SRP came Thursday and plugged me in! I'm PSYCHED!
15 Kyocera 200 watt panels, home made rack and a Xantres 3.3 inverter.

My question is...

What's the skinny with the Xantrex program? I guess this is a downloadable program where one could hook their inverter up to a PC (I assume for monitering/tracking purposes). Are there any thoughts out there? Shoud I bother? Is it simply another cool thing?

Thanks for all you help in the past!

Mikey

I just connected my Xantrex 3.3 inverter to my PC for real-time data capture, it works great. The data is displayed on the PC and also captured in 2 files (one for daily totals, the other every 10 seconds through the day).

I am also hoping to getting a Schulmberger Vectron Net Meter from the Electricity company and hope to track the actual usage from the mains in real time. http://www.metermansupply.com/products-schlumberger.htm
http://www.southernutility.com/rs232.htm - in Tucson these meters are now meant to be the standard moving forward. I don't know yet whether joe public will be allowed to connect to these meters, as I think maybe the Elec company might not allow or - or they might use the RF connection for their own purposes and the system may not be cable of supporting both a serial and RF connection.

So the benefts are that you monitor both production and usage to cut down on costs by changing how you use electricity. Also due to the kick backs from the Electricity company (TEP) - I have to send in the system kWh each month. Also monitoring the data, you get to "know" the system. I picked up that the Xantrex inverter runs hot (heat sink temp of 151 F on a 80 F ambient temp day, which in theory is above their system specification), but the system is still running at 95% efficiency so it is obvioulsy ok, but in summer when it is 110 F here I will probably have problems with the inverter efficiency being affected. All in all for the captial outlay of buying a serial cable or Cat 5 cable (or wifi/bluetooth) - it is worth doing as you can monitor the efficiency of the solar system and catch problems early etc.

So you have some choices and this site seems to cover them all:

1. Cheapest and most relaible is a serial cable (with DB9 ends) from the inverter to the PC, with the GT View Software. The only complication is that the serial socket does not pass through the casing hole. Better option is to buy 2 RJ45 to serial cable adapters ($3.50 each) and a length of regular straight through Cat 5 cable with RJ45 ends.

2. Bluetooth wireless connection. You will need blue tooth on your PC or laptop, if you don't you can buy a USB bluetooth adapter for your PC from newegg.com for $20 (get Class 2 bluetooth - longer range). I purchased an Air Cable serial to bluetooth device (ACC1302) http://www.aircable.net/serial.html - follow th e supplied instructinos and it connects right in. You can also simply the whole process by buying pre-configured http://www.aircable.net/cr-usb-serial-male.html from Aire Cable - you $60 for the PC bluetooth adapter. The 2 problems I ran into were that I had a brick wall in betseen the PC and inverter which caused the buetooth to have an intermittant connection. You also have to use a power supply for the bluetooth device in the inverter (Xantrex should deign to give power to pin 9 on the DB8 connecter in the inverter) - which was a pain since there was no electrical socket close to my inverter.

As a workaround, I used the rj45-serial adapter with Cat 5 cable to get around the wall and close to a power socket, then connected the bluetooth device to one end of the cat 5/rj45/serial adapter and the other end plugged into the inverter. The connection is nor rock solid. The irony in all this is that you now keep your PC on during daylight hours to log the data.

3. Wifi option - I found some WiFi devices that you could use. But they were expensive and you needed power also. Basically you end up having to use some kind of programmable wifi router.

Seems like some people use old laptops to log the data too, and either tranmit the data on through wifi or a remote desktop.


Hope this helps in some way.

Examples of data capture that is saved in ascii format on the pc: dail y log file

Date Time VDC DC Amps MPPT DC Pwr AC Pwr Eff VAC AC Wh HS Tmp Freq Status
12/1/2006 13:46:45 285.4 8.08 286.4 2325 2222 95.57 241.9 10243 134 60 ST:3 STS:0000 0000 0002 92fa FA:00
12/1/2006 13:46:57 286.6 8.03 286.3 2322 2219 95.56 242.2 10253 134 60 ST:3 STS:0000 0000 0002 92fa FA:00
12/1/2006 13:47:09 283.7 8.13 289.3 2322 2219 95.56 241.5 10258 134 60 ST:3 STS:0000 0000 0002 92fa FA:00
12/1/2006 13:47:21 288.9 7.96 288.1 2318 2209 95.3 241.9 10267 134 60 ST:3 STS:0000 0000 0002 92fa FA:00
12/1/2006 13:47:33 287.8 7.98 287.5 2316 2208 95.34 240.5 10272 134 60 ST:3 STS:0000 0000 0002 92fa FA:00
12/1/2006 13:47:45 286.6 8.03 286.7 2316 2212 95.51 241.5 10281 134 60 ST:3 STS:0000 0000 0002 92fa FA:00
12/1/2006 13:47:57 286 8.01 286.4 2313 2206 95.37 240.1 10286 134 60 ST:3 STS:0000 0000 0002 92fa FA:00
12/1/2006 13:48:09 287.8 7.98 286.2 2312 2205 95.37 241.9 10296 134 60 ST:3 STS:0000 0000 0002 92fa FA:00

Daily totals summary file:
Date AC Wh AC Peak W Time Online Lifetime AC Wh

10/16/2006 13608 13608
10/17/2006 14392 10:51:24 28000
10/18/2006 16701 10:47:18 44000
10/19/2006 17882 10:41:51 62000
10/20/2006 17468 10:36:26 80000
10/21/2006 17246 10:36:44 97526
10/22/2006 16945 2016 10:13:31 114472
10/23/2006 10366 10:10:41 124839
10/24/2006 10266 135105
10/25/2006 15687 10:25:45 150792

cheers

Thanks Hayden!

Thats a ton of good info. Seems like the best way is with the serial cable. We leave the computer on 24/7 anyway so that will not change our power usage. (And as you said, it would be silly to add a parasitic load to your generating system.)

Can you graph the output with the program? (If not, I figure you could import the data into Excell, deliniate it and graph it that way.) I teach HS Electronics so it would be usefull in the classroom.

I did not want any dereating issues (the graph on the inverter showed major losses over 100 degrees, we live over 100 degrees for months at a time here!) so I installed the inverter inside the house in the pantry.

As the termite burrows, the inverter is only 7-8 feet from the computer, but as the wire is routed (and to make it a clean install) The cable would have to go up inside the wall, through the attic and back down. (prolly around 15 feet or so).

I ran the supply and load leads out the back of the inverter, throught the wall directly into the disconnects so I would have no conduit exposed in the house. (yep, I'm married!) I'd have to use a surface mount raceway or something similar to get the cable out of the inverter and into the wall.

I guess I could knock out another the in the back of the inverter and use a gromet or conduit bushing to lead teh cable into the wall, then fish it up throught the top plate & into the attic. I don't know what NEC is for data cables though.

Anyone???

Thanks again for the reply!

Mikey

The ASCII file is automtacally saved with a .xls extension, so when selected it opens in Excel with no manual conversion etc. necessary.

You would have to set up your own graphing features (or macros) in Excel. Gt View does not generate any graphs.

The bluetooth connection I have goes through a stucco wall to get to my PC and it is a perfect connection now that I bypassed the brick wall. If you don't want to fish cable (and lose the serial port on ur pc or ethernet port - depending on how you connect) - I would go with Bluetooth if you are only going through an internal wall. One of the reasons I went bluetooth, I did not want to fish cable all over the house if I ever moved the PC to another room.

If you get the USB bluetooth adpater from newegg.com (u can get them cheap here), it means you can also connect a bluetooth headset or cell phone to your PC etc. as a supplementary benefit. The Air Cable USb bluetooth adapter for the PC end would not give you this additional ability connect to other bluetooth devices, and it is $40 bucks more.

In case youy were wondering what the RJ45 to serial DB9 connector looks like:
http://www.pccables.com/01910.htm

Remember that you need to select either male or female depending on what you are connecting to.

With the adpater. you have to configure the pin outs for the adpter for the Xantrex DB9 socket, the details can be found in the Xantrex User manuals or other posts on this web site.

cheers

Haydn

Hayden,

As only 3 conductors are used, couldn't you get a pair of female DB9 connectors and a 3 conductor cable, then just rig pins 2,3 and 5? This instead of the CAT5 cable and 2 adaptors.

Thanks!

In reading through some older threads, I found referance to using a USB to serial cable adaptor. As the USB ports are more numerous than the serial ones, and are plug and play, if that still works it would seem like the way to go.

I always make my own cables ... the db9 connectors and shells are less than a buck online and cat5 cable at Home Depot is like 50 bucks for 500ft and you can by much shorter lenghts for alot less

http://www.cablewholesale.com/popupspecs/3530-04009.htm for the db9 55 cents
http://www.cablewholesale.com/popupspecs/3501-009.htm snap shell for 25 cents

The PC to GT uses pins #2,#3,#5 and is a one to one straight thru, put another way, pin#2 on one end goes to pin#2 on the other

You will need a check soldering iron, you can get one for 2.49 here http://www.mcgillswarehouse.com/ItemDet ... ERINGIRONS



As for wireless, the only unknow is how the transmiter sends data ... its usally not specified, but if the wiresless does any type of byte packing, your hosed ...

I opted for an indoor install too, security concerns, and simplification.
I run over 150F too, till I installed a small desk fan, just to stir the air. Helped a whole lot for 50W worth of power. ( my GT3.8 )
Seems like the unwritten factory rule is outdoors in shade, so ambient wind will stir the air.

Serial cable for 50' or so, should be ok.

???? Only for some folks. I have to re-name my files to .CSV, which then forces excel to IMPORT them as the text files they are.


I've developed a fairly simple chart, where I can just copy and paste into my template, that shows Watts output and Heatsink temp.
let me know via PM if anyone wants it emailed to them

My complaint too, I anticipated this, and ordered a fan kit, but the mainboard in the GT, had no connector pins, they decided folks really didn't need a fan kit.
It's suppoesed to be rain proof, so maybe running your AC condensate drain to it will cool it down, and leave a nice layer of goo on it.
This thermal thing is really the only drawback on the GT series.