Meter running backwards AFTER PV turned off

Bright_Light · Jul 3, 2012

Had a customer who's meter has been running backwards - then when British Gas came to change over the meter he turned off the panels and the isolator switch by his fuse box. The meter was still running backwards albeit slowly even after it had all been turned off so British Gas refused to change the meter as it was still running backwards? Anyone got any ideas what this could be?

zeljuga · Jul 3, 2012

Seem to be meter with strong Personal opinion.

danesol · Jul 3, 2012

They dont know what they're doing ???

FB. · Jul 3, 2012

Bright_Light said:
Had a customer who's meter has been running backwards - then when British Gas came to change over the meter he turned off the panels and the isolator switch by his fuse box. The meter was still running backwards albeit slowly even after it had all been turned off so British Gas refused to change the meter as it was still running backwards? Anyone got any ideas what this could be?

Why didn't the engineer follow the usual PV shutdown procedure?

1.
Switch off (red/yellow) AC isolator.

2.
Wait for about 30 seconds until inverter completes shutdown procedure.

3.
Switch off (grey/black) DC isolator(s).

Solar array is then inoperative.

whinmoor · Jul 3, 2012

Bright_Light said:
Had a customer who's meter has been running backwards - then when British Gas came to change over the meter he turned off the panels and the isolator switch by his fuse box. The meter was still running backwards albeit slowly even after it had all been turned off so British Gas refused to change the meter as it was still running backwards? Anyone got any ideas what this could be?

Was it still running backwards a few minutes later? We recently came across a meter that seemed to do this but it came to a standstill after a while. We came to the conclusion that it was simply the momentum of the spinning.

Bright_Light · Jul 3, 2012

Thank you FB and whinmoor for your (constructive!) replys. The customer shut the system off in the correct manor so I dont think that would have affected anything.

The momentum idea would make some sense, I will ask the customer to isolate agian and wait a few minutes to see if it stops. Otherwise, could we have a faulty isolator that is leaking?

SolarCity · Jul 3, 2012

Leaking? It is feasible that you could have one isolator that has packed up and is locked-ON but you would need both the AC isolator AND one of the DC isolators to fail for this to be the reason.

Bright_Light · Jul 3, 2012

lol leaking - so to speak! Not a technical term im sure. Thanks for the reply, sounds very unlikely to be a fault with the isolators.

danesol · Jul 3, 2012

Bright_Light said:
Had a customer who's meter has been running backwards - then when British Gas came to change over the meter he turned off the panels and the isolator switch by his fuse box. The meter was still running backwards albeit slowly even after it had all been turned off so British Gas refused to change the meter as it was still running backwards? Anyone got any ideas what this could be?

Ok, would you NOT be best to attend your own customer site and undergo the same switch off - surely you can advise what is doing on, if its at all a fault with your installation, otherwise BG staff & customer need more training !