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Hi,
I have 1 of my 2 Orion XS chargers that stopped charging before the battery reached 100% and set the output voltage to 16.2V (see picture attached). The Orion has been working fine in the last 3 weeks. Other Orion is charging on the expected voltage (13.8V). What could cause this or is this expected behavior in ‘external control’?
The setup:
Lynx smart Bms
Cerbo
2x Smartlithium 12V
Orion XS 50A - VE direct connected.
Multiplus 1600VA
Do you have the OrionXS connected to a GX device? And if so, what is the version of the GX firmware?
Do you also have VE.Smart networking enabled on the Orion XS?
Kind regards,
Thiemo van Engelen
Hi Thiemo,
The Orion is connected with a v.e direct to a cerbo GX with firmware version 3.33. There’s no Smart network activated, besides monitoring on my phone over bluetooth.
Kind regards,
Christiaan
VictronConnect_report.logFollowing up on above thread, issue still persists, Orion is not charging and sets the output on >16v. Included the service report, hope someone can clarify this issue/bug.
Please check the connections/fuse between the Orion and battery. Probably a break in there somewhere.
Hi Kev,
I did check this, no issues found.
Kind regards,
Christiaan
I've just observed the same behavior. My setup is such that a WS500/Alternator charges the House Battery and the Orion XS is used to charge the Starter Battery from the House Battery. I usually don't have the Orion XS connected to the Cerbo GX but this time I wanted to check something and it exactly did what you described: The Orion XS was switched to External Control (kinda expected) and it was attempting to charge at 16.2V (unexpected). Where is that magic number (16.2V) coming from?
Hi @rkapsi
What firmware version is running on the GX device?
Do you also have VE.Smart networking enabled on the Orion XS?
Kind regards,
Thiemo van Engelen
Hi,
When the OrionXS is configured as charger and DVCC is enabled on the GX system, the output of the OrionXS should be connected to the main battery that is controled by the GX system. The reason is that it is being controlled by the GX system and following the charge state that is used for the main battery. When the output is connected to a secondary battery, either DVCC should be disabled, the OrionXS VE.Direct needs to be disconnected from the GX system or the OrionXS should be set to power supply mode (when possible as it then no longer follows a charge cycle but outputs a fixed voltage).
Kind regards,
Thiemo van Engelen
Hi @Thiemo van Engelen (Victron Energy staff) ,
In this situation there are 2 alternators charging 2 independent lead acid batteries (1 start engine, 1 windlass). Both these lead acid batteries feed an Orion XS, which charges the main battery bank (2x Victron Smart Lithium). Both the Orion XS’ are connected with a V.E. Direct cable to a cerbo GX. 1 Orion is working as expected and charging the battery, the other is setting the charge voltage to 16.2V.
The case that you’re describing should not apply to this situation, as I understand it. Do you agree? If so, what could be the issue? Should the device be returned and checked?
Kind regards,
Christiaan
When the sensing device is connected to a different battery (which has a lower voltage), the Orion XS tries to overcome this voltage difference by increasing the charge voltage. This additional voltage saturates at 2V, if you have your absorption set to 14.2V, you'll see 16.2V, this is where this magic number comes from.
See a description in the manual about disconnecting a battery sense, it has a similar result: https://www.victronenergy.com/media/pg/Orion_XS_12-12-50A_DC-DC_battery_charger/en/operation,-configuration-and-monitoring.html#UUID-d7cc20d3-6eaf-ca50-953d-b202a2162473
I am observing the same behavior reported here. I see Thiemo's reply above – if this is the case, this should really be disclosed on product information BEFORE purchase, that the GX functionality (which is one of the primary benefits of the Orion XS over its predecessor) only works if the starter battery is charging the house bank. Not the other way around. This is really disappointing from Victron and should be fixed. We need to be able to tell the GX device which bank the Input/Output of the Orion XS is connected to, so that it can update the behavior accordingly. Or at least give us a way to opt the Orion XS out of DVCC without disabling it for the entire system! Truly shocking situation we are in here...
I needed a few days to think about this. In my opinion there are two bugs in the whole decision process. The Orion XS takes blindly the decision that it's charging the House Battery. And it blindly increases the Voltage +2V if the data is all wacky because it isn't connected to the House Battery.
The Orion XS shouldn't assume anything based on whether a VE.Direct cable is plugged in or not. Ask the User: What am I charging? This will determine everything else like if DVCC is even an option. Secondly the Orion XS needs to respect the User's maximum voltage and under no circumstances increase the voltage blindly at the output terminals. It has no clue what's going and no knowledge about the physical setup that would require such voltage drop compensation.
In my case the Starter Battery is actually a 500F Supercapacitor Module. It has a maximum nominal voltage of 16V and maximum surge voltage (before it explodes) of 17.1V. I was initially charging it to 14.2V (to match the House Battery) but have lowered it to 13.5V to stay clear of the +2V offsetting. The Orion XS, House and Starter Module are within < 40cm of 16mm^2 cables of each other. There is no voltage drop the Orion XS needs to overcome.
While not exactly related to the 16.2v bug mentioned in this topic, I wanted to alert all Orion XS users to another bug that has surfaced when using Orion XS to charge the Engine battery from House bank: https://victron.discourse.group/t/orion-xs-not-charging/418
Basically, once you connect Orion XS to CerboGX via VE.Direct, the Orion changes some internal settings which breaks charging. The first symptom is that you will experience the 16.2v bug described in this topic.
Once you unplug the VE.Direct cable as a result, the behind-the-scenes settings persist, and your Orion will no longer charge until you do a factory reset on it. It will "appear" as though it's charging as normal, but 0 amps and 0 watts will flow.
Beware!
