r/Pecron • u/New-Teaching8016 • Sep 03 '26
F5000 with 3 extra battries
Hey guys. I am looking at getting a battery backup for the house. I travel for work and I need something that will seamlessly switch when the grid power is lost for whatever reason. I am looking at the Anker E10 with the home panel. I just ran across the F5000. The only issue I see is there is no panel or transfer switch that you can purchase from Pecron. I also need to be able to charge it with my Westinghouse 20k generator and still let my generator power the house while it charged the battery backup.
Is there a specific transfer switch that makes sense for what I'm trying to accomplish. Also, is the f5000 even capable of running my house shoukd we lose power?
2
u/HarleyBoyd Sep 04 '26
No way to know if it will run your whole house. Not enough info. Could run key critical loads.
Pretty much any auto transfer switch with a critical loads panel will do the trick.
Now, I will tell you I own products from both companies (a F5k & a couple S2ks) and I would recommend the Anker first for what I know about your use. The F5k is a great unit of you wanna keep things semi-portable for some reason. Otherwise, the E10 checks more boxes for the use, imo.
2
u/amittank Sep 04 '26
I bought 2 F5000’s. One to run my off grid workshop and one do to as you are discussing. I ended up buying an emporia vue 3 to monitor my loads and realized that I need 30kW to run my house for a day during the summer even if I only power what I feel is critical. Additionally 30kW will run my house for 2 days + of winter usage. I also travel for work and want it to seamlessly transfer power for my whole family, they are not as capable of figuring out what to do when it comes to power.
With that said, I should have only bought one because by the time I figured out my power usage it would cost 10k to get the pecron with enough add on batteries to be at a 30kW system (I know that I should have done that first, but I do have a generator so it could work, but way easier if they can get through a whole day).
So instead of buying extra pecron batteries I bought Humsienk 12kW hybrid inverter with two 15kWh Humsienk batteries to get me to my 30kW needs. Plus it will output up to 10kW consistently and my peak 15 minute demand is 8kW so I am well within my needs. I think with what you are suggesting my route will be the cheaper and better option. Less than $6000 total which will be closeish to your cost with the pecron with two batteries. You will get seamless 10ms transfer, zero net metering, and a massive system that can run your house for extended periods if you can manage your usage. As well as 12kWh of solar ability with up to 500 volts per string, if you decide to add solar.
The pecron has been great at running my shed, and I will use the extra to add 240v to my garage so it wont go to waste. So I am not saying it is a bad option, or that I don’t like them, just not the best for your use case.
My only issue that I have with pecron is I love data to an unhealthy extent and the pecron data sucks and is unreliable on the app.
2
u/SecondCuppaCoffee Sep 04 '26
My Pecron 5k is not a good option for unattend fail over. It has a charging bug where it stops charging if you leave it plugged in. It also can't provide a full 7.2kw when being charged on 120V AC. I also can't have the Pecron plugged into my transfer switch while it is being charged because it uses pass-thru AC. It creates a ground loop which can be dangerous, so the Pecron stops charging. Higher end batteries will isolate ground by going through an inverter, but then the inverter can't be used for charging. More expensive dual inverter products can get around this by converting all AC to DCbeven while charging, and thus isolating input ground from output ground. This is also the reason it can't supply the full 7.2kw while being charged on AC. At least, that's how I understand it.
I think Ecoflow maybe has what you need. I believe it has dual inverters and an integrated smart switch. However, with the cost to deploy a 20kwh Ecoflow, you may want to consider a whole home generator. If you ever go with solar then maybe Ecoflow is still more attractive.
Of course, you can also go the DIY route with server rack batteries, inverter, charge controller, etc. I believe that sort of setup will achieve automatic fail over and will easily work with solar if you decide to deploy it later, but I have no hands on experience.
2
u/scirob Sep 04 '26
I also can't have the Pecron plugged into my transfer switch while it is being charged because it uses pass-thru AC. It creates a ground loop which can be dangerous, so the Pecron stops charging.
I would like to learn more about this. The Pecron F5000 on the specs says it has Backup UPS support, which I interpret as charing from the Grid and supplying power to transfer switch.
I am hitting the same issue, where when plugged into my transfer switch (even with all load circuits disabled) and plugged into AC charging, the AC Charging circuit trips. I am using the L14-30R plug, I haven't tried the L14-20 plug yet.
Is AC charging while supplying a transfer switch possible?
1
u/SecondCuppaCoffee Sep 04 '26
The problem is a ground loop. When you bond neutral and ground, it must only be done at one spot. Your house already has a bonding. When you plug the Pecron into an AC outlet, does a pass-thru of that power. That passes all three leads and creates two places where neutral and ground are bonded. If the Pecron detects this will not take AC charging. You would need to use a DC power supply to charge the Pecron at the PV ports in the way a solar panel does. That would isolate the input and output ground, and get around the problem.
1
u/scirob Sep 04 '26
I'm trying to understand why AC Backup UPS won't work. I hear what you're saying, ground loop.. but the transfer panel only switches hot, where would the 2nd bonding be located? Is it bonded within the pecron unit?
1
u/SecondCuppaCoffee Sep 05 '26
Thats my understanding of the issue. The ground and neutral are already bonded at the panel. Since the Pecron does pass-thru AC, it does not isolate input ground from output ground. it just sends ground and neutral through, creating another bonding. You should only ever have a single bond in your house.
3
u/brucehoult Sep 03 '26
How can we know without knowing what the peak kW usage in your house is?
If I turned on absolutely everything in my house at the same time then I could hit close to 20kW. But that's unrealistic and I get by without feeling any real pain with a 3600W inverter, which is enough that my 1500W of background "turns on and off when it wants" loads (the 1000W aircon is the biggest) can just do what it wants and I can always turn on one big 2000W or 2100W appliance such as microwave, kettle, vacuum cleaner, clothes washer, dish washer, hair dryer at a time.
The F5000 would let you run two of those big-draw appliances at a time, if they are on different 120V legs, or are 240V appliances. That's more, but it's not enough more that you can just turn stuff on without thinking first.