raydas
Solar Devotee
Posts: 166
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Post by raydas on Sept 12, 2019 12:24:42 GMT
I missed RJ45, XT90 and external battery connection in the manual. Does that mean the battery itself has to have an XT90 and RJ45 connection built in. I did not see, on the Renogy site, any cables that could be used to attach to the battery, that would then attach to the XT90 and RJ45. I think the manual also mentions that you could use an SLA battery.
mediadogg, what version of the Lycan do you have? The reason I ask, I went to ebay, and there is a listing for a Lycan, but it looks like it has some differences from the one that Renogy has on sale today. I wonder if Renogy is getting ready to introduce a new model.
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Post by mediadogg on Sept 12, 2019 14:27:36 GMT
A new version? Now THAT would be interesting, especially if they put some of the stuff in that I want. I bought my first one during the crowd funding campaign as an early adopter. I bought my second off eBay. They appear to be absolutely identical in form and function. The product ships with everything you need, You don't need to buy any cables or attach anything. If you buy a spare battery, it comes with the RJ45 and XT90 cables required for external attachment. The Lycan ships with a kits of various cables for attaching solar panels, charging from an auto cigarette lighter port, and charging an external SLA battery. It comes with everything. And there are pictures and explanations of most of what I just said in this manual. See pages 5, 6 and 7. The only mods that I have made are (1) the Type C / USB 3.0 cigarette lighter adapter I mentioned, and (2) I made my own solar panel attachment cable. The Renogy one is so thick and heavy that I couldn't use it in my setup. So I made a more flexible cable, still sized quite well enough to handle the current. |
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raydas
Solar Devotee
Posts: 166
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Post by raydas on Sept 12, 2019 14:46:22 GMT
One of the reasons that I would need something like a Lycan, is to power the sump pump that is in the basement. The sump pump is a 1/3 HP, 110AC model. When it is raining outside, it does turn on quite often. You don't happen to have a sump pump in your basement? I am wondering how a Lycan would work with a 1/3 HP sump pump, that turns on quite often, for test run of 24 hours. I could probably plug the Lycan into an AC outlet, but during a power outage, it would have to depend on the battery.
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raydas
Solar Devotee
Posts: 166
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Post by raydas on Sept 12, 2019 15:07:43 GMT
If somebody could verify this for me, in the Lycan manual, page 5, the details picture, front main panel, it shows 4 110AC outlets. But in the product description it specifies 3 110AC outlets. So which one do you get.
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Post by mediadogg on Sept 12, 2019 15:29:15 GMT
If somebody could verify this for me, in the Lycan manual, page 5, the details picture, front main panel, it shows 4 110AC outlets. But in the product description it specifies 3 110AC outlets. So which one do you get. Interesting. Anyways, I am definitely staring at 4 in front of me right now.  This was originally a crowd funding thing, so they definitely went through some design rework that could have easily caused a mismatch in the print material that nobody caught before full production. |
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Post by mediadogg on Sept 12, 2019 15:37:59 GMT
One of the reasons that I would need something like a Lycan, is to power the sump pump that is in the basement. The sump pump is a 1/3 HP, 110AC model. When it is raining outside, it does turn on quite often. You don't happen to have a sump pump in your basement? I am wondering how a Lycan would work with a 1/3 HP sump pump, that turns on quite often, for test run of 24 hours. I could probably plug the Lycan into an AC outlet, but during a power outage, it would have to depend on the battery. I don't have one, but I have a good friend that does. Based on his experiences (and we talked a lot about his backup system as he was building it), and my exxperience with the Lycan, I would NOT recommend the Lycan for that application, for the following reasons: (1) Sump pumps take a huge surge on startup. We all saw this with my second AC experiment, how the Lycan would not take the surge, even though it could easily handle the running rate of less than 500 watts. My friend discovered this, even though we had carefully picked out industrial strength inverter / ATS and a huge battery. His sump pump tripped the breaker on startup, and we had to use a bigger inverter. (2) The Lycan needs to be manually reset whenever it gets unhappy. There is no remote control, wired or wireless, my main issue with its design. You do not want to be away from home, with water in your basement, with the Lycan shut down and not being able to restart it. Those are my opinions, based on experience. Sorry for the bad news. |
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Post by mediadogg on Sept 12, 2019 15:48:52 GMT
Now that Renogy is making some inverter / chargers with built-in ATS, you might want to start looking at those. Add a big battery, and a solar hookup for icing on the cake. Along with some kind of remote alarm or camera, which most people with sump pumps have, one of those inverter / charger / ATS units with a massive deep cycle battery, is a pretty reliable way to go with modern technology. I am salivating over monsters like this. Would have made my life a lot simpler if I had this kind of capacity, quality, features and price in one package, a few years ago when I started building my systems. Oh well ... |
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Post by mediadogg on Sept 12, 2019 18:50:20 GMT
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raydas
Solar Devotee
Posts: 166
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Post by raydas on Sept 12, 2019 19:30:13 GMT
I am now looking into the Renogy 2000W inverter/charger, to bad it does not have a built in mppt CC. I wonder how many AC outlets you could wire up and still be functional. The interesting part is how to calculate how much battery power you would need, plus expansion.
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Post by Admin on Sept 12, 2019 23:41:56 GMT
I missed RJ45, XT90 and external battery connection in the manual. Does that mean the battery itself has to have an XT90 and RJ45 connection built in. I did not see, on the Renogy site, any cables that could be used to attach to the battery, that would then attach to the XT90 and RJ45. I think the manual also mentions that you could use an SLA battery. mediadogg, what version of the Lycan do you have? The reason I ask, I went to ebay, and there is a listing for a Lycan, but it looks like it has some differences from the one that Renogy has on sale today. I wonder if Renogy is getting ready to introduce a new model. There will be only 1 Lycan version. As for your question the LFP battery will need both cables to hook up to the Lycan, not the external SLA one. |
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Post by Admin on Sept 12, 2019 23:43:34 GMT
Now that Renogy is making some inverter / chargers with built-in ATS, you might want to start looking at those. Add a big battery, and a solar hookup for icing on the cake. Along with some kind of remote alarm or camera, which most people with sump pumps have, one of those inverter / charger / ATS units with a massive deep cycle battery, is a pretty reliable way to go with modern technology. I am salivating over monsters like this. Would have made my life a lot simpler if I had this kind of capacity, quality, features and price in one package, a few years ago when I started building my systems. Oh well ... We have come out with a newer unit: www.renogy.com/2000w-12v-pure-sine-wave-inverter-charger-w-lcd-display/ |
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Post by Admin on Sept 12, 2019 23:44:49 GMT
I am now looking into the Renogy 2000W inverter/charger, to bad it does not have a built in mppt CC. I wonder how many AC outlets you could wire up and still be functional. The interesting part is how to calculate how much battery power you would need, plus expansion. We are exploring inverter chargers with solar integration. At the moment, we just have a 50A DCDC with alternator/starter battery and solar integration. www.renogy.com/dcc50s-12v-50a-dc-dc-on-board-battery-charger-with-mppt/ |
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Post by mediadogg on Sept 14, 2019 17:45:50 GMT
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Post by Admin on Sept 16, 2019 22:31:00 GMT
This will not work, the 48V internal Lycan batteries requires a communication port. -Renogy Team |
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Post by mediadogg on Sept 19, 2019 15:48:29 GMT
Really appreciate the support. I now have another question.
As the charging port for both solar PV and 12V auto are the same, does that mean that Lycan can accept a DC voltage at that port up to the maximum specified solar VOC (I think 50V)? I know there is an MPPT controller that manages the solar PV input. Is there logic that actually switches the MPPT in or out depending on whether the input is above expected cigarette lighter plug voltage (12 - 14V)?
In other words, can I safely charge Lycan with a DC input other than the cigarette lighter adapter as long as the voltage is below 50V (if not 50, then what)?
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