No current when plugged into AC?

Hi Folks,
Recently returned from a weeklong trip to Maine in our Cirrus 620 (with Battle Born upgrade). Everything worked great electrically/solar on the trip. Now the camper has been off the truck for a week in preparation for winterization.

I checked the Victron apps today and they're showing the battery current at around 11.67 (in SmartSolar & SmartShunt—see sceenshots below). That didn't look good to me so I plugged the camping in to our 15 amp home service (which I've done before). Now the VE.Bus doesn't show the AC coming in so the battery isn't charging. 

Can anyone please explain this to me? Am I doing something wrong? Like I said, I've plugged my camper into house power before and seen the current coming in in VE.Bus.

Thanks in advance! 

Comments

  • johnVTjohnVT Member Posts: 31
    Sorry, here are the screenshots...




  • johnVTjohnVT Member Posts: 31
    Poking around in the VE.Bud settings, I noticed this...



  • johnVTjohnVT Member Posts: 31
    Sorry for the piecemeal post... Here's a screenshot of the VE.Bus showing battery voltage:

  • AnOldURAnOldUR Member Posts: 1,618
    Your battery is very low yet your shunt says you’re at 100%. This means your shunt is not properly calibrated and possibly not setup correctly. Posting the battery settings of the shunt may give some clues to your problem.
    Stockton, New Jersey
    2020 nuCamp T@B 320S * Jeep Wrangler
    (47,171 towing miles through the end of 2024)
  • johnVTjohnVT Member Posts: 31
     AnOldUR said:
    Your battery is very low yet your shunt says you’re at 100%. This means your shunt is not properly calibrated and possibly not setup correctly. Posting the battery settings of the shunt may give some clues to your problem.
    Here ya go. Included a shot of the Shunt History as well in case that's relevant:





  • Sharon_is_SAMSharon_is_SAM Administrator Posts: 10,019
    Looks like it is set up for an AGM battery.  Also, battery SOC on reset should be “clear”, otherwise it will reset to 100% prematurely.  Charge your battery thoroughly using a portable charger, then sync to 100%.  In the meantime, you need to change your battery settings according to Battleborn parameters.  In addition, the Peukert is about 1.05 for lithium and the charge efficiency factor is 99%.
    Sharon / 2017 T@B CSS / 2015 Toyota Sienna Minivan / Westlake, Ohio
  • Grumpy_GGrumpy_G Member Posts: 643
    edited October 15
    Many rabbit holes to go down have been suggested, but the obvious issue is that the inverter/charger (which is what the smart dongle monitors/controls) is not seeing any AC input. It also appear the inverter is turned on so it will drain the battery. 
    Check that there is actually power at the end of the cable that plugs into the camper. The GFCI might have tripped. There is probably also a breaker in the camper that sits before the AC power gets to the Multiplus. 

    Edit: Just noticed the Multiplus is showing "off", in all the Victron documentation it shows "on". Try switching it to "on" or "charger only". 
  • pthomas745pthomas745 Administrator, Moderator Posts: 4,330
    On the shunt settings, the discharge floor is pretty far off, but that only deals with the "time remaining" display on the shunt.  Show us the settings on your Victron Solar Controller and lets see if the controller is properly set to charge a lithium battery, also.  Everything should work together to get reliable readings. These are Battleborn pages for setting up the shunt and the controller.  What exact 270 amp hour battery do you have?
    Controller settings for lithium:
    I would guess that a Cirrus has the "Gloso" type circuit breaker in the vehicle somewhere, usually close to the battery switch.  This circuit breaker is designed to handle the large surge of power that occurs when a seriously discharged battery (as your Apps are showing a very low voltage) gets plugged into shore power.  So, you need to find that circuit breaker and check if it has tripped or not.  It will look something like the one from a 400 in the thread below.  And, we don't know what year your trailer is, the newer models have bumped this breaker up to a 50 amp.  
    2017 Outback
    Towed by 2014 Touareg TDi
  • johnVTjohnVT Member Posts: 31
    Thanks pthomas for your thoughts. I've included a screenshot of my controller settings below. The 620 is a a 2025 with the factory installed Lithium Upgrade package. Brand new.

    What's got me scratching my head is that everything was working perfectly two weeks ago when I plugged the camper in to chill the fridge and top off the battery before our trip. They VE.Bus saw the AC power coming in. It all worked flawlessly during the trip as well—solar charge well, my Renogy solar suitcase and Victron controller worked well. Now the camper is off the truck. The ONLY thing that I did different was to turn on the battery heating switch as we've had some below 35˚ nights here in Vermont (I'm guessing that might have contributed to the drain and its OFF now.)

    This morning I toggled the Main breaker in the breaker panel and now I'm hearing a 4-tone chime emanating from the battery compartment about every minute or so.

    Thoughts?


  • pthomas745pthomas745 Administrator, Moderator Posts: 4,330
    edited October 15
    How many batteries?  2 or 4?  (Some Tab 400's have a 4 battery lithium setup...the variations of "lithium packages mean we need specifics!)  
    If you had the battery heaters on, and they were actually activated due to temps below 35 degrees "inside the battery" there would be a constant draw of 1.6 amps "per battery".  And, strangely enough, the way these batteries are wired directly to the switch that turns them on, that battery drain is not recorded by the Victron shunt.  So, there are lots of variables here.  
    Unless you truly need to "charge" a lithium battery when temps are below freezing, the battery heaters are not necessary.  The "low temp charging protection" installed in most all lithium batteries these days would prevent any charging from damaging the battery.
    On your solar controller: you should go through that setup procedure shown in the Battleborn page.  The "Smart Lithium" settings are for Victron's own "smart lithium" batteries.  Note how for the Battleborn batteries, the Absorption Voltage is 14.6 or so, and your settings are only showing 14.2.
    Your shunt settings for "Charged Voltage is also about a volt low. Yours is set to 13.2, so the shunt is seeing that voltage and resetting, and each time it syncs without the battery being at the proper charged voltage of at least 14.2, it is giving you lower than actual values.  So, go over that Battleborn "BMV" setup page and look over your settings.    What exact lithium battery and setup do you have?  If you don't have a Battleborn, find your battery brochure and find the charging specs.

    The chime you are hearing is most likely coming from the Multiplus.  Time to open up that cabinet and have a look and see what the flashing lights are trying to tell you.  Probably a low battery state alarm..but our experience these are limited.
    There have been Multiplus issues mentioned in several Facebook pages, and apparently there is a physical reset switch on the Multiplus itself that can be used to reset the unit.
    Update: Problem Solved
    "Solution: The Inverter switch had tripped. And Jordan, Technician at NuCamp, said we can only Reset the Inverter when it’s recording issues by physically (not virtually) flipping the switch at the physical inverter under the bed. So we did that and Voila problem solved."

    This is the Multiplus manual.....which does have troubleshooting, etc, and a description of the various flashing lights. There is no graphics that show anything about the unit (at least, I didn't find one in this manual).  But, paragraph 3.5 does describe where the "on off" switch might be: "bottom left hand underside of the case".  




    2017 Outback
    Towed by 2014 Touareg TDi
  • johnVTjohnVT Member Posts: 31
    OK, so I'm not entirely sure what made it work, but it's working now. The VE.Bus is seeing the shore power and I'm getting charge to the battery. I toggled the Main breaker on the breaker panel and also found and toggled the Gloso breaker behind the battery shut off panel. I also turned the VE.Bus Multiplus setting to "On". This seemed to be the magic that got the shore power coming in. But oddly, I'd turned the Multiplus to "On" before with no change. 

    My understanding regarding the Multiplus "On" setting is that it should be "Off" when I don't need to use AC in the camper (for the microwave or other appliance as it drains power). That was my experience while camping last week. 

    So, once my battery is back to full charge (in Float state), please let me know what I need to do to reset things. The SOC, Synchronize, and other options confuse me a bit.

    Thanks again for everyone's help. Much appreciated!
  • johnVTjohnVT Member Posts: 31
    Thanks pthomas745—I really appreciate your taking the time to help me out.

    I have 1 Battleborn SmartLithium 270Ah battery. I will go through the setups suggested by the BB pages you referenced. Hopefully things will get back to "normal". 

    Next step is figuring out winterization of my battery system given that I live in Vermont where wintertime lows can drop into the -15 to -20 range sometimes. Happy to take any suggestions, and I will search this forum for such recommendations.
  • Grumpy_GGrumpy_G Member Posts: 643
    johnVT said:

    My understanding regarding the Multiplus "On" setting is that it should be "Off" when I don't need to use AC in the camper (for the microwave or other appliance as it drains power). That was my experience while camping last week. 


    Basically correct if you're out camping, but "off" means off for both the inverter and the charger. There is a "charger only" setting that turns off the inverter while still charging the battery. 
  • johnVTjohnVT Member Posts: 31
    Grumpy_G said:
    johnVT said:

    My understanding regarding the Multiplus "On" setting is that it should be "Off" when I don't need to use AC in the camper (for the microwave or other appliance as it drains power). That was my experience while camping last week. 


    Basically correct if you're out camping, but "off" means off for both the inverter and the charger. There is a "charger only" setting that turns off the inverter while still charging the battery. 
    Thanks Grumpy— I *just* figured that out. No wonder I was having trouble charging from shore power. 

    Sometimes ya just gotta fess-up that you're an idiot... 
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