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Forum Index : Electronics : Burnout of chinese controllers
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gpalterpower Senior Member  Joined: 19/07/2009 Location: AustraliaPosts: 175 |
Hi all, Well I started with my solar system just on 2 years ago. From humble beginnings with one Kw array and a small 200Ah/24v battery bank, a 60A Chinese controller and a power star inverter, was my first step for going off grid. A few more batteries and 2 more kws of panels along with more of the same controllers I was off grid from sun up to 8pm at night. Later with more panels, controller and a huge fork lift battery plus a home build PJ inverter I was off grid. Yay! The problem with the controllers is that they run hot. Even with just 40A into a 60A controller they get hot. So with the introduction of some fans keeps thing in tow. Still they occasionally burn out a FET and the thing runs flat out. Its an easy fix. Take it apart and solder in a new one. I did that last week and reconnected it. Working well  After going up stairs later for lunch I could smell smoke. Raced downstairs to find them on fire...not one but all of them. Eeeek! Seems the lowest controller caught on fire and ignited the 2 above it. Not a pretty sight. The hose was the only option, which got things under control. The Meltdown  Will be venturing into one of the controllers made by Madness. Marcus if it aint broke dont fix it!! |
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| brucedownunder2 Guru  Joined: 14/09/2005 Location: AustraliaPosts: 1548 |
Oh Damm , Sorry for you Marcus,what a mess. So , why did the incoming fuses not blow ,surely they would have seen a short .earier than the fire??. thank God you were home , install a fire alarm above and have a remote sensor upstairs, or, these days into your mobile phone? Gee mate ,you were lucky . I'll let you settle down a bit before I (we) start the questions. Bruce Bushboy |
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renewableMark Guru Joined: 09/12/2017 Location: AustraliaPosts: 1678 |
I had one of those years ago on a little setup I had out the back to charge up a 12v fridge battery, it got so hot it worried me. I ran epever after that with no problems, still have one in my caravan. They have a monster heatsink on the back that covers the entire area. Like this Cheers Caveman Mark Off grid eastern Melb |
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| gpalterpower Senior Member Joined: 19/07/2009 Location: AustraliaPosts: 175 |
The 2 on top were like this  .I had one Kw running thru each one. one facing north and one facing west. they were the ones that used to give problems and fixed with the occasional FET replacement. The controller which I believe burnt out was the third one down from the top. Its an 80amp programmable type, so I set the voltage lower than the 2 controllers above. Most of the time it should of been idle until something big was turned on! So I had a little more power going thru that one. One Kw facing east and one west. It had been running that way for at least 8 months. It wasnt until I recently added another 0.5 Kw North that probably tipped the scales. All 3 arrays were on their own individual circuits with breakers so I guess each individual breaker didnt see an overload or short. Didnt think it would catch on fire...and yes lucky I was home although the flames didnt reach the floor above....but the smoke sure did. Still smells. Anyway.....good lesson learnt. Dont buy the cheap stuff and dont overload it either. And yesss.. definitely smoke alarms too! Marcus if it aint broke dont fix it!! |
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Grogster Admin Group  Joined: 31/12/2012 Location: New ZealandPosts: 9308 |
Lucky boy! Yeah, most of that stuff from eBay etc - you probably need to de-rate it by at LEAST 50% on whatever they claim it can do - unless you have actually bench-tested it yourself to the claimed loads. It is very common for sellers of cheap Chinese stuff on eBay etc, to inflate the figures, sometimes by huge amounts. Not saying accurate units can't be had on eBay and the like, but more often then not, they will be over-rated stuff, and....bang! Anything that gets really hot is a bad sign IMHO. Heat is an electronics killer. Anything that runs really hot all the time, WILL fail on you, probably sooner rather then later. It's really scary when something like that catches fire though, and puts your entire property at risk.  I see the garage was all brick, so that could contain any fire. Was there anything else in the area that the fire could have spread to had you not discovered it when you did? Smoke makes things work. When the smoke gets out, it stops! |
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| Solar Mike Guru Joined: 08/02/2015 Location: New ZealandPosts: 1138 |
Bloody Hell, you were lucky. I agree with Grogster, many of those controllers sold on EBay etc are very under rated. The last 2 PWM controllers I tried both rated at 30a worked very well until the PV supply was increased to 20 amps approx, they then started to play up, pulled them apart and noted the interior had no ventilation, drilled small hole in the case and placed a temp probe, interior was heating up >70c and affecting the battery temp sensor which was mounted on the main pcb, interior pcb tracks too thin and heating up with the current. Extremely poor design and just not engineered for the job. These Mppt Devices are extremely good, huge exterior alloy heat sink, no fans required, very well built and engineered, fully programmable for all battery set points and charge rates, works 12 to 48v systems and also on Lifepo4 bank, RS232 cable to laptop for management software. Have had two running past two years no problems at all. Cheers Mike |
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Revlac Guru Joined: 31/12/2016 Location: AustraliaPosts: 1026 |
I also have those PCM60X MPPT charge controllers 2 on the house system since November 2015 and another on the shed since, all of them running well. At the time I chose them because they had custom settings which was a necessity for the system I am running, Others at the time were ether expensive or did not have custom settings. I must say that If it wasn't for some of the cheap Chinese stuff eg inverter, I wouldn't be OFF GRID. If I had bought a expensive thing in a blue box, it would of being blown to bits in the lightning strike. However it also inspires the build your own gear mentality, something one can fix easily.  Mike, that link has expired. Cheers Aaron Off The Grid |
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| Grogster Admin Group Joined: 31/12/2012 Location: New ZealandPosts: 9308 |
Oh, I hear that. You just have to be careful with some of the cheap stuff from China, and NOT trust what is printed on the label as to it's specs. ...unless you have personally tested it on the bench. I too rely on how stuff out of China is so cheap. Take PCB's. They are so cheap, it is not worth etching your own these days. Smoke makes things work. When the smoke gets out, it stops! |
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| Solar Mike Guru Joined: 08/02/2015 Location: New ZealandPosts: 1138 |
So it has, Try this one The prices seem to fluctuate, they drop in price every so often. Cheers Mike |
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| hotwater Senior Member Joined: 29/08/2017 Location: United StatesPosts: 120 |
I had a lightning strike a couple weeks ago and almost all the stuff I had built. I was back in limp mode after 30 minutes and functional in about 4 hours. It reached into every part of the system. Oddly enough it took out the buck converter for the microprocessor board, but left the micro relatively unscathed. Shorted out one of the A/D inputs. Fortunately, I had just started moving the refrigerator program to a separate micro as the main program had just too many patches. I was able to move the control functions for the dead A/D to that one. Bunch of FET and thank God for cheap diodes. The damaged panels all had shorted bypass diodes, but the panels seem to work fine. All the instrumentation from China was toast. |
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| gpalterpower Senior Member Joined: 19/07/2009 Location: AustraliaPosts: 175 |
Hi all, Just an update on my system. Going back bout a month ago now I was in deep sh*t with no controllers at all. I was attempting to construct one of Madness's GTI/LOW DC controllers but being short on time was an no go. I needed something pronto!! He came to the party with one of his already assembled plug and play controllers. A few initial teething problems with 24v system voltages were soon rectified. It has been up and running for a month now and hasn't missed a beat. Just sits there with a slight humm with all the necessary readouts. It hardly gets more than warm when working hard, although I have placed a couple of fans at the rear of the heatsink for good measure and also coming in to summer . I have mounted it to a disused Inspire heat sink. The 120 ohm 5w resistor does get hot to the touch but dosent seem to worry things. With that I placed a small heat sink to it! I am going to cover the controller at a later date and mount the readout on the front but for now its working like a beauty! Thanks once again Madness for all your help and knowledge.  As an added security I have placed a smoke alarm above the power wall! Guess I should of had one there in the first place.  if it aint broke dont fix it!! |
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Madness Guru Joined: 08/10/2011 Location: AustraliaPosts: 2498 |
Good to see it is all going well Marcus, mine has been working hard for many months now so I don't expect you will see it go up in flames like the Chinese ones. These controllers can do 24 or 48 volt but I don't think the MOSFET drivers will work under 18V. There is the 12V vent fan output (for removing lead acid battery fumes) that you could use to turn on the heatsink fans although I would have thought the fans would not be required. Also the Hot Water output could divert unused power to a heater if you wanted to take advantage of that. There are only 10 types of people in the world: those who understand binary, and those who don't. |
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| renewableMark Guru Joined: 09/12/2017 Location: AustraliaPosts: 1678 |
Should have yelled out mate, I could have loaned you a couple of ep ever 40A units, just sitting idle. That controller is a ripper, mine has been running on low volt dc for a month or so, prob longer. I don't think it really need a fan, but wont hurt. Cheers Caveman Mark Off grid eastern Melb |
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| gpalterpower Senior Member Joined: 19/07/2009 Location: AustraliaPosts: 175 |
Thanks Madness, You really have packed some goodies into the controller. Its going great thanks! Yeah, it probably dosent need the fans but they were already wired in so thought Id make use of them, plus I do like the idea of keeping things cool as I plan to wire some more panels later. Thanks for the offer Mark. I was always wanting to go down the Mad controller path. The flame out just sped thing up a little. They are a great unit with so many add ons. Some Ill never use abut will definitely be looking to hook up the GTI at a later date.Marcus if it aint broke dont fix it!! |
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