Victron Connect App
- Thread starter Irish Rover
- Start date
Irish Rover
Well-Known Member
Thank you.
vas
Well-Known Member
I suggested 5mins because usually within a couple of mins any capacitors and other bits of electronics empty and the rest of the hardware dies out of lack of juice - which is what you want. Don't want 5, do 10, do 15 no worries.
could also do it at night when for sure panels don't do much, but it will be a struggle with no lights around whilst everything is disconnected for the reboot...
fwiw, panels can survive disconnected or I'm told even bridging two cables exiting the control box. Had no reason to try the latter, but when installing the panels for sure they spend a week under the med sun before I sorted out cabling and connecting them.
could also do it at night when for sure panels don't do much, but it will be a struggle with no lights around whilst everything is disconnected for the reboot...
fwiw, panels can survive disconnected or I'm told even bridging two cables exiting the control box. Had no reason to try the latter, but when installing the panels for sure they spend a week under the med sun before I sorted out cabling and connecting them.
Irish Rover
Well-Known Member
No joy. Disconnected from the panel for over 10 minutes. Reconnected and still not showing. Restarted the phone etc.
I've looked on the Victrom community site and I can't see any alternative suggestions. I think the easiest and cheapest thing to do at this stage is buy a VE cable and see if I can reset the BT. Even if not I guess I'll be able to see on the laptop if the controller is working correctly and do occasional checks. If anyone has any other suggestions I'm always grateful.
I've looked on the Victrom community site and I can't see any alternative suggestions. I think the easiest and cheapest thing to do at this stage is buy a VE cable and see if I can reset the BT. Even if not I guess I'll be able to see on the laptop if the controller is working correctly and do occasional checks. If anyone has any other suggestions I'm always grateful.
[70521]
Well-Known Member
Did you check the PIN number and if Bluetooth was switched on?
Irish Rover
Well-Known Member
My app simply doesn't see it - it does see my other identical controller. So if I can't see it the pin is not an issue. If you tell me how to check if BT is switched on I'll definitely do it but ???
vas
Well-Known Member
IR, have you changed anything in boat/mobile setup since the last time you connected?
was thinking that maybe trying ANOTHER mobile/tablet where you install victron connect afresh and see if you can see both controllers. That is just to make sure it's not your mobile to blame (unlikely I know but nothing to loose tbh)
was thinking that maybe trying ANOTHER mobile/tablet where you install victron connect afresh and see if you can see both controllers. That is just to make sure it's not your mobile to blame (unlikely I know but nothing to loose tbh)
Irish Rover
Well-Known Member
Nothing changed. I use the boat almost every day but I was abroad for a week or so. I checked everything before I left including the two controllers on the app and everything was OK. I was raining and windy first full day back so I just went to the marina to check everything and one of the controllers didn't show.
I have a Samsung tablet which I sometimes use on the boat - I'll take it with me tomorrow and do as you suggest.
PaulRainbow
Well-Known Member
I agree, buy a cable and see what's going on.
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Irish Rover
Well-Known Member
Tried using the tablet. No change. Can still see one but not the other. I've ordered the VE Direct cable - not cheap for what it is - $30 from Amazon US but I had to pay the equivalent of $42 here in Türkiye.
GHA
Well-Known Member
Sort of related, but in case someone (me ?) thought they could save some cash by using a arduino as a cheaper alternative for a serial/usb interface- works fine to receive the data getting sent out from the victron but you can't update the firmware , it changes the baud rate as it goes, arduino is fixed.
So splash the cash.
What have victron said? Generally they're pretty helpful.
Irish Rover
Well-Known Member
Thanks. I haven't tried contacting Victron yet. I'll see how I get on with the cable and try contacting them if I can't sort it.
GHA
Well-Known Member
Their forums are a good resource as well, how I found out about cheap don't always work. ? Victron is one company that embraces the open source/diy world. (They are by far the biggest financial contributor of signalk)
Irish Rover
Well-Known Member
Yes I checked the forums and, as far as I can see, anyone who had the same problem as me solved it by disconnecting the inflow and outflow. Unfortunately didn't work for me.
Irish Rover
Well-Known Member
So the cable arrived yesterday and I connected to my laptop today. From the readouts it seems to be working normally with everything pretty much mirroring the other controller. However I can't see anything in settings re Bluetooth so I opted to restore the unit to factory defaults. Did that but I still can't see this controller in the app on my phone. Any suggestions?
vas
Well-Known Member
v.odd, how about changing the name of the mppt that you do see on victron connect? maybe something v.silly has happened and there's a name conflict. Too far fetched tbh, but nothing to loose.
other option I'd do is disconnect both in and out flow of the working controller and see if magically the other one appears on BT
if not, I'd list all the steps and describe the problem on victron site and see what they suggest.
V
other option I'd do is disconnect both in and out flow of the working controller and see if magically the other one appears on BT
if not, I'd list all the steps and describe the problem on victron site and see what they suggest.
V
Irish Rover
Well-Known Member
Thanks. I'm off for a visit to the old sod tomorrow so probably won't get back to the boat for a week or so. I found this on the Victron forum last night:-v.odd, how about changing the name of the mppt that you do see on victron connect? maybe something v.silly has happened and there's a name conflict. Too far fetched tbh, but nothing to loose.
other option I'd do is disconnect both in and out flow of the working controller and see if magically the other one appears on BT
if not, I'd list all the steps and describe the problem on victron site and see what they suggest.
V
"When you have a VE.Direct USB cable, you can a laptop (or android phone using USB-OTG/USB-C cable) to the VE.Direct port of the SmartSolar, run VictronConnect on the laptop/phone/tablet (windows/MacOS/Android) and VictronConnect will connect to the SmartSolar via the VE.Direct USB cable. Then in the "Product info" menu of the SmartSolar (Settings->three dots top right corner->Product info), there is a toggle "Bluetooth enabled". With this you can switch the Bluetooth off and on again. I was wondering if this makes the SmartSolar visible via Bluetooth again. But this requires a VE.Direct USB cable."
I didn't notice the "product info" tab when I connect it yesterday but I'll have another look next week before I do anything else.
vas
Well-Known Member
yep, you should be able to turn on and off from the cable connection, so do that first. Maybe for some odd reason BT has turned itself off on this controller...
Trident
Well-Known Member
Bear in mind the BT chip in these things cost them about 18p each - they may simply not be very robust...
I find this is not uncommon - I've fitted literally hundreds of Victron BT devices and Renogy also - if I happen to be working by a boat I did I often check the Renogy Home or Victron Connect Apps just to see if all is as it should be (and especially to see if customers have heeded the advice to not charge their Lithiums full and leave them that way over winter!) and at a rough guess I'd say 10% of the time the BT doesn't show up for all devices - last week I checked 3 LifePo4 batteries and only 2 showed up - I tried several times and eventually got the owners keys and found all well. 3 days later all 3 showed up with no changes to anything.
No very helpful I know but these things do seem to have regular issues without in any way effecting the function of the device
I find this is not uncommon - I've fitted literally hundreds of Victron BT devices and Renogy also - if I happen to be working by a boat I did I often check the Renogy Home or Victron Connect Apps just to see if all is as it should be (and especially to see if customers have heeded the advice to not charge their Lithiums full and leave them that way over winter!) and at a rough guess I'd say 10% of the time the BT doesn't show up for all devices - last week I checked 3 LifePo4 batteries and only 2 showed up - I tried several times and eventually got the owners keys and found all well. 3 days later all 3 showed up with no changes to anything.
No very helpful I know but these things do seem to have regular issues without in any way effecting the function of the device
Irish Rover
Well-Known Member
Further to my #37 I reconnected the cable today and couldn't see the BT connection setting
I then connected the cable to the second controller and, lo and behold, I found
I also connected via the cable to the Victron app on my phone using a USB to C connector. The suspect controller again had no BT option whereas the other one did plus the option to rename the controller etc.
So now I'm flummoxed. I don't really know what more to do. The controllers are still under guarantee but supplier is in Mersin in the south east and I know if I contact them I'll eventually end up having to disconnect the unit and courier it to them. They'll then tell me it has to be sent to Victron and, this being Türkiye, the whole process could take months.
I've left the cable connected to the faulty controller so I can plug in with my phone anytime. The controller is otherwise working as it should. I'm tempted to leave well enough alone and hope it fixes itself whenever the release a firmware update.
What do the experts think?
I then connected the cable to the second controller and, lo and behold, I found
I also connected via the cable to the Victron app on my phone using a USB to C connector. The suspect controller again had no BT option whereas the other one did plus the option to rename the controller etc.
So now I'm flummoxed. I don't really know what more to do. The controllers are still under guarantee but supplier is in Mersin in the south east and I know if I contact them I'll eventually end up having to disconnect the unit and courier it to them. They'll then tell me it has to be sent to Victron and, this being Türkiye, the whole process could take months.
I've left the cable connected to the faulty controller so I can plug in with my phone anytime. The controller is otherwise working as it should. I'm tempted to leave well enough alone and hope it fixes itself whenever the release a firmware update.
What do the experts think?
