Whole house UPS STARK COUNTRY 3000 INV LT + Ventura GPL 12-120 batteries
In many places outside the city, electricity is often cut off, but there is a way to make sure that you practically do not feel these blackouts and live in a country house or country house in comfort, even when your neighbors are running around their dark houses with flashlights.
A whole-home uninterruptible power supply (UPS) operates fully automatically, provides near-instantaneous switching to battery power during a power outage, and when the power comes back on, switches to utility power and charges the batteries.
The basis of the system is inverter UPS with pure sine wave and a power of 3000 W STARK COUNTRY 3000 INV LT, equipped with an automatic charger, a 1200 W solar PWM controller and automatic switching. Usually it is hung on the wall, but you can also place it on a shelf, like mine.
Batteries with a total voltage of 24 V are connected to the UPS, in my case these are two connected in series Ventura GPL 12-120 batterieswith a capacity of 133 Ah each (my article on testing these batteries is here).
The batteries are connected from below to the UPS using the thickest wires (in my case 25 mm²). There are also blocks for connecting to the network and consumers (the incoming and outgoing zeros are not connected). On the right there is a “PV IN” connector for connecting solar panels.
On the right side of the UPS there is a general system switch, on the left are connectors for connecting to a computer (USB or COM port, both cables included).
The two fans you may have noticed come on under heavy load while running on battery power, and also while the batteries are charging. When operating from mains power, when the batteries are charged, and when the load when operating on batteries does not exceed 50 W, the fans do not turn on and the system operates silently.
The UPS can operate for a long time at a power consumption of 3000 W (both when operating from batteries and when operating from the network) and can withstand heavy overloads – 4500 W for up to 10 seconds, 6000 W for up to 5 seconds. When overloaded, the UPS begins to beep, which makes it possible to quickly reduce consumption to avoid shutdown.
A power of 3000 W is enough to power all electrical equipment in the house (lighting, refrigerator, pump, TV, computer, electric kettle, microwave oven, storage water heater) with the exception of electric heaters and those appliances where heating takes a long time, such as electric stoves and ovens.
If there is an overload, when the UPS beeps, you can simply turn off something powerful and turn it on later: for example, if you turn on the microwave and kettle while heating the storage water heater, the load will become more than 3000 W and the UPS will beep. It is enough to turn off the kettle and turn it on after the microwave has warmed up the food.
The switching time to power from batteries and back according to the passport is <10 or <20 ms depending on the setting; in fact, when switching, a short blinking of the light is noticeable.
At the moment of switching to battery power, the UPS beeps, indicating that the electricity has been turned off (this sound can be turned off in the settings).
The default screen displays the input and output voltage and the UPS operating mode. Now it is shown that the load is running from the mains, in addition, the charge maintenance voltage is supplied to the batteries (the battery symbol shows that they are fully charged). An additional indicator shows that consumption is currently 25% of the maximum.
Various parameters can be displayed on the screen (left: mains voltage, frequency, battery voltage, right: output voltage, frequency, percentage of maximum load, power consumption in VA and W, battery current). For example, here the screen shows the battery voltage of 27.0 V and the load power of 1.06 kW.
When the load is powered by batteries, the circuit at the bottom of the screen changes. If solar panels appear in the system, they will also be displayed on the diagram.
All parameters can be viewed not only on the UPS screen, but also on the computer (I connected the UPS to the computer with a USB cable).
The UPS has many settings, and the default settings are made in such a way that when using AGM batteries, you don’t have to configure anything at all (except that the charging current can be reduced from 25 to 15A, but this is not necessary – the batteries can withstand up to 36 amperes). Even when connecting solar panels, you don’t have to configure anything – the UPS will simply “feel” their appearance and start using solar energy.
You can configure settings both on the UPS control panel and on your computer.
The entire system can be assembled in half an hour by anyone who is not afraid of technology. The only difficulty that may arise is the correct connection to the electrical panel. It is advisable to make “two networks” in the house – connect the light, the main consumers and most of the sockets via a UPS, and connect some of the sockets, where electric heaters and other powerful consumers operating for a long time, can be connected directly. In this case, the “zeros” in these two networks should not be connected to each other.
One of the main questions that you probably already have is how long can you be powered by batteries. I conducted an experiment by connecting the entire house via a UPS and turning off the external power. The house had lighting, a pump, a refrigerator, a computer, a microwave, and a kettle. I used the equipment as usual, without trying to save electricity in any special way.
After the UPS, I installed a smart energy meter that continuously monitors consumption and counts the total amount of energy consumed. The experiment began at 10 am. The first kilowatt-hour was consumed after 9 hours. By midnight, 14 hours after the start of the experiment, the system produced 1.5 kWh. The next morning, when turning on a powerful load (coffee machine), the UPS began to beep, signaling a low battery level, but as soon as consumption decreased, the beeping stopped (the sound alarm can be turned off in the settings). At 10 am, a day after the start of the experiment, when 2 kWh was consumed, the UPS began to beep intermittently even at low consumption, indicating that the batteries were running low. At 13:45 the microwave was turned on, it worked for about 30 seconds and the power went out. It was possible to restart the UPS and it would have been able to work for some time with a small load (refrigerator, light, computer), but I decided to end the experiment there.
The entire house ran on UPS for almost 28 hours, and the system was able to supply 2.2 kWh of energy.
In the Moscow region, in most cases, electricity is turned off for no more than five hours, so I conducted another experiment, adding a storage water heater to the main load. The first squeak, signaling a low battery charge, was heard when a powerful load was turned on 6.5 hours after the start of the experiment, when the system supplied 1.5 kWh. In total, the system worked for eight and a half hours, during which time the UPS was able to supply 2,057 kWh of energy.
I am sure that most summer residents and people living outside the city would like to have such a system. And even for those who already have a generator, a UPS will increase the comfort of country life, because the generator is noisy, you need to tinker with gasoline, start it if there is no autostart, connect and disconnect it.
At my dacha, the electricity is turned off a couple of times a month, and the shutdown time does not exceed five hours, and such a UPS completely solves the problem of power supply.
© 2024, Alexey Nadezhin
