I have a watchmon that I have been using for a few years. Earlier this year, one of the blockmons went out (would read random temps) prompting me to replace all four blockmons. The system has been working great until about a month ago. Now, I get all four blockmons voltages dropping to near zero (the last one was 0.662V). This is causing random disconnects. It only happens for about a few seconds and resets. I was hoping that someone could help me troubleshoot this. Forgot to add that I’m on firmware 2.17.57.0
Thank you. I ran a network test. Everything came back good. If I do a reboot of the watchmon, the problem stops for a about a week and then returns. I’ll try moving the cables around to see if that does anything. The weird thing is that the voltages drop (not to 0V and communication never goes away. The system never goes into critical either. I recently upgraded the firmware. I’m not sure if the problem started after the update though.
It has been 3 days post reboot and not problems. I checked all the cables and I’m not getting any errors. I’m afraid the same is going to happen in a few days. Is this a hardware issue with the watchmon? Again, when the problem happens, the voltages drop to less than 1V but greater than 0V
Each BlockMon measures the voltage independently, so all your BlockMons are not going to fail at the same time.
When it happens post a picture of the page
"Menu , Telemetry , Cell Info "
Are you shore it is not a large load overloading the battery.
is the watchmon powered from the same battery.
if it is can you power it from a different source.
The watchmon is powered by the house battery. It is independent of the LifePO4 bank. I’m not sure I can capture that screen since this happens momentarily (lasts seconds). It usually happens when the system is idle. It seems like it doesn’t matter how much charge the batteries have when this happens. Usually happens with over 50% SOC. I have been rebooting the system everyday or other day and haven’t had the event happen. My other computer that logs all of the data shows when it happens. If I don’t reboot the system, it’ll happen up to 4x per day.
I’ve been running a couple of Watchmons w/Longmons for several years now and had 2 different issues.
In the home DIY powerwall case with Watchmon4 + 140 longmons I’ve had ‘freezes’ at individual longmon(s) and this has invariably been 'loose connection’s. It seems to correlate with a strong changes to hi humidity - e.g. after a day of really heavy/hot rain kind of thing. In each case I’ll I’ve had to do is wiggle the connector at the longmon - so it’s like the physical connection just get’s a little bad over several years? and the humidity change kicks it over the edge? It only happens once a year so it’s not fatal as far as ongoing operations.
I also have a 2nd Watchmon5 w/24 longmons in a travel trailer battery. A particular longmon works OK except when balancing at the higher voltage range and it suddenly varies wildly as the voltage it’s reporting. Changes from 4.1v to 2.2v and back within a few seconds… sounds similar to what you’re seeing. In my case it happens when balancing - e.g. when heat is applied? to the longmon? Fortunately I don’t need to balance very much so I live with it (disable the shunt-trip) while balancing for a few days and then turn Auto Level off.
So ‘loose connection’(s) and heat->bad-longmon? seem to have been the source of my issues over the last 7 yrs. It’s not good if you have ongoing trouble every day or few days - renders the system inoperable at a practical level.
Does this happen during balance (heat)? or just all the time? Can you start by wiggling all the wiring? Then maybe move on to replacing a couple of blockmons?
Thanks XXXX. I’ll try wiggling all of the connectors. I have to drop the batteries to do that. I tested the wires coming out of my closed system and everything seemed fine. The heat thing might make sense. I’ll look into that as well.
This was today. using 5-10A the entire day. As you can see, all 4 blockmons dipped 3x. The interesting thing is that each blockmon is in a separate battery box and independent. I’m going to tear the whole thing apart next week.
Yes I do. I’ll take a picture the next time the event happens. It usually happens during a low current event. Each of these cellmons are connected to 5 180ah cells in parrallel. It takes a lot to bring them down.
My Raspberry Pi setup had an SD card failure. No monitoring until I get it fixed. I was able to drop all the batteries. Everything looked good. I replaced the Isomon while I was there with an extra one that I had. So far. 5 days and no disconnects.
