Isata 3 Freedom Edition Owners Only - Xantrex eGen System Log

[Judge64]

Looks like the incoming AC voltage lowpoint is adjustable in the inverter...

It is... I adjusted it to 104V before I was able to get the EMS installed.

 

[llwill]

As a side note from years of installing UPS in rack systems, inexpensive UPS was only good for a single use at or near max draw. Would last years if you do not exceed normal rating. Even very good units were only rated for X number of high current uses. If we are hitting max current draw more then 5-10 times I would be expecting unit failure. It takes a lot of engineering to control the thermal problems of max current for even 1 second or less and be able to repeat it often.

 

[Judge64]

As a side note from years of installing UPS in rack systems, inexpensive UPS was only good for a single use at or near max draw. Would last years if you do not exceed normal rating. Even very good units were only rated for X number of high current uses. If we are hitting max current draw more then 5-10 times I would be expecting unit failure. It takes a lot of engineering to control the thermal problems of max current for even 1 second or less and be able to repeat it often.

Thanks for your experienced commentary.

That would seem to support the situation where the compressor is running and shore power is removed. If the ATS isn’t fast enough to keep the compressor running, then the short cycle could cause a rotor lock situation as the inverter switches over. Then if Auto Recovery is enabled, the inverter will try 3 times to recover from the E03 error. That would mean three surges of 7000W in short successive order.

While maybe it doesn’t cause the inverter to fail immediately, it might be enough to weaken components leading to an eventual failure.

 

[burtbick]

Might be more Coleman’s than you think. Including myself, I know 4 others with the C-M. And we have all had inverter failures.

Since your in this deep, might be worth a discussion with C-M. They don’t put out an engineering document for every model but the 15K data I found seems to have a 7000W+ surge startup.

Ours also has the Coleman and we had the inverter fail.. For what that is worth..


Note I have an external PMS and when shore power goes away there is a 4-5 minute delay before the PMS will pass power to the coach when SP is restored. This is to prevent short cycling air conditioners.



Of course in the FE when shore power goes away the inverter kicks in quickly, but if that is too slow then you could get the much heavier short cycle current draw as others have pointed out. I don't know if a soft start would help in that case, unless the soft start effectively adds a short cycle delay.

 

[burtbick]

I wanted to add that on the first leg of our FL trip the alternator is once again not really charging the batteries.


2.5 hours of driving and only went from 71% to 75%. We stopped for lunch and ran the microwave and cook top and then drove another 2.5 hours and never got above 77%..



We are on shore power now and in a little over an hour we are at 99%.


When I checked the Alternator icon on the eGen display while the engine was running it appeared to have a capital 'H' in the middle of the icon. Not sure what that means, but the legend of the icons on the eGen doesn't show that icon with the capital 'H'.. So that may be a clue.


I've asked Xantrex what that icon indicates. But haven't heard back yet.

 

[Judge64]

Ours also has the Coleman and we had the inverter fail.. For what that is worth..


Note I have an external PMS and when shore power goes away there is a 4-5 minute delay before the PMS will pass power to the coach when SP is restored. This is to prevent short cycling air conditioners.



Of course in the FE when shore power goes away the inverter kicks in quickly, but if that is too slow then you could get the much heavier short cycle current draw as others have pointed out. I don't know if a soft start would help in that case, unless the soft start effectively adds a short cycle delay.

My EMS also does a 2 minute 10 sec delay as well but that doesn’t help with the short-cycle as you pointed out.

The SoftStart reduces the compressor start current draw. So in theory, it would also reduce the locked rotor amps of a short-cycle.

 

[burtbick]

My EMS also does a 2 minute 10 sec delay as well but that doesn’t help with the short-cycle as you pointed out.

The SoftStart reduces the compressor start current draw. So in theory, it would also reduce the locked rotor amps of a short-cycle.

I guess the question would be is it enough of a reduction to keep the inverter happy, and more importantly what impact it might have on the A/C/Heat Pump..

 

[Judge64]

I wanted to add that on the first leg of our FL trip the alternator is once again not really charging the batteries.


2.5 hours of driving and only went from 71% to 75%. We stopped for lunch and ran the microwave and cook top and then drove another 2.5 hours and never got above 77%..



We are on shore power now and in a little over an hour we are at 99%.


When I checked the Alternator icon on the eGen display while the engine was running it appeared to have a capital 'H' in the middle of the icon. Not sure what that means, but the legend of the icons on the eGen doesn't show that icon with the capital 'H'.. So that may be a clue.


I've asked Xantrex what that icon indicates. But haven't heard back yet.

Someone else posted… either here or on Facebook…. that they are also having Alternator Charging issues and they have the “H” error on the eGen Display as well.

Yesterday we drove 6 hours from Cape Coral to Flagler Beach. When I left home the batteries were at 44% SOC. Within 2 hours they were back to 98%. The last 2 hours I ran the A/C and the batteries were at 100% SOC when we got to our destination.


You definitely have an Alternator Charging issue. That is a bummer.

Let us know what the “H” code means once you know.

 

[burtbick]

Someone else posted… either here or on Facebook…. that they are also having Alternator Charging issues and they have the “H” error on the eGen Display as well.

Yesterday we drove 6 hours from Cape Coral to Flagler Beach. When I left home the batteries were at 44% SOC. Within 2 hours they were back to 98%. The last 2 hours I ran the A/C and the batteries were at 100% SOC when we got to our destination.


You definitely have an Alternator Charging issue. That is a bummer.

Let us know what the “H” code means once you know.

Yes, something is definitely up with it. So we will see what I hear back from Xantrex..


When this happened on our NY trip in October it was similar on the 2+ hour drive, but then a shorter 1 hour drive it topped off the batteries. Could be an intermittent issue with the Alternator or maybe even something with the new battery FW update since the batteries control the Alternator.

 

[burtbick]

I wanted to add that on the first leg of our FL trip the alternator is once again not really charging the batteries.


2.5 hours of driving and only went from 71% to 75%. We stopped for lunch and ran the microwave and cook top and then drove another 2.5 hours and never got above 77%..



We are on shore power now and in a little over an hour we are at 99%.


When I checked the Alternator icon on the eGen display while the engine was running it appeared to have a capital 'H' in the middle of the icon. Not sure what that means, but the legend of the icons on the eGen doesn't show that icon with the capital 'H'.. So that may be a clue.


I've asked Xantrex what that icon indicates. But haven't heard back yet.

Nothing back from Xantrex yet, but was looking at an old slide show for the eGen screens and on there it showed the alternator icon with the capital 'H' in it!! No explanation of course And the icon legend screen definitely does NOT show the capital 'H'...

 

[Judge64]

Nothing back from Xantrex yet, but was looking at an old slide show for the eGen screens and on there it showed the alternator icon with the capital 'H' in it!! No explanation of course And the icon legend screen definitely does NOT show the capital 'H'...

Hopefully you hear something next week before the holiday.

I would think that "H" would mean something like HIGH for high voltage or current.

I wouldn't think it means HOT. I would expect something like "T" for temperature related errors.

But you never know with software developers!

 

[burtbick]

Hopefully you hear something next week before the holiday.

I would think that "H" would mean something like HIGH for high voltage or current.

I wouldn't think it means HOT. I would expect something like "T" for temperature related errors.

But you never know with software developers!

I think that you are probably correct that it means High Voltage. The pack probably needs to be below a certain voltage before the alternator really kicks in. That's just a guess, but since you have reported charging rapidly from the alternator from a 10% or so point that may be the difference. Even though I would think that when at 70-71% or so should be low enough to kick the Alternator into high gear there just isn't much information on the details of how the batteries do mange the Alternator charging.


I did note that on the last leg of our trip it went from about 98% to 100%. But of course we also had abundant solar so....

 

[Bearii-FRF]

I wanted to add that on the first leg of our FL trip the alternator is once again not really charging the batteries.


2.5 hours of driving and only went from 71% to 75%. We stopped for lunch and ran the microwave and cook top and then drove another 2.5 hours and never got above 77%..



We are on shore power now and in a little over an hour we are at 99%.


When I checked the Alternator icon on the eGen display while the engine was running it appeared to have a capital 'H' in the middle of the icon. Not sure what that means, but the legend of the icons on the eGen doesn't show that icon with the capital 'H'.. So that may be a clue.


I've asked Xantrex what that icon indicates. But haven't heard back yet.

Yeah, something is definitely off there. I had to move our coach into a storage spot and ran the engine for less than 15 minutes and the battery charge went from 70% to 80% in that time - very impressive. I wasn't even fast idling, just normal idle for all but that last couple of minutes when I moved the coach from the camping spot to the storage spot at the campground.

 

[Larry-NC]

And...

A Locked Rotor is a compressor failure, so the AC will pull the 61 amps if the rotor is locked up...

And for a few seconds at startup before the rotor is spinning at rated speed. (Motors don't instantaneously reach rated speed, where there's enough "Back EMF" to reduce the current draw.)

 

[xrpb11a]

And for a few seconds at startup before the rotor is spinning at rated speed. (Motors don't instantaneously reach rated speed, where there's enough "Back EMF" to reduce the current draw.)

From what I understand, it's the combination of "Back EMF" and "Head Pressure" that causes the rotor to lock up for a few seconds and draw max current. The head pressure being high is due to the AC being "short started".
If you are turning the AC on after it being off for a couple of minutes, and the head pressure is at minimum, it should only draw about 2.5x the rated running current.
From what I understand...

 

[Larry-NC]

Instantaneous...

From what I understand, it's the combination of "Back EMF" and "Head Pressure" that causes the rotor to lock up for a few seconds and draw max current. The head pressure being high is due to the AC being "short started".
If you are turning the AC on after it being off for a couple of minutes, and the head pressure is at minimum, it should only draw about 2.5x the rated running current.
From what I understand...

Various types of motors can also be used as generators. if you spin them, they will produce electricity. And when they they are running under power, they produce a voltage that counters the line voltage. That's back EMF (EMF, electromotive force, is an archaic name for voltage). You probably knew this; I wrote it for other readers.

So, as you would expect, when the rotor is not spinning (locked, not producing back EMF), the current flow is much higher than the run current. When the motor starts, it doesn't instantaneously reach operating speed; it's more gradual. The effect is that current spikes, the gradually reduces to run current level as the rotational velocity of the rotor reaches rated operating speed.

Head pressure is definitely a factor; it slows (maybe stops) the acceleration to operating rotational velocity and makes it more likely that a breaker could trip. But here's an example where there was no head pressure. 40 years ago I boxed the bottom of my table saw and connected a shop-vac to it. I added an outlet to the table saw to plug the vacuum to, so they would start and stop together. I instantly blew the 20 amp plug fuse. No head pressure was involved, just two motors starting with no rotational velocity. In this case, a quick trip to the hardware store got me a 20 amp slow-blow plug fuse and the problem never recurred.

These days no one uses plug fuses any more; they've been replaced by circuit breakers. As you may know, circuit breakers used in panels have two tripping means: magnetic and thermal sensors. The magnetic trip acts in 8.33... milliseconds, one-half of a 60-cycle AC pulse. If the locked-rotor current exceeds the magnetic threshold, the breaker pops. As you would expect, the thermal trip takes more time for the breaker to heat up. It's dependent on the amount of overload current of course. It would not be unusual for a 150% load to take many minutes before the breaker trips. And it's dependent on ambient temperature, too.

 

[DJP2]

I wanted to add that on the first leg of our FL trip the alternator is once again not really charging the batteries.


2.5 hours of driving and only went from 71% to 75%. We stopped for lunch and ran the microwave and cook top and then drove another 2.5 hours and never got above 77%..



We are on shore power now and in a little over an hour we are at 99%.


When I checked the Alternator icon on the eGen display while the engine was running it appeared to have a capital 'H' in the middle of the icon. Not sure what that means, but the legend of the icons on the eGen doesn't show that icon with the capital 'H'.. So that may be a clue.


I've asked Xantrex what that icon indicates. But haven't heard back yet.

I have been emailing back and forth with Alex from Xantrex for the past couple weeks about the same issue, batteries not charging from the engine.
I also had the "H" symbol in the engine icon. This is what he said about it:

"When you get the engine symbol on the eGen display you will sometimes get an "H" or an "L" inside the engine logo. This signifies that the batteries are asking for a high charge or low charge. You will not always get one of these symbols but when you do this is what it means."

He didn't say how to give it a high charge, my guess is plugging it in to shore power for a couple days.

Has for not charging off the engine, we checked all the settings on the FXC app, then charged the batteries to 100% on shore power for about 2 days than ran them down to 15%. We drove it for 1.5 hours (36 miles) and the engine charged the batteries up to 64%.

This was what he said:

"My theory is that one cell got slightly out of sync with the other cells. The best thing for this would be to charge using shore. Shore is how we are able to balance everything with a continuous and reliable power supply."

I'm afraid plugging in to shore power may not be possible when we are traveling, after all the reason we bought this unit is to not have to rely on being plugged in.

ISATA3 eGEN FAQ

 

[Judge64]

I have been emailing back and forth with Alex from Xantrex for the past couple weeks about the same issue, batteries not charging from the engine.
I also had the "H" symbol in the engine icon. This is what he said about it:

"When you get the engine symbol on the eGen display you will sometimes get an "H" or an "L" inside the engine logo. This signifies that the batteries are asking for a high charge or low charge. You will not always get one of these symbols but when you do this is what it means."

He didn't say how to give it a high charge, my guess is plugging it in to shore power for a couple days.

Has for not charging off the engine, we checked all the settings on the FXC app, then charged the batteries to 100% on shore power for about 2 days than ran them down to 15%. We drove it for 1.5 hours (36 miles) and the engine charged the batteries up to 64%.

This was what he said:

"My theory is that one cell got slightly out of sync with the other cells. The best thing for this would be to charge using shore. Shore is how we are able to balance everything with a continuous and reliable power supply."

I'm afraid plugging in to shore power may not be possible when we are traveling, after all the reason we bought this unit is to not have to rely on being plugged in.

ISATA3 eGEN FAQ

I guess that makes some sense..... but I have a hard time believing the alternator can't provide a High charge. The Freedom X/C Pro 3000 is capable of 150A of charging current while the second alternator is capable of 280A.

If you get an "H" symbol, driving should be able provide plenty of current to get the batteries charged. Personally, I have seen the alternator bring up the batteries from a very low SOC back to 100% SOC in a few hours of driving on several occasions. I have even seen Xantrex documentation refer to the second alternator as a "generator" since its sole function is to charge the batteries.


Now when I bought my coach back in May, I kept getting a COV Fault on the drive home on of the packs and it kept disconnecting. I would reconnect the pack and then a little while later the COV Fault would occur and the pack would disconnect. When I looked at the individual cell voltages once was higher than the others by a couple tenths of a volt compared to the other cells. Xantrex did tell me to leave the coach plugged in for a few days to allow the cells to balance since the coach was new and it was sitting at the dealer not plugged in.

After a few days the COV Fault did stop occurring. What is interesting is that 6 months later when I have looked at my cell voltages they are all identical or maybe one cell is different by a couple hundredth. The other thing is my fully charged SOC would hang around 98% and I never saw 100% during the first month or two I owned the coach. Now I always see 100% SOC when plugged in or driving and the batteries get to a full charge.

I've assume all of that was a transition of the cells becoming balanced over time from use and charging. I didn't even have any issues with my batteries when I couldn't charge the batteries via shore power for 3 weeks when my Inverter failed and had to be replaced.


I'm surprised that if you and Burt have issues with balanced cells causing charging issues when not on shore power that you aren't getting a COV or a CUV Fault on the eGen. Especially if Alex said you may or may not get the H or L on the eGen Display. If you truly have cells out of balance that means a cell is too high or too low and it should cause a COV or CUV fault and the BMS should disconnect the pack to protect the battery.


It sounds to me like there could be some isolated battery issues out in the field... especially after I had some cell balance issues when the coach was new then after 6 months of use and some regular access to shore power my cells have been all very equal and I consistently see 100% SOC after charging. Brian C did say that Xantrex wanted to replace Rev A batteries that were in the field so maybe this has something to do with this issue.


Maybe the eGen and BMS firmware for cell voltage monitoring spec is a bit too tight.... or perhaps the cell chemistry and design require very tight specs. I don't know for sure but I agree that this is a system designed for off-the-grid use so the alternator... or even solar.... should be able to provide battery charging unless there is a critical fault in the system.

 

[DJP2]

I guess that makes some sense..... but I have a hard time believing the alternator can't provide a High charge. The Freedom X/C Pro 3000 is capable of 150A of charging current while the second alternator is capable of 280A.

If you get an "H" symbol, driving should be able provide plenty of current to get the batteries charged. Personally, I have seen the alternator bring up the batteries from a very low SOC back to 100% SOC in a few hours of driving on several occasions. I have even seen Xantrex documentation refer to the second alternator as a "generator" since its sole function is to charge the batteries.


Now when I bought my coach back in May, I kept getting a COV Fault on the drive home on of the packs and it kept disconnecting. I would reconnect the pack and then a little while later the COV Fault would occur and the pack would disconnect. When I looked at the individual cell voltages once was higher than the others by a couple tenths of a volt compared to the other cells. Xantrex did tell me to leave the coach plugged in for a few days to allow the cells to balance since the coach was new and it was sitting at the dealer not plugged in.

After a few days the COV Fault did stop occurring. What is interesting is that 6 months later when I have looked at my cell voltages they are all identical or maybe one cell is different by a couple hundredth. The other thing is my fully charged SOC would hang around 98% and I never saw 100% during the first month or two I owned the coach. Now I always see 100% SOC when plugged in or driving and the batteries get to a full charge.

I've assume all of that was a transition of the cells becoming balanced over time from use and charging. I didn't even have any issues with my batteries when I couldn't charge the batteries via shore power for 3 weeks when my Inverter failed and had to be replaced.


I'm surprised that if you and Burt have issues with balanced cells causing charging issues when not on shore power that you aren't getting a COV or a CUV Fault on the eGen. Especially if Alex said you may or may not get the H or L on the eGen Display. If you truly have cells out of balance that means a cell is too high or too low and it should cause a COV or CUV fault and the BMS should disconnect the pack to protect the battery.


It sounds to me like there could be some isolated battery issues out in the field... especially after I had some cell balance issues when the coach was new then after 6 months of use and some regular access to shore power my cells have been all very equal and I consistently see 100% SOC after charging. Brian C did say that Xantrex wanted to replace Rev A batteries that were in the field so maybe this has something to do with this issue.


Maybe the eGen and BMS firmware for cell voltage monitoring spec is a bit too tight.... or perhaps the cell chemistry and design require very tight specs. I don't know for sure but I agree that this is a system designed for off-the-grid use so the alternator... or even solar.... should be able to provide battery charging unless there is a critical fault in the system.

I can see with normal use for 6 months the batteries would condition themselves and equal out.
We haven't had normal use of ours in the past 6 months.
It spent the first 2 months in the dealers service department. We had it for the month of August and than the next almost 2 months back at the dealership and then at the factory.
We got it back at the end of October and used it a couple of times.
It'll be going into storage soon, I won't find out till spring if that was the issue or not.

 

[Judge64]

I can see with normal use for 6 months the batteries would condition themselves and equal out.
We haven't had normal use of ours in the past 6 months.
It spent the first 2 months in the dealers service department. We had it for the month of August and than the next almost 2 months back at the dealership and then at the factory.
We got it back at the end of October and used it a couple of times.
It'll be going into storage soon, I won't find out till spring if that was the issue or not.

That's a bummer......

If you're having to store in a cold climate, you won't be able to keep it plugged in to see if the batteries finally stabilize.

Don't know if you have access to shore power in your storage but if you can put a heat lamp in the battery compartment and leave it plugged in for a couple weeks while you monitor the cell voltages, it make help give you some peace of mind before you shut things down till spring.