[APP][Pro] Victron Energy

Apps
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1

Blue Power

https://www.victronenergy.com/

App Store Page

https://homey.app/a/com.victronenergy

Description

Monitor and control your Victron system equipped with a GX device.
ESS Mode 2 is what is currently supported.
The app relies on the Modbus TCP API of the GX Devices.

I have a Cerbo GX, usually with the latest firmware version, and this is what the app is tested with.

Need to know before adding a GX Device to your Homey

  • You need to know the IP number and port of your GX Device. Port is 502 by default.
  • Your Homey needs to be able to connect to your GX Device via the network
  • You need to enable Modbus TCP in your GX Device

By default, Modbus-TCP is disabled. To enable it, go into the settings menu, scroll down to ā€˜Servicesā€™, and then enable the Modbus-TCP service.

  • The information is read and written via Modbus using two UnitIdā€™s;
    100 which is for com.victronenergy.system, and to my understanding this is the same across all GX Devices. But for com.victronenergy.vebus, com.victronenergy.battery and com.victronenergy.grid, which the app also relies on, the UnitId differs depending on your setup.

To see a list of available devices, and their Address, go to Settings ā†’ Services ā†’ Modbus/TCP ā†’ Available services

Navigate the list of Available services and find com.victronenergy.vebus and com.victronenergy.battery. Note the UnitIds - you need to select this when adding a GX device to your Homey.

Victron GX device type

Capabilities

  • Consumption
    Sum of all phases. Calculated by the formula: solar - battery + grid
    As of version 1.0.1 the device is recognised in Homey Energy as a smart meter and consumption is counted as a total value. This is possible to change in the deviceā€™s advanced settings to not be counted towards the total.

  • Grid
    Sum of all phases. A negative value means export, positive import.
    You need to have a meter added to your system. I use this project to simulate an EM24 meter using my SMA Home Manager 2.0.

  • Battery
    A negative value means discharge, positive charge

  • Solar
    Sum of all phases. You need to have either Victron PV equipment part of your system or a 3rd party PV inverter that Victron supports. I have added my SMA Tripower.

  • VE Bus status
    10+ different statuses possible, for instance Bulk

  • Alarm
    The capability shows statuses; Ok, Warning or Alarm. This is calculated by checking the following alarms and warnings; Temperature, Low battery, Overload, Temperature sensor, Voltage sensor, Phase rotation, Grid lost and for each phase; Temperature, Low battery, Overload, and Ripple.

  • Battery status
    Idle, Charging or Discharging

  • Battery SoC
    State of Charge in %

  • Battery voltage

  • Battery current
    A negative value means discharge, positive charge

  • Switch position
    Charger Only, Inverter Only, On or Off

  • Grid lifetime import
    Always shown, if com.victronenergy.grid doesnā€™t exist or is not configured will display 0.

  • Grid lifetime export
    Always shown, if com.victronenergy.grid doesnā€™t exist or is not configured will display 0.

Triggers

  • Switch position changed
  • Battery status changed
  • VE Bus status changed
  • Alarm status changed
  • SoC changed
  • Battery voltage changed
  • Grid surplus changed

Conditions

  • Switch position is
  • Battery status is
  • VE Bus status is
  • Battery SoC is
  • Consumption power is
  • Grid power is
  • Battery power is
  • Solar power is
  • Excess solar power is
    PV power - consumption power
  • Grid setpoint is
  • Max charge current is
  • Max discharge power is
  • Max grid feed-in power is
  • Min SoC is
  • AC loads are
  • AC inputs are
  • AC outputs are
  • Time since last full charge is

Actions

  • Set switch position
    Allows you to turn off or on the system, or charger vs inverter only.

    Modbus info
    UnitId: com.victronenergy.vebus
    Address: 33

  • Update grid setpoint (W)
    A positive value means import from the grid, a negative value export to the grid. Default is 30W.

    Modbus info
    UnitId: com.victronenergy.system
    Address: 2700

  • Limit inverter power (W)
    Maximum power in Watt that the Multi will feed to the loads.
    (docs says -1 sets it back to unlimited, I donā€™t get this to work.)

    Modbus info
    UnitId: com.victronenergy.system
    Address: 2704

  • Limit charger current (A)
    Only works when DVCC is turned on.

    • -1: No limit.
      Solar Chargers and the Multi will charge to their full capacity or individual configured limits.
    • Any positive number: Maximum combined current in Ampere for battery charging. This limits the solar chargers and the multi, and takes loads into account. Solar chargers take priority over the Multi.

    Modbus info
    UnitId: com.victronenergy.system
    Address: 2705

  • Limit grid feed-in power
    Maximum power in Watt to feed into the grid.
    (docs says -1 sets it back to unlimited, I donā€™t get this to work.)

    Modbus info
    UnitId: com.victronenergy.system
    Address: 2706

  • Update minimum SoC (%)
    Minimum state of charge in %, unless grid fails.

    Modbus info
    UnitId: com.victronenergy.system
    Address: 2901

  • Switch relay 1 on/off
    Turn relay 1 on your GX device on or off

    Modbus info
    UnitId: com.victronenergy.system
    Address: 806

  • Switch relay 2 on/off
    Turn relay 2 on your GX device on or off

    Modbus info
    UnitId: com.victronenergy.system
    Address: 807

  • Create charging schedule
    Create any charging schedule, 1-5. Requires the config of ssh user and private key.

  • Enable charging schedule
    Enable any charging schedule, 1-5. Requires the config of ssh user and private key.

  • Disable charging schedule
    Disable any charging schedule, 1-5. Requires the config of ssh user and private key.

Settings

  • Charge current control
    By default turned off. Setting Control charge current to Yes means the app will automatically control the max charge current depending on the state of charge of the ESS. Please adjust the charge amp per state of charge interval to suit your needs.

  • SSH
    There are lots of tutorials out there on how to generate a public and private key to use for ssh authentication.
    On Mac OS I did the following.

  1. ssh-keygen -t rsa
    Donā€™t enter a pass phrase
  2. Copy the content of the public file (*.pub) to the file ~/.ssh/authorized_keys on the GX device. Create the file if it doesnā€™t exist.
  3. Test login from Mac using command ssh -i ./id_rsa root@192.168.nnn.nnn. id_rsa in this case being the private key file. Enter the correct IP address of your GX device. If the login is successful continue to the next step.
  4. Update config of the GX device in Homey. Enter root as user and paste entire contents of the private key file into key field.

Disclaimer

Use this app at your own risk.
Please note that an ESS is pretty complex stuff and it is easy to get lost and forget you had a flow that did this or that. You need to pay attention to the actions you use and if your system for instance is configured to charge using max 40 amps, then you shouldnā€™t set that to 200 amps and hope for the best.

As usual, any feedback is welcome :smile:

3 Likes
2

Screenshot from the app

gx_device
gx_device764Ɨ2332 95.4 KB

1 Like
3

ThatĀ“s what i was waiting for :+1: :+1: :+1:

4

Hi!

Excellent app for Homey.

Any chance that you can add ā€œTime since last full chargeā€ to trigger or condition? This way I would be able to force a full charge every XX hours from the grid - I combine that with Tibber integration in homey so that I only charge up the batterybank when its Very Cheap price on the grid.

/Kaj

5

Hi!
Sorry for the slow response.
Feels like I need to understand a little more of the use case to understand what the need is.
Fully charge should be taken from the battery state of charge, when it hits 100% we set a timestamp, then using a condition you can check how many minutes(?) it was since last time the state of charge was 100%?

6

There is a new test version of the app available, 0.9.6.
There are some new features related to vehicle charging. I myself reduce max discharge from the battery when a vehicle is charging.
There is also a feature to automatically control charge current based on state of charge.
The settings for these new features are in advanced settings on the device.

7

When using Victron Smart Shunt (or their regular shunt) connected to the GX device it reports, among other stuff, time since last full charge.

in victron dbus world its the following register/value. Can that be accessed over MQTT?

com.victronenergy.battery/History/TimeSinceLastFullCharge
8

Is a Victron shunt a requirement to see the History values? I can read those values via modbus on my setup but they all return 0.

Another ā€œissueā€ is that we in such a case need to map how to address the dbus-service-name for the service com.victronenergy.battery. In my setup this is Unit ID 225 (CAN-bus BMS).
The mapping can be seen in menu ā€œSettings ā†’ Services ā†’ Modbus/TCP ā†’ Available servicesā€. Wonder what Unit IDs people have here in their setups.

9

In my install its Unit ID 226 (com.victronenergy.battery).

Would a solution be to have a input field where one has to define the Shunts ID?

I need to doublecheck with a MQTT client to my GX device that its the only place in the mqtt flow that shows time since last charge. Since the charger/inverter keeps tab of the SOC if there isnt any external shunt / BMS connected it might have that information somewhere else aswell.

/Kaj

10

@KajLehtinen Test version 0.9.7 allows you to select com.victronenergy.battery and see value of time since last full charge in advanced settings, info section + a condition to query it. Please try it out and let me know what you think.

The test version is as always available here

11

Hello,
My system use a UnitId for com.victronenergy.vebus that is not listed as an option, it is 228.
Can you please add it, i love to use these app for my homey.

Aaron

12

Somehow missed your reply, when setting the correct ID in Advanced settings it seems to pickup the right time in seconds since last full charge as what the Victron app & the Smartshunt reports.

Will redesign my charging flows to incorporate the time since full charge and let you know if there are any incosistencys

/Kaj

1 Like
13

There is a new test version available (0.9.9) which includes vebus id 228 - let me know if it works as expected.

14

Hi, in my GX device the com.victronenergy.battery Unit ID is 224 which is not an option in the setup. Could you please add ID 224
Regards Ad

15

Version 1.0 on itā€™s way :+1:

16

Version 1.0.1 in test phase.
Changes the consumption property of the device to be recognised in Homey Energy as a smart meter.

1 Like
17

Thanks for the update, GX is connected to Homey now. Next step is using the possibilities

1 Like
18

Iā€™ve been searching for a 12V system that could be connected to Homey. So Victron seemed like the right choice and in combination with this app it would be great.

So now Iā€™m done with this but Iā€™m not able to connect it to Homey. As I almost only use 12V I have no big inverter. I have a small one but itā€™s connected by VE Direct.

But if I understand it right I need an inverter connected by Vebus, so I can get a valid UnitId for com.victronenergy.vebus, to be able to connect it to Homey. Or am I missing something?

1 Like
19

Hello, I have a Problem about integrating the GX into the Homey system
I know the IP address of the GX and also the Victron VEBus ID.
But I donā€™t have the Battery ID. Can anyone help me ?
The error message is: Connected successfullyton GX Device but Victron Energy Battery ist invalid

Thanks

20

anyone an idea ?