SUNAMP ISSUES

[Simon Brooke]

Ok will do tomorrow am.

[Simon Brooke]

SORTED! I eventually decided to call the Eddi technical line. Explained the problem and was told to go into settings and check the'hot setting delay'. That was showing zero. I was advised to increase it to about 30 minutes. This was done as an upgrade to cater for the sunamp issues. So we seem to be up and running which is great.

Thanks for all the contributions.

I did later speak with sunamp technical and will be sending them the info. for their files! During the conversation I pointed out what a pain it is not being able to see at what stage of charge the battery is. Apparently they have some software and a gizmo which they use for testing that would in effect show the charge level and could possibly be retro fitted. It was suggested I write to the company and request that it be released. I will do this and report back.

In the meantime I have a final basic question which is, if I have a 9kw battery does it take 9kw of electrical input to fully charge?

[Jeremy Harris]

The 9 kWh Sunamp takes around 10 kWh to fully charge, and actually stores around 10 kWh of useful heat, as the 9 kWh rating seems to just be for the energy stored by the phase change of the PCM.  There's about another 1 kWh stored by the hot PCM when it's all melted and sitting at ~60°C or so.

 

This means that in regular daily use you can get around 10 kWh out of a 9 kWh rated Sunamp, especially if you start to draw off hot water shortly after it has completed charging.

 

Be very interested in whatever Sunamp come up with to indicate state of charge.  It's a PITA not knowing what the thing is doing, or what state it's in.  It shouldn't be too hard, as they already have a string of thermistors running vertically down inside the thing, so the control system knows the temperature variation from top to bottom already, it just doesn't display it.

[Simon Brooke]

Thanks

[joth]

1 hour ago, Simon Brooke said:

 

I did later speak with sunamp technical and will be sending them the info. for their files!

Out of interest do Sunamp have a recommended manufacturer of PV redirect?

It seems all would likely need this workaround, but I can't imagine they all have it. 

 

[DamonHD]

I am not Sunamp, but I did a little review of possibilites and the Eddi looked the best for my purposes.

 

I ranked my selection 'best' first in the "Some diverter products" part at the foot of the page:

 

http://www.earth.org.uk/note-on-solar-DHW-for-16WW-UniQ-and-PV-diversion.html#sources

 

Rgds

 

Damon

[Jeremy Harris]

13 minutes ago, joth said:

Out of interest do Sunamp have a recommended manufacturer of PV redirect?

It seems all would likely need this workaround, but I can't imagine they all have it. 

 

 

 

Not sure it matters much, TBH.  Mine is home made, and works just fine with the Sunamp, and before running the Sunamp Uniq we have now it also worked fine with a Sunamp PV.  Before that the same unit worked with an immersion heater in a thermal store.

 

All the Sunamp needs is power, and it's not fussy where that power comes from. as the power just flows through the contactor in the control box direct to the heating element, there's nothing smart inside the control box that even senses that power.  It looks as if there was an issue with the Eddi that meant that it was not providing power to the Sunamp in this case.

 

By the same token, lots of EV owners have also had issues with the Eddi controlling the Zappi charge point.  I'm far from convinced that some of these "smart" solutions are a good option for stuff that is critical, like having reliable hot water, or reliably charging a car.

[Barney12]

1 hour ago, Simon Brooke said:

I did later speak with sunamp technical and will be sending them the info.

Sorry to be negative but this statement is really quite scary. I know for a fact that this change to the Eddi was instigated by Sunamp after they were previously recommending other diverters which quite simply didn’t work (due to the issue you experienced). I believe the technical manager (who I understand is now on long term sick) might have spearheaded it (it was certainly him that told me about it). Its just another example of what appears to be poor communication within Sunamp. 

[Barney12]

2 hours ago, Simon Brooke said:

Apparently they have some software and a gizmo which they use for testing that would in effect show the charge level and could possibly be retro fitted. It was suggested I write to the company and request that it be released.

That has been in existence for some time. The “top dogs” don’t want it released and stated very clearly to me that they see no need for such a device as the Sunamp is a dhw cylinder replacement and a cylinder doesn’t give you any feedback. 
 

I do though suppose they have a point in that you don’t know how much hot water is left in a cylinder but if you had the opportunity to provide a feature which has obvious benefits to the user why wouldn’t you use it? 
 

At best; marketing opportunity lost. FAIL. 

[Simon Brooke]

Not that scary. As you say the manager is away at the moment and those present could not remember the fix and asked for details.

[Jeremy Harris]

9 minutes ago, Barney12 said:

That has been in existence for some time. The “top dogs” don’t want it released and stated very clearly to me that they see no need for such a device as the Sunamp is a dhw cylinder replacement and a cylinder doesn’t give you any feedback. 
 

I do though suppose they have a point in that you don’t know how much hot water is left in a cylinder but if you had the opportunity to provide a feature which has obvious benefits to the user why wouldn’t you use it? 
 

At best; marketing opportunity lost. FAIL. 

 

 

Every hot water cylinder I've ever had has had at least one temperature display, two have had three, top, centre and bottom.  Even our buffer tank has two temperature sensors, so that I can glance at a display and quickly see how charged it is.

[Ed Davies]

Also, with a cylinder you can feel the water temperature drop a bit as the thing discharges whereas a PCM store should hold its temperature right up until it's nearly empty, giving you little warning of it not having been recharged.

[Barney12]

1 hour ago, Simon Brooke said:

Not that scary. As you say the manager is away at the moment and those present could not remember the fix and asked for details.

We will have to agree to disagree. If a company (the size of Sunamp which is locked in a significant product development lifecycle) has significant knowledge locked in a single individual then they definitely have some pretty significant issues with structure, management and process.