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I bought my GS6 strictly for emergency use so it stays off most of the time. Today I had a power outage and had a very hard time turning on my unit. I had roughly 52v in my blank and whenever I would connect my pre charge resistor (a forklift light bulb) the main board fan would start to ramp up even though the inverter's power button was off. Even if I let it ramp up and turn the dc power on, I could not get the inverter to power on, the fan would just stay at full throttle and the button would light up green but absolutely no screen activity. It took maybe 20 to 30 tries of connecting the bulb, waiting for the fan to come to a stop, waiting a few extra seconds and repeating until finally the fan DIDN'T turn on and I was able to power the unit on and it seemed to function properly.
Interesting scenario. When you say the "main board fan would start to ramp up", was it just the one fan--or was it both fans? And "ramp up"...just part way, or all the way to full speed?
When the power button would light up green, I am assuming that it would produce AC output on the terminal block?
If so, I'm 99% sure I know what the issue is.
When you say the "main board fan would start to ramp up", was it just the one fan--or was it both fans? And "ramp up"...just part way, or all the way to full speed?
It was just the one fan and I believe it was ramping up to full speed.
When the power button would light up green, I am assuming that it would produce AC output on the terminal block?
I didn't test that but I can try to recreate the issue and test it out once this storm passes (don't want to risk shutting the inverter down and not being able to power it back on right now)
I also use a lamp for precharge
Because the control circuits are run off a switching supply, they actually keep it from coming all the way up to voltage through the lamp
I wait until the lamp dims a bit and throw the battery switch on
The power button is a soft control, not a hard break, so it tries to power up until reaching operating voltage in the control board
When the power button would light up green, I am assuming that it would produce AC output on the terminal block?
I did confirm today that there is in fact voltage on the output terminals when the inverter is having the previously mentioned issue.
When the power button would light up green, I am assuming that it would produce AC output on the terminal block?
I did confirm today that there is in fact voltage on the output terminals when the inverter is having the previously mentioned issue.
OK, so that means that we're dealing with a malfunctioning processor on the LCD board (which also controls the fans). They're powerful little processors, but every now and then, one of them becomes a bad banana and randomly won't start--which is causing the issue you're experiencing. The solution unfortunately is to replace the LCD board.
The solution unfortunately is to replace the LCD board.
What would the next step be? I have very little soldering experience so I assume swapping the board myself is out of the question? I assume I can remove the entire lcd unit easily and ship that in for repairs without having to send the entire inverter in?
They actually just plug in other than the battery wire screw terminals
He is referring to the complete display unit
The solution unfortunately is to replace the LCD board.
What would the next step be? I have very little soldering experience so I assume swapping the board myself is out of the question? I assume I can remove the entire lcd unit easily and ship that in for repairs without having to send the entire inverter in?
Swapping the whole LCD board, yes. It takes a hot air gun to replace the processor; that's completely out of the question!
I'll pull together a replacement board here after the holidays, and we can get the problem solved thataway.
@cali-carlos I've gotten a replacement LCD screen pulled together. Now to do just a tad of firmware tweaking for another customer (give the LCD board some good testing!) and I'll be able to get the replacement LCD screen shipped out to you.
Just a quick update on this. Sid sent me the new LCD a while ago and I just got a chance to swap it over the weekend (wasn't in a big hurry being as I was able to power the unit back on last time and was keeping dc power on it the whole time just incase. After a little trouble updating the firmware we got it to update and all seems to be working well.