Recent posts

#1

Online Training sessions / Webinar SPDs Wednesday June 17...

Last post by Sunshine - June 12, 2026, 03:12:00 PM

Register here.
https://attendee.gotowebinar.com/register/8585322596664052567

#2

The Rosie / Solar Assistant 6/8/2026 BETA ...

Last post by aaapilot - June 11, 2026, 01:01:25 PM

For those of you who use Solar Assistant for monitoring Rosie, the latest Beta app dated 6/8/2026 now lists several of Rosie settings under the POWER tab!  There are 3 sections, Grid Support, Battery, and Input/Output.  Two of the items under Battery are actually ADJUSTABLE when you select edit!  Great step forward for being able to remotely control Rosie

Dave

#3

Hawke's Bay / Hawke's bay startup surprise

Last post by qrper - June 03, 2026, 03:05:40 PM

Hi everyone!

Got the HB mounted, with epanel underneath. Order in 2 gauge wire, with lugs on one end, bare on the other. After I trimmed the cables down to the correct length, I put on ferrules on the ends. Dug out my label maker, and made labels and covered them with clear heat shrink tubing. 

What I figured would have been a 30-45 minute job, ended up taking 2.5 hours! Getting those 2 gauge wires into the Roise's epanel was more work that I figured it would be.

After triple checking all connections, I flipped the circuit breaker and the break lite up a bit. Lots of sparky stuff. Scared the dog do-do out of me. Apparently everything is fine, and I have the HB showing up on the graphic panel. I don't have solar panels connected yet, and the screen displays 'solar' and 0 kWh. So I'm thinking all is good.

I sure wish someplace in the manual it would have mentioned the sudden inrush of current when first turned on.

mike

#4

Hawke's Bay / Re: Whizbang Jr and the Hawk's...

Last post by qrper - May 28, 2026, 10:41:34 PM

Have you ever had one of those ah ha moments? I had one today.

Apparently I was looking for the trees in the forest.

The epanel for rosie had two terminal blocks marked battery - and battery +

I was under the impression that those were to be installed by the user when installing the Classic on the side.

I was wrong!!

With a bright flashlight, it does indeed, appear that the neg battery terminal does in fact go the correct stud on the WBJR. And the battery terminal goes to pos battery. So, it looks like I can run the output of the HB to those terminal blocks inside the rosie epanel. I hope they take #2 gauge wire!

now if I do that, I'm of the understanding that the WBJR in the rosie Epanel will talk to the HB?

mike

Yes sir, that will work correctly, as I described yesterday.  I'm using #2 cables from my HB as well and the lugs in the Rosie E-panel will accommodate both the battery cables and this cabling from the HB.  Your Whizbang JR will see all the power coming from the HB .

Dave

Yeah, over thought ,it. Was confused about the wiring shown for the classic. I wasn't sure it was factory installed thus the confusion. I'm going to order in some 2 gauge wire and start wiring in the hawks bay

Mike

#5

Hawke's Bay / Re: Whizbang Jr and the Hawk's...

Last post by aaapilot - May 28, 2026, 06:40:10 PM

Have you ever had one of those ah ha moments? I had one today.

Apparently I was looking for the trees in the forest.

The epanel for rosie had two terminal blocks marked battery - and battery +

I was under the impression that those were to be installed by the user when installing the Classic on the side.

I was wrong!!

With a bright flashlight, it does indeed, appear that the neg battery terminal does in fact go the correct stud on the WBJR. And the battery terminal goes to pos battery. So, it looks like I can run the output of the HB to those terminal blocks inside the rosie epanel. I hope they take #2 gauge wire!

now if I do that, I'm of the understanding that the WBJR in the rosie Epanel will talk to the HB?

mike

Yes sir, that will work correctly, as I described yesterday.  I'm using #2 cables from my HB as well and the lugs in the Rosie E-panel will accommodate both the battery cables and this cabling from the HB.  Your Whizbang JR will see all the power coming from the HB .

Dave

#6

Hawke's Bay / Re: Whizbang Jr and the Hawk's...

Last post by qrper - May 28, 2026, 02:26:29 PM

Have you ever had one of those ah ha moments? I had one today.

Apparently I was looking for the trees in the forest.

The epanel for rosie had two terminal blocks marked battery - and battery +

I was under the impression that those were to be installed by the user when installing the Classic on the side.

I was wrong!!

With a bright flashlight, it does indeed, appear that the neg battery terminal does in fact go the correct stud on the WBJR. And the battery terminal goes to pos battery. So, it looks like I can run the output of the HB to those terminal blocks inside the rosie epanel. I hope they take #2 gauge wire!

now if I do that, I'm of the understanding that the WBJR in the rosie Epanel will talk to the HB?

mike

#7

Hawke's Bay / Re: Whizbang Jr and the Hawk's...

Last post by qrper - May 28, 2026, 10:30:47 AM

I have a victron smart shunt hooked up now, but it won't talk to the local app and neither rosie or HB know it's there. I need a WBJR to let the HB know what the state of charge is when I get my new rack batteries wired up.

I'm kicking around some ideas in my head. With the price of copper, I'm thinking of trying to use the cables that feed rosie.

mike

The smart shunt can calculate the state of charge. Are you talking about doing closed loop and letting the battery bms tell the Hawkes Bay when to charge and stop charging the battery ?  Let me know how that works out. I gave up on closed loop awhile back and just use open loop charging which works fine.

Larry

I'm going to give it a shot. Letting the HB and the batteries talk to each other.

Way back when I was an installer, this was so much simple. FOur wires, total. Two in for PV, two out for batteries. Lead-acid didn't care closed or open loop. There wasn't any like a CAN bus, and if you wanted to monitor current, you tossed in a shunt, either high or low side, it didn't matter.

mike

#8

Hawke's Bay / Re: Whizbang Jr and the Hawk's...

Last post by qrper - May 28, 2026, 10:23:31 AM

Looking at the manual that I linked earlier, it appears that there are wires already installed for the pv that go to the shunt. See item #14.

Or aren't these prewired?

Yes, to a point. The wiring shown is optional for installing a Classic controller to the Roise. That's not factory wired. The drawing shows the WBJR inside the rosie. However!! IF you follow the black wire from the classic negative it lands on the top stud of the WBJR. That's the problem. You can't get to it. The 300A breaker is right above it, and I don't know how much dissassembly would be required to access that lug. Do I have to remove the 300A breaker?

Remember, too, that the wire coming from the HWB is #2 gauge. The wiring shown in the diagram is for the classic.

Mike

#9

Hawke's Bay / Re: Whizbang Jr and the Hawk's...

Last post by ClassicCrazy - May 27, 2026, 09:02:08 PM

I have a victron smart shunt hooked up now, but it won't talk to the local app and neither rosie or HB know it's there. I need a WBJR to let the HB know what the state of charge is when I get my new rack batteries wired up.

I'm kicking around some ideas in my head. With the price of copper, I'm thinking of trying to use the cables that feed rosie.

mike

The smart shunt can calculate the state of charge. Are you talking about doing closed loop and letting the battery bms tell the Hawkes Bay when to charge and stop charging the battery ?  Let me know how that works out. I gave up on closed loop awhile back and just use open loop charging which works fine.

Larry

#10

Hawke's Bay / Re: Whizbang Jr and the Hawk's...

Last post by UpNorthMan - May 27, 2026, 08:57:16 PM

Looking at the manual that I linked earlier, it appears that there are wires already installed for the pv that go to the shunt. See item #14.

Or aren't these prewired?