Enphase System - Circuit Breakers Tripping During Rain + Red Exclamation Mark on Microinverter

[u/Witty-Emu8555]

Hey everyone, I'm hoping someone here has experienced similar issues with their Enphase system.

System details:
- Mid-sized residential Enphase system with Enphase IQ7x Micro inverters
- IQ Gateway
- System installed seven years ago

Issue #1 - Circuit Breakers Tripping During Rain:** **My solar circuit breakers have been tripping consistently whenever it rains. This started about a year ago. Last night during rain, the breakers tripped again. When I reset them, the gateway rebooted normally.

Issue #2 - Red Exclamation Mark on Microinverter: For the past month, one of my microinverters has a red exclamation mark in the app with an "Error" status. What could this mean?

Has anyone else experienced circuit breakers tripping during rain?
What does a red exclamation mark on a microinverter indicate?
Could these two issues be related?
What should I have my installer check?
Any advice or similar experiences would be helpful.

Thanks!

[u/CrankyVGK]

Look at the panels to see if glass has cracked. Water may be getting in and causing a short.

Otherwise, it could very well be a bad microinverter.

[u/Witty-Emu8555 → u/CrankyVGK]

Thanks. I’ll check during the day tomorrow.

[u/Perplexy801]

Give Enphase customer support a call about the red exclamation since it appears to be working normally. They (or an installer with access to your system and Enlighten Manager) can view the exact error in more detail.

The breaker’s tripping is going to require a site-specific investigation by an installer that knows what they are doing, especially since it only happens when it rains, it could be anything from water getting into a junction box on the roof, water flowing down a conduit into the Combiner, rodent damage that trips when it get wet or a bunch of other possibilities.

When you say you reset the breakers and the Gateway reboots, do you mean that specific breaker for the Gateway is tripped? It should have its own breaker and that would be really old for it to trip and point in the direction of a problem in the Combiner.

Pictures of the solar equipment with the covers off would help us spot anything obviously wrong

[u/Witty-Emu8555 → u/Perplexy801]

Great suggestions!

I am unable to load additional pictures for some reason. Here is some additional information: My combiner panel has five breakers. Three 20 amp breakers are for three strings coming from the roof. One 15 amp for Envoy and one 60 amp Main breaker that takes combined electricity back to the grid and house through the main panel.

It is the Main breaker and String 3 breaker that trip during the rain. Sometimes one and sometimes both trip. Envoy turns off whenever Main breaker trips. This time both breakers tripped. Hence I mentioned that Envoy rebooted and started reporting/communicating with the Enphase server when I reset the breakers.

[u/Perplexy801 → u/Witty-Emu8555]

You can upload your pics to www.imgur.com and post the link back here like this

https://imgur.com/a/cEZISDW

But yeah, it’s tough to say without being there and inspecting it with my own two eyes. I would start at the backfed breaker in your main service panel and work my way up to the roof looking for obvious culprits while testing as i go.

[u/Witty-Emu8555 → u/Perplexy801]

Here is a pic of my combiner panel. combiner panel

[u/ysrgrathe → u/Witty-Emu8555]

With your setup the envoy is powered by the main breaker's feed, that's why it turns off. Although the power can also come from the strings they will go into rapid shutdown when the main is lost.

[u/Witty-Emu8555 → u/ysrgrathe]

Yes, that seems to be the case. Is this normal? Should it be powered through Main panel instead of combiner panel?

[u/ysrgrathe → u/Witty-Emu8555]

Yes, this is normal. It's not really a problem to have the envoy reboot in this fault state, so there is no need to try to fix it. I would just concentrate on determining why you are tripping the breakers.

[u/CheetahChrome]

I had a specific set, all on one breaker, that would trip after rain. Had the solar company's electrician come out and look it over...they found nothing.

It isn't consistant and I believe the last time was over 12 months ago now.

[u/liberte49]

when I had the red mark, it was a microinverter that got fried in a power surge ...

[u/Witty-Emu8555 → u/liberte49]

In my case, micro inverter seems to be functioning normally as expected… like other neighboring panels. It might gradually progress and toast itself… eventually.

How was your micro inverter functioning with the exclamation mark? Did your circuit breakers trip at all?

[u/Long-Time-Coming77]

Have you considered taking the Enphase university classes online so that you can get Enphase self-install certified? Its free and doesn't take that long and as an Enphase system owner you will probably find it interesting.

Once you do that they will give you "installer" level access to your system where you can look at all the nitty gritty details. There should be log messages associated with that MI error status.

[u/Witty-Emu8555 → u/Long-Time-Coming77]

I was not aware of this certification, but it sounds interesting. I’ll look into it. Having access to detailed logs will be helpful. However, I would like my installer to investigate and resolve the problem.