Hooking up a Sunny Boy 2500TL to the net
Posted by jpluimers on 2016/01/22
Out of the box, the BlueTooth equipped Sunny Boy models (the non network connected ones) can be monitored from your PC using the SUNNY EXPLORER software. But that has quite a few drawbacks:
- The software is Windows-only.
- It is not network connected.
- The Sunny Boy aggregates historical data, so after a short while you loose the details it aggregated from.
There are scripts and apps that to download data via Sunny Explorer or directly over bluetooth and even export it to PVOutput.org a site that collects and publishes PV statistics. They even have a nice region donut about world wide performance.
Some ways to do this:
- Windows: sma-uploader – VB Script to upload PV data from SMA inverter to pvoutput.org – Google Project Hosting.
- Android: Inverter Reader – Android Apps on Google Play is free, but requires a physical menu button which modern Android devices lack. Some other apps have problems with this as well.
- Android: Felix Solar PV Log – Android Apps on Google Play which is EUR 9, but has a lot of options and is in active development.
- Windows: pvbc / PV BeanCounter — Bitbucket: the PV BeanCounter Software supports SMA Inverters via Sunny Explorer.
Note: PV BeanCounter understands the Currentcost EnviR power meter, and the Currentcost Optismart works with Landis+Gyr ZME120ACd (and many other power meters too). Which means I can use PV Beancounter to watch my power consumption as well.
Cloud based Sunny Portal
There are two ways to connect to the cloud based SMA Sunny Portal. There are is an Android app and an iOS app connecting to the portal
Easy way:
- Get a SMA Speedwire network interface Webconnect module (Europe: model SWDM-10, USA: model SWDM-US-10)
- Connect to the Sunny Portal.
- Register your Sunny Boy using the PIC and RID identifiers on your network interface module.
The cool thing: all Sunny Boy equipment produced from October 2014 up come with Webconnect; too bad by SB 2500TL ST-21 was just a few months too old. If you live in the USA, the even younger and one model bigger models 3000TL and up have now have Secure Power Supply.
Slightly more difficult way: more expensive, superseded by the easy way.
- Get an RS-485 interface (for Europe: model DM-485CB-10, for USA: model DM-485CB-US-10).
- Get an SMA WebBox module (for Europe: model SWebBox-BA, for USA: model SWebBox-BA-US).
- Connect the SMA WebBox to the Sunny Portal using the Sunny WebBox Assistant (now called SMA Connection Assist).
Note: WebBox should be able to do ModBus too.
Do it all yourself without the cloud
Then there is the do it yourself way that gives you more insight (not just multi-string aggregates).
It’s also the hard way using the built-in BlueTooth and a stack of software to do it yourself.
There are a couple of choices to get started software wise:
- Linux only
TD22057/T-Home:
T-Home – Home automation integration
Source: https://github.com/TD22057/T-Home
It’s based on SBFspot: - Linux and Windows
Yet another tool to read power production of $MA solar inverters – Home:
SBFspot is an open source project (Windows & Linux) to get actual and archive data out of an inverter over Bluetooth or Ethernet.
Source: sbfspot.codeplex.com/ (in the past it was called SMA-spot and hosted at code.google.com/p/sma-spot; it will move to github.com/sbf-/SBFspot and has a fork on github.com/Papafox/SBFspot)
It’s based on NanodeSMAPVmonitor: - Linux
stuartpittaway/nanodesmapvmonitor:
nanodesmapvmonitor – Nanode to monitor a SMA PV Inverter over Bluetooth
Source: https://github.com/stuartpittaway/nanodesmapvmonitor
I got most of the above from Best way to monitor SMA SunnyBoy inverters? – Solar Panels – Solar Panels Forum.
For instance you can use SBFSpot for connecting to PVOutput.org on PV generated power:
PVOutput.org – share, compare and monitor live solar photovoltaic output data
Source: PVOutput
PVOutput.org supports WebBox out of the box, but for WebConnect you will have to do a bit more work.
SMASpot Monitoring in Domoticz – Domoticz explains how to use SBFSpot with Domoticz.com
Domoticz is a lightweight Home Automation System
Source: Domoticz
–jeroen
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