How does your inverter act?

[Robby]

Sence we have moved back to Mobile it seems that we are looseing the inverter more often.We have a Freedom inverter and 3 times in the past few weeks we are not doing anything to cause the E-5 backfeed error message or the E-10 Low voltage message.While cooking breakfast yesterday morn Bren blew the shore power master and I watched as I reset the breaker and it E-5ed on me.Soooooooo I go down to the ER removed the block and wires and power from the inverter.We ran the genny all night to make sure we have a good charge and I just put it all back togather and everything is fine.We have thought that Thunderstorms could have caused a line surge and now I am wondering just how much power we are getting to the boat.Comments please and all of the 4 8D batterys are new.

[Pascal]

Not sure what you mean by "how much power we are getting to the boat". What do your volt and amp meter show? I find that having good digital meters in a place where they can be easily seen is a critical troubleshooting tool which often allows you to prevent problems.

Is the e10 low voltage error a low DC voltage error (low batteries) or is it a low AC input alarm to tell you the inviter switched to inverter mode?

If its DC then it s easy to check the voltage on the battery bank to see if the batteries are low or if its an issue inside the unit.

If it s the AC voltage that low, then the inverter will switch to inverting, but again your panel meter should tell you if voltage is above the inverter kick in point

[Robby]

Not sure what you mean by "how much power we are getting to the boat". What do your volt and amp meter show? I find that having good digital meters in a place where they can be easily seen is a critical troubleshooting tool which often allows you to prevent problems.

Is the e10 low voltage error a low DC voltage error (low batteries) or is it a low AC input alarm to tell you the inviter switched to inverter mode?

If its DC then it s easy to check the voltage on the battery bank to see if the batteries are low or if its an issue inside the unit.

If it s the AC voltage that low, then the inverter will switch to inverting, but again your panel meter should tell you if voltage is above the inverter kick in point

Just wanting to kow whats comng into the pole at the dock.I;ll check it.The inverter is not in use when this happens.the charger is on but the inverter is off .If when this happens as we use DC on the boat it will deplete the batterys.It will not auto switch with low A/C voltage.I plan on having the whole thing rewired but now we are working on the a/c you've read about.Plus a new Bemeni cover next week.E-10 is low D/C E-5 is Backfeed.

[Pascal]

The way is should work is like this... With AC power on (shore or gen) the inverter works in charging mode. Then it senses power is either disconnected or falls below a preset value (likely around 100v) it should switch to inverter mode automatically. Assuming it is wired as per Xantrex instructions.

Again the key here is know what happens to your voltages, both coming into the boat, but also on your battery bank.

Do you have a separate inverter bank or do you power the inverter from the house bank?
Do you have another charger on board for the house bank if separate from inverter?

[Robby]

The way is should work is like this... With AC power on (shore or gen) the inverter works in charging mode. Then it senses power is either disconnected or falls below a preset value (likely around 100v) it should switch to inverter mode automatically. Assuming it is wired as per Xantrex instructions.

Again the key here is know what happens to your voltages, both coming into the boat, but also on your battery bank.

Do you have a separate inverter bank or do you power the inverter from the house bank?
Do you have another charger on board for the house bank if separate from inverter?

We have 4 8Ds for the inverter and 2 4Ds for engine starting.The charger and inverter are one box with a link 2000 controller. It will not self initiate.As soon as I can get thru my ac issue I'm going to get Brent our Marine tech to chec out the install.Bill never was happy with it but It got them around the loop.

[Bill Root]

For what it's worth, when I had the Xantrex inverter and Link 2000 panel put in, I had zero knowledge of how inverters worked, so I pretty much followed the recommendations of Bill Goldie, the tech who installed it.

Mr. Goldie explained that I could have it set up to come on automatically when AC power was lost, or I could set it up to be turned on manually when I wanted it. His recommendation was that since we were not real comfortable trouble shooting electrical issues, and were about to embark on a 6,000 mile trip through many states and Canada with widely varying power quality, we would be better off with the manual system; one less thing to worry about. Sounded good to me at the time. So, he set it up so that in order for the inverter to work one has to flip a switch on the breaker panel, then go to the Link 200 panel and select "invert" and/or "charge" to charge the batteries. The bad news is that if you forget to turn off the master breaker on the breaker panel or turn off the generator before pushing the "invert" button, you get a backfeed and the inverter/charger shuts down. If I had it to do over, I would definitely set it up top come on automatically

Sorry Robby!

[Pascal]

That is a dangerous, irresponsible way to install an inverter... Hrd to believe a professional electrician didn't figure out that all he had to do prevent back feeding is install a double breaker with safety slide. This would only allow one source to be selected at a time yet provide for manual operation

I suggest you get it done asap. Back feeding can damage inverters.

Manual or automatic is a matter of preference. The problem with auto mode using the built in transfer switches is that if the inverter fail, it may leave you with no power at all until you manually disconnect the inverter. The better installations use a by pass circuit so that you can bypass the inverter Nd its automatic transfer switches in case of failure

[Robby]

For what it's worth, when I had the Xantrex inverter and Link 2000 panel put in, I had zero knowledge of how inverters worked, so I pretty much followed the recommendations of Bill Goldie, the tech who installed it.

Mr. Goldie explained that I could have it set up to come on automatically when AC power was lost, or I could set it up to be turned on manually when I wanted it. His recommendation was that since we were not real comfortable trouble shooting electrical issues, and were about to embark on a 6,000 mile trip through many states and Canada with widely varying power quality, we would be better off with the manual system; one less thing to worry about. Sounded good to me at the time. So, he set it up so that in order for the inverter to work one has to flip a switch on the breaker panel, then go to the Link 200 panel and select "invert" and/or "charge" to charge the batteries. The bad news is that if you forget to turn off the master breaker on the breaker panel or turn off the generator before pushing the "invert" button, you get a backfeed and the inverter/charger shuts down. If I had it to do over, I would definitely set it up top come on automatically

Sorry Robby!

I'M not looking for an apogily.It is what it is and its a PITA.Of all the things on this boat its a small thing that we need to deal with.We love you guys hope to see you soon next week we hope!!

[Boatnut]

Good deal, it turned out to be a simple solution. It's a boat so now you can get on to the next puzzle. That's why we name them after ladies, you'll never figure them out or keep up with them. LOL