question

zanshin avatar image
zanshin asked

Phoenix Inverter and external power

If I have a "live" 230V AC power supply (e.g. shore power or generator) supplying current, can I have a Phoenix inverter switched on and also connected to the same 230V AC circuit?

I have a 230V AC breaker/switch that lets me choose from shore power or generator as the source of AC. I would like to hook up a phoenix inverter on the "generator" circuit without installing another 2-way AC breaker, meaning it could happen that I have the inverter turned on when the generator runs and supplies AC current. I see in the manual that the phoenix has "230VAC on inverter output" as a protection but am not sure if that means it is OK to do this or that is very unwise to do this but the inverter will deal with it. Seeing that several Phoenix inverters can be placed in series to augment supply, I am leaning towards thinking that the Phoenix has no trouble with this, but would like to confirm.

inverter current draw
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2 Answers
Daniël Boekel (Victron Energy Staff) avatar image
Daniël Boekel (Victron Energy Staff) answered ·

Hi @Zanshin

Please don't try this, you have a big chance of damaging things.

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zanshin avatar image zanshin commented ·

Thanks for the response, I guess the "230VAC on inverter output" in the manual is not meant for constant use but only for a mistaken connection. I am replacing a Quattro which does have a 230V input and a 230V output so I will then use the circuit with a breaker and leave the extra one unconnected.

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Matthias Lange - DE avatar image
Matthias Lange - DE answered ·

For what you want to do you need a MultiPlus instead of a Phoenix.
There you have a AC-IN where you can connect the generator/shore.
Than the Multi can synchronize it's own sine-wave to the generator/shore and than switch over and pass-trough the generator/shore to the loads.

"Seeing that several Phoenix inverters can be placed in series to augment supply,"
In that case the Phoenix' are connected together via VE.Bus to synchronize the sine-wave.

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zanshin avatar image zanshin commented ·

I currently have a Quattro with that functionality that is about to die. I also have a 100A Centaur charger so didn't want to duplicate charger by replacing the Quattro with an inverter. But as luck would have it, the 24V/5000W/230VAC Phoenix inverter that I'd ordered via Victron in the USA shrunk during shipping and I only got a 24V/500W/230VAC charger. While significantly cheaper, it is far too small. So I decided to go for redundancy and order a new Quattro. And then I can just replace like-for-like and don't have to add new circuit breakers.

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