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Sadly, running a one-man business is mostly stress and high blood pressure. I know from experience it's a losing battle. I ran a one man computer store in the 90's for 5 years and don't think I ever got caught up on everything. Still, it's frustrating to try to communicate and getting no response. With his business expanding, Sean needs to get some real help before it puts him in the hospital.
Yep, I know, I ran a Vending biz for 10 years, and was doing 400+K a year in sales and it was just me and one employee, how you think I felt after it all when i shut my doors in 2019 right before the crap hit the fan. I got high blood pressure, have to use a Cpap machine, gain 60 pounds. Oh the fun it is. . . Not!! I'm glad I'm not running a biz right now. Just enjoy my time relazing, doing things I want to do and feeling a lot better.
I've offer to answer the phone basicly for free to help out. But, I think Sean is one of those type that seems to micro manage everything and worry too much which is the worse way to run a biz and the reason why he gets bent out of shape . But, thats me looking from the outside, who knows what is going on in the inside.
If y ou going to run a biz, run a biz, keep your family life out of the mix, and run it like a real thing, dont' mix work and personal, other wise it will burn you.
11 hours ago, dochubert said:LOL!
Sid, it seems like a lot of work for ~$12 apiece. Are you making any money on these? (Hopefully I'm not shooting myself in the foot here!) Maybe you're planning to have them made in china after this test batch?
Yeah, I have a small profit margin--if I sell all of 'em in a month or 2, I should make enough profit to maybe crest above the federal poverty level during that timeframe 😉. I may not make much...but all of my needs are fully met, so I can't complain.
I don't want to have them fully manufactured in China--because then China would the ability to rip me off and start selling it for pennies on the dollar. Actually, there's 2 other factors why not to make them in China:
- I can't find the tiny LCD display for a reasonable price in China. (Goodness sakes, that's the first time someone ever said that!) Any LCD supplier on Alibaba doesn't seem to stock "generic LCDs", and they would have to be custom made--with an MOQ well past 5,000pcs. At close to $1/ea. (Ouch.) Excuses for the high cost that I've gotten from manufacturers usually boil down to, "it is so small, there is a lot of wastage during production of LCD glass."
- It would cost me a fair amount to pay a Chinese factory to fully hand-assemble the units--money I'd much rather keep here in the U.S. and pay a family member to do.
11 hours ago, dochubert said:Hopefully I'm in line for 16 of this batch. No answer from Sean about buying them....
I'll see if I can bug him today and figure out what's going on. Heard from him briefly yesterday.
11 hours ago, The Blind Wolf said:Also, from what I'm hearing from a certin person, there been some issue that is being iron out. I am hopeing I get my GS inverters next week, but, I'm not holding my breath on that happening. I think I won't see my inverters until June.
We can't delay on yours 'till June, that's simply not right. I don't fully know what's going on; I am aware that there seem to be some PCB assembly quality issues (poor soldering is my guess)...worst case, this would add a week or so of time for him to mail the defective boards to me...I repair and test them, then send them back to him.
3 hours ago, Sid Genetry Solar said:We can't delay on yours 'till June, that's simply not right. I don't fully know what's going on; I am aware that there seem to be some PCB assembly quality issues (poor soldering is my guess)...worst case, this would add a week or so of time for him to mail the defective boards to me...I repair and test them, then send them back to him.
Well, he tooken this long, if I knew it was going to take this long I would have told him to give me two of the second batch that has the better wire connetors. Maybe they won't have the same issue of what ever going on with mine.
3 hours ago, The Blind Wolf said:Well, he tooken this long, if I knew it was going to take this long I would have told him to give me two of the second batch that has the better wire connetors. Maybe they won't have the same issue of what ever going on with mine.
Speak of the devil. Sean just text me, and instead of answering the text I sent him he told me it be another 14 days for the other inverters. The text I sent him was would I be getting my two inverters this coming week. I think he didn't look who he was texting. unless he is going to wait for the new inverts, so if that is the case, yep looks like June is when I'll get my two babies.
2 minutes ago, The Blind Wolf said:Speak of the devil. Sean just text me, and instead of answering the text I sent him he told me it be another 14 days for the other inverters. The text I sent him was would I be getting my two inverters this coming week. I think he didn't look who he was texting. unless he is going to wait for the new inverts, so if that is the case, yep looks like June is when I'll get my two babies.
I think someone's a bit overworked. Text him back asking for further clarification, that you were in the preorders...
I think someone's a bit overworked. Text him back asking for further clarification, that you were in the preorders...
I text him back saying this is the blind grey wolf if he don't know that, then I don't know. *sigh* Oh well, Sid you shouldn't be the one that cover for him though. He needs to get things in order. That is whyhe needs to get somebody to handle the orders and stuff, even if its hard for him to step back. He should be getting the things out instead of doing it all. You know what we talked about, and the offer still stands. I just can't talk to him, cuase well he don't answer phone calls at all, and leaving voice mail is like leaving a lost lvoe letter. Cause he never called back way before he started the pre order of the GS inverts when I was goign to order a custom inverter.
He called me on March 18th, we talked and he basicly said it would be another week before he would be able to send it out., thats the only report I got from him, you shouldn't be the middle man. . .
Either way, I'm going to step back, remove my self from even thinking about the inverters. I'm busy playing with my 3d printers and modding stuff and having fun with it. I just wish i knew about that it was goign to take more then a month before I get my inverts, otherwise I wouldn't have tooken down my PJ setup, and costing me $5 a day to run my house since I took it down is no fun. I would have saved over $$300 from the time I took it down till now if I knew it would have been this long.
Talk with yall later, I'm off.
Got the "chaining comm protocol" successfully tested across 3 balancers (will test it on 8 balancers shortly)...yes, I did use the binary method. Comm runs at 4800bps, with a quiescent current of 700uA (0.7mA).
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The data transmit time for each balancer is roughly 16-17mS. With a 5 second repeat interval, that's 5000 / 17 = 294 balancers absolute max string length before there's a serial bus collision somewhere down the line. Heck, I could half the clock speed to save even more quiescent power, with 2400baud serial comm (max ~148 balancers).
In the 'scope screenshot above, the very first byte is a "header" (0xA7), followed by a balancer string (0xFF, followed by 6 more bytes, some reserved for future expansion). Following the balancer string, each unit appends a checksum string (0xFE, [checksum byte]), which the next balancer in line reads and verifies (but does not send) before appending it's own balancer string (0xFF + 6 bytes) and updated checksum.
You can see the omitted checksums in the above screenshot: the blank space between units is the non-sent checksum bytes.
Next in line: writing and testing the automatic overheat reset function (currently, it's very difficult to get the balancers to reset if they overheat). Balancers will also be able to indicate if the main transistor has failed ("FAIL"). And yes, all these flags are indicated in the serial string.
You may notice that the serial is active high. I very nearly got myself backed into a corner...the on-board simple RX level-shifter circuit (to allow cascading balancers 1 cell apart)...inverts the serial signal. This particular PIC allows inverting TX...but not RX. Thusly I had to invert TX in order to make this work. (Fancier PICs allow inverting either or both TX and RX; this one does not.)
It would be relatively simple to make another small adapter board with a PIC on it that can translate this binary string to JSON @ 57,600baud (or 115,200 if necessary). Worth a thought.
12 hours ago, Sid Genetry Solar said:Excuses for the high cost that I've gotten from manufacturers usually boil down to, "it is so small, there is a lot of wastage during production of LCD glass."
This idea is probably crap, but what about one larger lcd that is able to display up to 16 balancer's output in a single window? Then sell sets of balancers (say 8-16) with one all purpose lcd that shows output of all of em at once.
This idea is probably crap, but what about one larger lcd that is able to display up to 16 balancer's output in a single window? Then sell sets of balancers (say 8-16) with one all purpose lcd that shows output of all of em at once.
Have thought about that, but then I lose the completely modular and reconfigurable simplistic approach...currently, you can buy just what you need for the size system you have, and mount them in (almost) any necessary method. Most commercial "BMS" systems are stuck to a particular size (or have lots of extra unused parts)...instead of being configurable to the exact size needed.
I didn't particularly buy the excuse given for the higher price, because I can buy ready-made off-the-shelf LCDs from Mouser Electronics for under $1/ea. Heck, I can buy a 16x2 character LCD WITH a backlight (much bigger LCD!) from a supplier I like to use...for all of $1.41 in single-piece quantities!
Uhm, how about a custom modual that can connect inline witht he balancer and output to either bluetooth or WiFi to a html page to get the readings? the Modual would work with as many as you want. . . It don't even need a screen. Its just a reading output device, should be a simple item to make. I buy bluetooth from overkill bms for $11 for my bms. I'm sure you could use that bluetooth as a add on to the inline device. I got a Tablet with my Make sky blue and BMS display all the time where I can check any status on my system.
2 hours ago, The Blind Wolf said:Uhm, how about a custom modual that can connect inline witht he balancer and output to either bluetooth or WiFi to a html page to get the readings? the Modual would work with as many as you want. . . It don't even need a screen. Its just a reading output device, should be a simple item to make. I buy bluetooth from overkill bms for $11 for my bms. I'm sure you could use that bluetooth as a add on to the inline device. I got a Tablet with my Make sky blue and BMS display all the time where I can check any status on my system.
In a nutshell that's a future project I have in mind: a central control system which is (practically) infinitely customizable, and allows connecting all the various aspects of a solar system together into one central screen (HTML or otherwise)...as well as "interwiring" various parts together (i.e. if batteries reach full charge, and there's plenty of sunshine--turn on an outlet for a water heater. Or if batteries are too cold, shut the chargers off.)
But that's a long ways down the road.