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Solar Battery Not Working? Fault Diagnosis and Support

A large share of the battery faults reported to us turn out to be settings, communications or firmware — not broken hardware. That’s good news, because those cost nothing to fix and often don’t need a visit at all.

Work through the diagnostic below. You’ll either fix it yourself in the next ten minutes, or you’ll arrive at our door with the diagnosis half done.

batteryinstall.ie / fault triage

What's your battery actually doing?

A large share of the faults reported to us turn out to be settings, communications or firmware rather than broken hardware. Work through this and you'll either fix it yourself in the next ten minutes, or arrive at our door with a diagnosis already half done.

Step 1 The symptom

What's happening? Pick the closest match. If two apply, choose the one that started first.

Likely outcome Pending

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Pick a symptom and we'll rank the probable causes.

Fixable yourself

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Based on what typically causes this.

Warranty relevant

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Whether this is often a manufacturer claim.

Probable causes In order

The ranked list appears once you've chosen a symptom.

The five most common battery complaints, and what usually causes them

My battery isn’t charging

Ranked by how often we find each:

1 Charge schedule or tariff window mis-set

Especially after a tariff change or a clock change

2 Target state of charge capped

Below current level, so the system believes it’s already full.

3 Solar surplus genuinely insufficient

In December, a 4 kWp array may produce barely more than the house consumes.

4 CT clamp failed, reversed, or on the wrong conductor

The system can’t see surplus, so it doesn’t charge.

5 Communications lost between inverter and BMS

Usually a CAN or Modbus cable, occasionally a connector that was never fully seated.

6 Temperature protection active

LFP cells won’t accept charge below roughly 0°C. Outdoor installations in a cold snap will pause and resume

7 Actual BMS or module fault

Least common, and the one that needs us.

My battery isn’t discharging

Usually a reserve setting holding charge back for backup, a discharge schedule that doesn’t match when you actually use electricity, a CT clamp problem, or an inverter that’s derating on temperature.

It empties by ten o’clock

The app shows nothing / the system is offline

There’s an error code on the display

Look it up. Codes are brand-specific and the same number means different things on different products.

Look up your error code with our special tool

Look it up. Codes are brand-specific and the same number means different things on different products.

When to stop and call someone

Some things are not diagnostic exercises. Stop, leave the system alone, and phone us or an electrician immediately if you see:

Smoke, burning smell, or scorching around the battery, inverter or cabling
The battery casing swollen, deformed, split or leaking
Audible hissing, popping or crackling from the enclosure
The unit hot to the touch beyond normal warmth
Any liquid or residue around or beneath the battery

Do not attempt to isolate the system yourself unless you already know how and it is safe to reach the isolator. Evacuate the area, keep people away, and call. Lithium battery fires behave differently to ordinary electrical fires and are not something to investigate at close range.

For everything else, the wizard is safe to work through.

What we need if you do call us

Battery and inverter make and model, from the labels
Installation year and installer, if known
Any error codes exactly as displayed
A screenshot of the monitoring app, ideally showing a full day
A description of when the behaviour started and what changed around then
Whether anything else changed — new tariff, new appliance, router replaced, power cut

That’s typically enough for us to tell you over the phone whether it’s a settings fix, a firmware issue or a site visit.

We work on systems we didn’t install

Including ones whose original installer has ceased trading. That’s an increasingly common position in Ireland, and it doesn’t leave you without options — but it does mean warranty claims may need to go directly to the manufacturer rather than through the installer, and we’ll tell you honestly where you stand on that.