SolaX Gen4 capping PV to prevent exporting when using remotecontrol (didn't previously)

[syserr0r]

I have a SolaX Gen4 inverter, battery storage and a bunch of PV panels.
This module is connected to a RS485 to Wifi adapter.

We've used this module for some time now and it has been invaluable to charge battery and prevent discharge to manage our grid use as we are on Octopus Agile.

Previously we managed this by setting the remotecontrol duration and activepower fields - if the battery wasn't full it would use the PV/grid to charge with any excess PV exported to the grid. When the battery was full it would not use the battery and again excess PV would be exported (this was useful as it ensured the battery wouldn't be used to supply the house as soon as it was full and keep it until later in the day).

I'm not sure what I changed or if this module changed, but exporting no longer happens when the remotecontrol is used. We had ~4.5kw PV today and when using remotecontrol in any fashion the solar reading immediately dropped such that nothing was exported (it would match the house load). As soon as I stopped the remotecontrol the PV (and export) went back up.

Thoughts:

• No idea when it happened as we haven't had much/any excess PV over the winter
• I wasn't sure when this change happened, but I have tried rolling back as far as the 2024.08.9 release with no joy
• I upgraded the firmware on the inverter over the winter (hopefully this isn't the cause of the issue as I doubt SolaX will fix it)
• I adjusted enough of the module settings to no longer be 100% confident what exactly they were when they were working

Key module settings that may be of note:

• Inverter mode: Self use
• Export Control User Limit 60,000 W
• Remotecontrol Active Power 3000 W (varies depending on how fast we want to charge the battery)
• Remotecontrol Power Control Enabled Power Control (also tried Enabled Battery Control and Enabled Self Use with no change to this issue)
• Remotecontrol Import Limit 20,000 W
• Remotecontrol Reactive Power 0 W (also tried 4,000 W)

Any help/suggestions on what might have gone wrong would be greatly appreciated.

[syserr0r]

To follow-up I have spoken with SolaX support over the phone who were surprisingly helpful.

Understandably they weren't sure they could help as this is an undocumented way of interacting with the system, but also because they can't see any of the setting changes remotely as they aren't written to EEPROM.

They had a newer firmware update than the ones available in the repo from this project's documentation that they applied and it seems to be working as expected it has unfortunately not fixed the issue.

For reference these are the parameters used:

• Remotecontrol Power Control: Enabled Battery Control
• Remotecontrol Active Power: 4000 (rate in watts at which to charge the battery)
• Remotecontrol Reactive Power: 4000 (unsure if this was needed but including for completeness)

The firmware version we are now on is DSP v1.48 and ARM v1.44
The firmware version prior to upgrade (with the original problem) was DSP v1.45 and ARM v1.42

[syserr0r]

Update: Now we have some good solar generation I can unfortunately confirm this does not fix the issue.

At this point I'm not sure what else to do, any suggestions welcome.

Edit: For now I have made an automation that reproduces this functionality by setting Remotecontrol Power Control to Enabled Battery Control while the Battery Capacity is below threshold and switch to Enabled No Discharge otherwise, which seems to replicate the previous functionality.