suspect it would be at a cost. You could always ring up Octopus and see if they'd come back out and do it.

NEVER interfere with your hard wired electrical system, unless you’re a qualified and certified electrician. You could find your insurance invalid if anything occurs as a result. Plus the fact it’s illegal.

 

[johnb80]

You could always ring up Octopus and see if they'd come back out and do it.

Im not sure why Octopus would do any of this work?

 

[Eber]

I checked the electric box [...]

That's some nice Victorian plumbing right there. ?

 

[johnb80]

NEVER interfere with your hard wired electrical system, unless you’re a qualified and certified electrician.

A couple things here, you only need to be a competent person, not necessarily a qualified electrician (or certified).

You could find your insurance invalid if anything occurs as a result.

Have you any case studies to show this is the case? It's a bit like people saying their car insurance wont pay out if theyre driving illegally, how many speeding drivers have not been paid?

Plus the fact it’s illegal.

No it isnt:

The IEE Wiring Regulations, aka BS 7671
Surprisingly, perhaps, Part P does not alter the status of the Wiring Regulations. They are still non-statutory, and there is still no legal requirement to adhere to them in domestic installations. This is a source of great discomfort to many electricians, and some of them will jump through hoops to try and prove that they are mandatory, but the fact remains that they are not.

HOWEVER, adherence to them is a very good way of ensuring that you meet the technical requirements of Part P, and you would need a very good reason, and a very good understanding of what you were doing, to decide to not adhere to them.

Local Authority Building Control Issues
As mentioned above, some LABCs are spreading misinformation, either by accident or design, about the status and acceptability of electrical work done by DIYers or other non-registered people.

These include:

1) Stating that such persons simply cannot carry out notifiable work, and that it must be done by registered electricians. The legislation referenced above makes it quite clear that this is not the case. LABCs are not allowed to refuse to process Building Notices submitted by non-registered people.


2) Stating that work carried out by a non-registered person must be inspected and tested by someone who is registered, or who they regard as qualified. Again, there is no mention of this requirement in the statutory instrument.

However they are allowed (indeed must) charge people if they choose to subcontract inspection & testing, and this might mean a charge per visit.

See The Building (Local Authority Charges) Regulations 2010 - particularly 7(3):

Where the local authority consider it necessary to engage and incur the costs of a consultant to provide specialist advice or services in relation to a particular aspect of building work those costs shall also be included in the determination referred to in paragraph (1).

 

[benflugel]

Im not sure why Octopus would do any of this work?

I was assuming they installed the charger point. They installed mine.

 

[Robf]

Could you give myenergi (zappi maker) a call?, they are usually helpfull and I am sure wouldcheck the installation (from the picture) and suggest where the additional CT clamp should go (and supply it). I suspect the current clamp would be moved to the live solar input and the new battery clamp to the battery live input. Benflugel could perhaps kindy post a picture of his installation?

 

[johnb80]

I was assuming they installed the charger point. They installed mine.

I didnt see any mention of the installer.

 

[benflugel]

I got the certificate from Octopus that Zappi has been installed and tested and not sure whether anyone can mess around with that.
Thanks

If this is correct, this is who I would ring.

 

[johnb80]

There is a setting in the Zappi for house batteries to "avoid drain" but that only works if your zappi knows about the house battery. If you can see input and output of the house battery on your zappi app, you should be able to fix it.

I havent seen any such setting on mine, could you elaborate what the setting is please?

If this is correct, this is who I would ring.

Agreed, I hadnt spotted the mention of Octopus as the installer.

 

[benflugel]

https://support.myenergi.com/hc/en-gb/articles/6778001879569-Using-a-battery-with-your-myenergi-system

Under the "standalone battery" setting. Reading it again, I'm not sure it would work in this particular scenario as I think the Zappi enter fast mode for scheduled charging. Because I have my house and car set to charge overnight at the same time, I'm not sure what it does.

I know for certain in Eco and Eco+ it doesn't charge from the house battery. It did until I changed the settings as per the above.

 

[tsedge]

I was assuming they installed the charger point. They installed mine.

Usually this work is subcontracted to a local installer, so while Octopus may have arranged it, they are unlikely to have done the work. Making changes for customer setups is unlikely to be covered in their contract, but it is always worth trying, nothing to lose by talking to them.

 

[misiekz]

I got the charger installed thru Octopus as my MG is a work deal thru Octopus vehicle scheme so they did all the instal and upgraded the charger from Ohme to Zappi when they spotted panels on the roof just didn't account for the batteries being part of the solar system.
I have emailed them and will wait for the reply.

Update for these that helped and others like me that struggle a bit...
So stayed up till I figure it out and it worked.
Tried like someone said charging the solar storage and charging the car and it worked sending 4kW to storage and 7kW to the car. Then tried disabling storage charging and on eco+ it tried sending power from storage and grid to make 7kW in total draining my storage at home and then moved the eco slider all the way to 1% and it stopped draining the storage at home and used only grid to charge the car.
Hopefully this will help someone. Maybe different install will behave differently but worth trying. Picture of my electric box is a bit earlier in this post.
Thanks all the guys that send their ideas.