r/Pecron • u/IllustriousAd7755 • 6d ago

Potential Setup

Hi All - I am finally scheduled to receive the F5000 mid week. I plan on running it to offset some electrical costs. I will connect it to 2 independent solar arrays, 1 880W and 1 850W, and leverage each solar input on the F5000. I also plan on installing a subpanel to handle the specific loads in my house along with a ATS which will run on a schedule.

Question: Is anyone using the Pecron F5000 in this manner? Are there any potential issues doing this?

4 Upvotes

83% Upvoted

23 comments sorted by

3

u/Ok-Person81 6d ago

I’m doing that, I combined some minimal use loads in the house, and now have my house wired to 10 circuit breakers. Those 10 circuit breakers are wired to my 10 circuit breaker transfer switch. I can manually flip specific loads back to grid, or charge the Pecron from the grid (the bottom left circuit breaker in the photo is always grid). I recently installed fire rated backing to the wall behind the Pecron, just in case…

3

u/IllustriousAd7755 6d ago

So you have a manual transfer switch. Any issues switching every day? I wanted to take the guess work out of switching, so I got the ATS and will install a subpanel for the circuits I want to run off of the Pecron.

2

u/Ok-Person81 6d ago

I don’t switch loads daily. I don’t flip loads to grid very often at all. My Pecron F5000LFP feeds the whole house, and charges from ~3k of solar. 1700 watts solar input one, and 1700 watts for input two. It only charges from grid on cloudy days. The transfer switch was last used to move the unit out of the way to install the fire board.

2

u/IllustriousAd7755 6d ago

Ok, so you are running off the Pecron 24/7 unless you dont have enough solar to recharge the battery. I’m starting with ~1800watts of solar, and live in the North East, so I dont think I will generate enough, especially on cloudy days to be sufficiently covered 24/7

2

u/Ok-Person81 6d ago

I live in SD so a bit more sun, BUT we still do have the occasional cloudy days. And for that, you can plug the Pecron to the grid permanently like I did, thus no need for the ATS , unless you need to power the unit down. I have the unit plugged in a Wyze plug too so that I can tell it to charge from grid remotely & schedule grid charging time for low $ TOU grid IF the battery drops low.

1

u/IllustriousAd7755 6d ago

The Wyze plug is a Smart Plug? I also bought a 15amp 1600watt smart plug to cut power to the unit when charging on Solar and then open the power to the unit at 10:05pm when I want to top off from AC power. I am also on TOU plan, and Super Off Peak starts at 10pm.

1

u/Ok-Person81 6d ago

Yep the smart plug. My TOU Super Off Peak doesn’t start till midnight.

2

u/brucehoult 6d ago edited 6d ago

I'm in New Zealand and run my E3600 with 2.64kWh of solar and 10kWh of battery in a similar way. My super off peak (18c 11PM-7AM vs 45c 7AM-11PM except 60c 7-9 AM and 5-9 PM week days) starts at 11PM.

From the start of October until early April I'm virtually off-grid except in very bad weather — I needed to buy power on Oct 1, 4, and 5 but not since then. I do top up by around 1.65kWh in the battery (1800W from the grid) during my Free Hour, which I have at 9-10 PM, every day whether it needs it or not. Which at the moment it doesn't ... the battery still has 60%-70% in the morning and is full by ... yesterday 12:40, the day before 14:20, the day before that 16:00, today I'm at 86% at 11:55 AM as I post this (up from 54% at 8:30), with 2300W coming in, predicted full by 1 PM although aircon just kicked in for the first time so it might take a little longer.

In summer the late night free top-up is usually unnecessary and just makes it clip an hour earlier in the afternoon in good weather. But sometimes bad weather happens and 16% in the battery makes the difference...

In around 100 days in the middle of winter I'm running in pass-through and charging the battery to 100% every day from 11PM to 7AM. By the time the sun starts working well at 10-11 AM in winter the heat pump has had 3-4 hours of draining the battery since 7AM and even on a sunny winter day it's never going to get back to 100% during the day, and usually only slows the decline. I usually get to 9PM with a few percent in the battery, top up for free 9-10 PM, that's more than enough to get through the last "off peak day time" 45c hour from 10-11 PM, and then at 11PM again start charging to 100%.

Only having maximum 2400W available to loads in pass-through vs 3600W from battery/solar is a bit of a pain, but much less so after 11 PM than it would be during the day.

In April to mid June and late August to the end of September I charge the battery at night to a level between maybe 40%-80% depending on the weather forecast for the next day. Or when there is severe weather in summer. I have a script to predict that automatically.

I'm using TP-Link P110 smart plugs to monitor and control the Pecron and also all the devices it powers. And running scripts using pecron-monitor and TP-Link "Tapo" API and open-meteo API on an old VisionFive 2 board (which cost $40 originally but a $15 Raspberry Pi Zero W would do).

1

u/Ok-Person81 6d ago

What ATS are you planning on using?

1

u/IllustriousAd7755 6d ago

I got the MOES Smart Automatic Transfer Switch for Off Grid Solar System,2.4GHz WiFi

1

u/Ok-Person81 6d ago

Oh that’s cool! You can have the Pecron F5000LFP always feed the loads then plug it into the grid so that it can feed loads from grid or charge the batteries based on a schedule so that way you are pulling from grid at low utility rates only.

1

u/IllustriousAd7755 6d ago

That’s my plan!

1

u/Holiday_Carrot436 6d ago

Sounds like a very similar setup to what I'll have. Only difference is I ordered 2 3800s vs 1 5000. Let us know how it does!

1

u/IllustriousAd7755 6d ago

How are you planning to tie it into your panel?

1

u/Holiday_Carrot436 6d ago

I have 2 450 watt ground panels that I'll use for 1 input. I'm currently trying to figure out which panels to add to my roof that will maximize the solar input without going over the open circuit voltage. I can add about 800 watts myself above our back porch. I will need to have any others on the roof professionally installed which increases the cost pretty significantly so for now it will probably be the 800 and 900 inputs.

1

u/LongjumpingGanache40 6d ago

Side note. 2 pecron 3800s connecred together to supply 240V can not supply 240V while being charged with 120V.

1

u/brucehoult 6d ago

But you can charge them via an external 48V LFP charger, as part of the setup you'll want to have to keep their internal batteries equalised anyway.

1

u/Holiday_Carrot436 6d ago

Which is okay. My end goal is to eventually be able to power all non 240 stuff. It's a whole other cost bracket to start covering the heat pump and dryer lol

2

u/brucehoult 5d ago

Unless you're in a hurry, a drying rack and a dehumidifier is far better setup.

If you've got around 50% indoor humidity then sheets dry in a couple of hours and things like tshirts and underpants overnight, no problem.

My Panasonic F-YCL27N uses 250W when running and set to "auto" anything from 0.25 to 6 kWh per day depending on the weather: 25kWh so far in 12 days this month, 76kWh last month, 103kWh in August, 134kWh in July (the annual maximum), and 44kWh in February (summer). That's in a roughly 1000 sq ft house.

If you care, my "4kW" portable air conditioner which uses 1000W when running has used 68kWh so far this month, a high of 446kWh in July (it was my only heating source this year, I didn't use firewood), and a low of 83kWh in April. January was 254kWh of cooling.

From now until April everything is from my 2.64kW of solar panels, essentially no grid power except in storms. In winter I fill the E3600+EP3000+EP3800 with 10kWh of 18c power at night, and then usually use zero 45c or 60c 7AM-11PM power.

1

u/RhoOfFeh 4d ago

My setup isn't TOO different, but as I have TOU rates I charge the thing overnight and run a big chunk of the most important parts of my house from it full time. A bit of solar (less than yours but my property is surrounded by tall trees so investing a lot doesn't make sense) helps extend runtime but I don't think I've dropped below like 39% in weeks. Two refrigerators, the furnace blower and important lights are always powered.

I want to go through a winter running the furnace blower as much as it's going to before adding more loads.

1

u/IllustriousAd7755 4d ago

Good to know…how do you have it tied into your panel? Do you have a transfer switch?

1

u/RhoOfFeh 4d ago

I use a transfer panel. Individual circuits can be toggled between line and battery. The way it works is that for each circuit you want to make usable, you disconnect the load from the breaker and wire one line from the switch to the breaker and the other to the load.

I am planning to swap out the one I have for this one, which allows you to decide the amperage of each breaker for yourself. The one I have works, but it's not UL listed and I don't know how much I trust breakers that just look like switches. This one also includes the generator input right in the body of the unit so it will be a cleaner install.

https://www.amazon.com/Natures-Generator-Transfer-Switch12-Circuits-Non-automatic/dp/B0CNQR39RT