question

Hi Jonathan

At the outset, let me state, we are big supporters of Freedom Won. We've got 400+ FreedomWon batteries in the field and we're still heavily invested in their products, buying 2-5 batteries per week from eTower to 80/64.

For the first few years, we had very few issues - all software and none hardware.

From late last year and intensifying in Q1-2 this year, we've had a boatload of hardware issues on FreedomWon batteries (and the old firmware issues). We've performed hardware repairs on a long list of batteries which are are currently compiling to submit to FreedomWon to help them understand the scale of the problems.

We now have a "Battery Day" on a nearly weekly basis which we did not have in the past. This is to attend to maintenance issues. The technical support team at Freedom Won are overwhelmed and they say as much. We often spend hour(s) waiting for them onsite with laptop connected and online on AnyDesk.

Freedom Won cannot accuse us of dropping them. We've taken on the task of doing our own hardware repairs so the experience for customers is better than us having to remove the battery and shut their system down until a third party can repair it.

But, in our opinion, none of that should be happening. The batteries should be robust as they were in the past and the support should be sufficiently scaled and capacitated to meet the requirements of the installed base. I know of at least two very large installers of FreedomWon who have been told by FreedomWon that they're the only ones experiencing problems.

Freedom Won has a track record of not communicating with its customer base (crucially installers). It is high time they changed that and I have personally raised their communication failures with them and asked them to improve that.

To better serve our growing customer base, and after a lot of research, we have added BYD to our offering and are delivering BYD where customers are less sensitive to the 'look' of the solution. Our sales team is still selling FreedomWon as the primary solution in the residential space. It is crucial to us that we have another option in case of serious manufacturing delays as we've had issues with on a few occasions of the recent past. And, I guess, in the long run if the quality and support issues are not resolved, we'll probably move the majority of our solutions onto BYD.

That's us.

Hi @Jonathan , there has been a recent uptick in posts from members having unstable systems attached to FW batteries, though from a forum view it’s not easy to tell where the issue is. I know of other (new) packs all reporting SOC drift.

Hi @Jonathan , I have a FW 10/8 installed with an MPII since early March 2022. The battery has performed very well so far and I haven't had any issues. As part of my legacy equipment (from the days of lead-acid batteries) I still have a BMV-712 connected to the system and can confirm that SOC estimation (especially during slow charging) is terrible. The attached graphs show SOC from the BMV-712 on the left and from the FW on the right for the same time period.

I've learned to live with this since I know to read SOC from the BMV-712 (even have the small display still mounted next to the inverter) and the battery is charging correctly (charge voltage limit drops in line with the BMV-712 reporting SOC > 98%).

Thank you! This is brilliant! It in fact confirms our suspicions that this is a built-in flaw with the Freedom Won batteries, and that no amount of firmware updates and settings tweaks can "fix" a hardware problem.

Dear Jonathan

The SoC jump is related to a slight current sensor inaccuracy. This only happens on some sites with Victron inverters. We did establish that the challenge is related to the sensor's difficulty with processing the wave form on the DC bus that is delivered by the Victron inverters. Freedom Won has a software fix for this issue, which needs to be deployed on sites that display this phenomenon. We do not deploy the fix on all batteries because the fix is only applicable to sites that display the issue. From September 2022 we will be using a new type of current censor that will be better suited to dealing with all scenarios.

We were forced to use a new sensor at very short notice last year because of the chip shortages. The previous sensor we used for many years was simply not available. The new sensor is similar to the original sensor.

Please do reach out to us on support@freedomwon.co.za if you have any other sites displaying this problem.

Regards

Antony

from what i see, these Freedom Won batteries, use the same "Pace-BMS" as BSLBATT does.

I have had the very same SOC-jumps during charging on my BSL´s.

But there is a new BMS-firmware available now, that fixed this issue.

Since latest update a few weeks ago, those rapid SOC-jumps are totally gone. Now SOC calculation seems realistic.

The eTower uses a PACE BMS, but this thread is referring to an isolated SoC jump occurence on the Freedom Won LiTE range, which uses the Orion Junior 2 BMS with an external hall effect current sensor.

Apologies for posting on an old thread but it seems to be detailing the exact issues I am having with my Freedom Won LiTE 5/4.

Disclaimer: I am a customer and not an installer, nor do I have the technical knowledge on these setups ;)

I have been having SOC issues on an adhoc basis (sudden loss of charge down from 60% or 80% to 10% in a matter on minutes with no real load < 250w), then whilst out of the province visiting family this week I start getting Low Battery Voltage errors followed by No BMS error notifications from my victron system.

My installer is away on Christmas break and my neighbor was kind enough to pop to my house to take a look.

The battery had tripped so we went through the process of switching on the BMS again and reseting + clearing error codes before putting the breaker back up.

All started operating fine again but a few minutes later the BMS triggered the low voltage errors again and tripped the battery. So I asked my neighbor to just switch the main breaker over to run on grid and bypass the inverter system for now until I can get home next week.

The gauge on the battery display once switched back on shows charge at 100%…

There were voltage changes Freedom Won tech support walked my installer through 2 months ago to try solve the SoC & cell imbalance problems but these seem to have not solved / or caused a different issue?

My installer needs to book it in with Freedom Won when they open in January for assessment but until then my home is back on grid without backup…

However, I am not seeing any answers from Freedom Won on this issue (nor is my installer) which is very concerning as an end customer. If they have not resolved this nor communicated the exact nature of the problem + solution I don’t see how one can place any trust in their products + brand if the whole point of the installation is to have reliable backup power…

Hoping someone has feedback on this?

We are the distributor for Freedom Won in NZ.

There are a few points I would like to note here:

The problems with SOC "slide" or inaccuracy is certainly not unique to Freedom Won batteries. I have seen it with multiple batteries, inverter systems and battery monitors. From what I can gather (Antony may be able to clarify this) the main reasons the Freedom Won batteries sometimes experience this slide are:

A, Cell imbalances. The SOC calculation uses the maximum cell voltage when charging and the minimum cell voltage when discharging (along with current). So if the battery cells are not balanced the max/min cell voltages may be far enough apart that a recalibration is triggered. Check the VRM Max/Min cell voltages as a start point, make sure the SOC is reaching 100% regularly and for extended periods of time. Generally in an ESS situation the SOC can stay under 100% for long periods if the battery is small and the load is large, in this case make sure "optimised with battery life" is enabled under the ESS settings and also try setting to "keep batteries charged" for a week or so to balance the cells. Then as a last resort update the Firmware to the latest version. Cell imbalance can also be the reason for the shutdown problems depending on the inverter settings. In a couple of rare cases I have seen it trip the battery MCB.

B: DC ripple will definitely cause a problem with some current sensors. Some inverters and installations will not experience ripple as much as others. Factors such as the inverter typology and size and attached loads can cause different amounts and types of ripple. Again, a Firmware update may fix this but talk with the FW Factory or your distributor first preferably (they may have the fix already without bothering the Factory - that's partly what they are there for!).

C: Occasionally I have seen the comms cable get disconnected or the terminals get corroded or the customer fiddling with the settings in the GX. The GX device then reverts automatically to the Victron Inverter for it's battery monitoring (if battery monitor is set to automatic in the GX device - there are pros and cons to doing this). One good feature of Freedom Won is that if it loses comms to the system it will STAY ON and run stand alone indefinitely. The later Victron FW updates mean that the MPPT will likely stop charging (I don't like this but I can see the logic) but the system will keep running on the inverter and MPPT setpoints for as long as the voltage and currents are within Freedom Won BMS tolerances. The BMS will protect the battery by turning off if there is a problem. In the case of corrosion the BMS comms may come back online and drop out causing the SOC to suddenly change it's reading as it changes from the Inverter to the BMS and back - but this is rare.

Firmware updates are the way to go if no other changes help - they definitely 'can' fix the hardware issues we have seen so far - preferably do this via your distributor through remote access so they can be done in your timezone (not South Africa's) and again so that the tech support load matches the supply chain as it should. We have had excellent support from Freedom Won and have had a very good run considering how many of them are being installed. In one case we had a firmware re-write for a specific problem completed in less than 48 hours.

Hi @Jonathan

I'm hoping this messages raeches you seeing this is an old thread. Last week I upgraded my Deepcycle battery bank to a FreedomWON eTower. Only one. Running 48/5000 Multi with CerboGX.

I've been having the Battery Low errors and constant battery Shut Down especially when Grid Drops for loadshedding. The battery would then just switch off and shows ALARM. SOC was 100% and loads <800W at the time of failure.

I've today contacted Support and the same Rudene support Engineer is currently investigating my issue, however not much can be done without them either seeing the battery physically, or me collecting and installing the Remote Support Cable from FW.

Is there currently any UPDATE/SOLUTION on what you've experienced? Is a 'global' software update not required on my eTower? Production Date on the battery State Aug '22.

Kind Regards,

Dawid.

Very useful insights here....Im in the process of upgrading to LiFEPo and have been doing a reseacrh for over a year and i had arrived at two choices based on results of my research - Freedom Won and Pylontech. I guess my mind is 90% made up now between the two.

Hi @Jonathan,

Experiencing similar issues here in the South Pacific.

We install the LiTE HOME range. 5/4,10/8 and 15/12 with Victron MP, MPII and Quattro's

SOC drift, under-voltage cut off with SOC at 30-40% and the big one at the moment, parrallel batteries not syncing correctly.

Hoping some solutions will come, not holding my breath.