So the best I can do for right now is using a smart plug that monitors energy consumption.
The smartplug was showing 591w vs the 577w from the unit
The smartplug went to 0.81kWh with a runtime of 89 minutes
I had a oil filled portable heater set to low as the load.
Charging settings from AC is either slow (218w), medium (558w) or fast (782w) wattage reported from the unit display. Now these values are from a dead battery. I will play with these again once the battery gets to over 20% charge to see if these values pick up a little bit.
*edit: once the battery is above 15%, the device on fast shows 996w from the device screen and 971w through the smartplug from the wall socket. So there is some kind of protection there when the battery drops below a certain level to not be able to charge it too quickly
Next full charge I will test the UPS functionality and see if the switching is fast enough for office desktop, screen, QI charger, Google Home screen thingy. All plugged into a standard cyberpower powerbar.
Following up with a switching test as described in my previous post. I could not get the devices to turn off, flicker or otherwise show any signs of loosing power whatsoever. The entire setup remained operational while removing the utility power from the Phoenix 1000. At first I would remove, wait 10 seconds and apply utility power once again. after doing this 5 times, I went to about 5 seconds intervals, same result. And my final test I just went crazy with it and unplugged and replugged with a 1 second interval and not a single blip. This result is quite satisfactory especially given that Renogy is not marketing the device as a UPS given its 20ms switching time.
studio65 wrote: ↑
Good news for the UPS fonctionnality.
Maybe you can test with another electric device to see if you can get closer to their advertised 998wh capacity.
0.81kWh with a runtime of 89 minutes , would give around 1200w/h right?
Semms like you were able to charge it to 96% in about an hour..
there is a new behavior that I noticed as well. I observed when the device was at 48% that the fast AC charging was pulling over 1100w from the plug but by 80% it drops down quite a bit to top off. Honestly I would have imagined Renogy marketing to use that higher value as a highlight but they did not. almost seems like they used an average charge rate from 0-100% and used that value. So again their marketing so far is on point.
I am currently testing at about 250w now using various devices connected to it to see if the result.
studio65 wrote: ↑
The app on your phone is monitoring your smart plug?
How do you change the charging setting?
Good thing that the charging rate is adjusted according to tha SOC of the battery.
It should also slow down as it approach the end of charging cycle.
All settings for the device are through the Renogy app. there is nothing on the device itself.
The smartplug I use the app for the plug.. The Kasa app in this case to monitor what the plug is seeing versus what the Renogy is telling me
studio65 wrote: ↑
Good news for the UPS fonctionnality.
Maybe you can test with another electric device to see if you can get closer to their advertised 998wh capacity.
Typically you will get 75-85% power out because of inefficiency losses in the 120VAC and USB inverters.
So 750-850Wh out would be expected.
In fact in Rand McNally they wear hats on their feet and hamburgers eat people
Comment or observation, can this be used as a power conditioner when using a gas generator?
I bought a great generator about a year ago at Costco. I was going to buy an inverter generator for $1700 but a Firman Trifuel at $879 was hard to pass up. Thankfully have not needed to use it. Power has gone out many times but was back on within reasonable time frame. However, the THD still worries me a bit. Was looking for a long time for pure sine wave conditioners, or even UPS but saw that even the UPS may not run properly because of THD.
This unit seems to have no issue with THD for input and does have pure sine wave outlets. Can it run like a UPS for all the sensative equipement with no worries? It would be fridges, furnace (electronic boards). And of course router and laptop (to keep working). Will THD stop the unit from charging off generator?
And maybe a better question, will it charge battery and still allow output at same time?
Last edited by Paulie1RFD on Jan 5th, 2023 7:12 pm, edited 1 time in total.
I agree with you , plus those Lifepo4 battery should not be discharge below 20% in an ideal world , to preserve longivity ,
but then who knows what technology will be available in ten yeays ,
this will probably become obsolete before , so might as well beat the hell out of it while it works.
Quentin5 wrote: ↑
Typically you will get 75-85% power out because of inefficiency losses in the 120VAC and USB inverters.
So 750-850Wh out would be expected.
That would be a poorly designed inverter. High end ones are 90-94% efficient.. Plus good manufacturers take the loss into account and have that extra capacity in batteries (they advertise usable capacity). I have no idea if Renogy is one of those manufacturers though.
Paulie1RFD wrote: ↑
Im about to pull the trigger on this or a different smaller wattage unit currently on sale at Canadian Tire. Different battery too.
Curious on the downvotes. Is Renogy a bad manufacturer? Or why the downvotes?
As far as i kow they make quality product , i have a 100ah lifepo4 battery since 18 months and it never failed on my , and will prows on youtube openned one up and we could tell how well they are made.
Paulie1RFD wrote: ↑
Im about to pull the trigger on this or a different smaller wattage unit currently on sale at Canadian Tire. Different battery too.
Curious on the downvotes. Is Renogy a bad manufacturer? Or why the downvotes?
There is no equivalent stuff at canadian tire , this is way superior in every ways.
Paulie1RFD wrote: ↑
Im about to pull the trigger on this or a different smaller wattage unit currently on sale at Canadian Tire. Different battery too.
Curious on the downvotes. Is Renogy a bad manufacturer? Or why the downvotes?
There is no equivalent stuff at canadian tire , this is way superior in every ways.
travellerw wrote: ↑
That would be a poorly designed inverter. High end ones are 90-94% efficient.. Plus good manufacturers take the loss into account and have that extra capacity in batteries (they advertise usable capacity). I have no idea if Renogy is one of those manufacturers though.
90%+ efficiency is uncommon and expensive.
Power station companies almost always tell you battery capacity.
In fact in Rand McNally they wear hats on their feet and hamburgers eat people
