PowerWalls offline

[Fruitcake]

What about turning them off until the issue is resolved? They should be able to keep a static charge for quite a while I would guess, just like they would in a warehouse.

I didn't try that, but my suspicion is that even if one toggled the PW power switches to the "off" position, the batteries would still slowly lose charge over time. Perhaps lose charge more slowly, but lose charge nonetheless. I believe the industrial term here is "self-discharge current."

And at that, during some well-intentioned-but-ultimately-useless troubleshooting with Tesla's first-level "support" personnel, I switched my PWs off, and the green status lights on the PWs continued to glow solid green. So I'm not really even sure what the hell the power switch actually does - I suspect it's more a logical switch than a physical one.

And of course, switching the PWs off would defeat the purpose of the system - e.g. resiliency in the event of a grid outage. Even if unable to charge, they could still provide backup with what power remains (this happened a few times - I experienced a few brief 10-20 minute outages while waiting for service, and the Gateway and PWs kicked in exactly as expected - no home downtime whatsoever.

Fruitcake

 

[bob_p]

Update on our situation.

I turned off all 4 of our PowerWalls after they had been sitting for an extended period with the status lights off. When the app last reported their status, the PowerWalls were at 35% charge. And because the electronics won't go online due to the Gateway motherboard's "synchronizer" failure, the PowerWalls shouldn't lose much charge while sitting - in our garage.

Our installer sent a tech out on Tuesday to replace the Gateway motherboard - and once the Gateway was powered up, all 4 of our PowerWalls had green status lights. And once the Gateway was online, it showed they had around 35% of charge.

So sitting with the power switches off - and with the Gateway not trying to access the PowerWalls, we didn't lose much charge to vampire drain.

The only issue we have left is the inability to change anything but the reserve % in the app. I'm unable to change the operating mode of the system to handle our free nights plan (no cost electricity from 9PM to 9AM).

I called Tesla Energy support, and they claimed the app should be able to control settings after 48 to 72 hours. We're beyond 72 hours - and the app still won't allow us to change the Gateway's settings.

As it turns out, the delay in getting the part may not have entirely been the fault of Tesla. Our installer had a staff issue - and the person who was assigned to get the part ordered for us dropped the ball on our case - along with other cases. Immediately after that staffer was replaced, the part was ordered - and it was here within a week.

I suspect most of our delay was due to bad luck - relying on our installer's staff member to take care of things - and when he wasn't doing anything about our problem - waiting for them to fire and replace him.

Oh well...

At least we have our PowerWalls (mostly) operating again - and we got through the hurricane season without needing backup power!

 

[BGbreeder]

@bob_p Great to hear that you are back online and mostly ok! It is rather interesting that the vampire drain appears to be entirely the electronics being powered up, rather than battery chemistry self discharge.

All the best,

BG

 

[reddy]

I called Tesla Energy support, and they claimed the app should be able to control settings after 48 to 72 hours. We're beyond 72 hours - and the app still won't allow us to change the Gateway's settings.

When I had issues with a new circuit board communicating with the Powerwalls, I was able to see it in the app almost instantly. The rub was that I now showed TWO Powerwall installations in my app, and I had to switch to the new one.

Perhaps that is your issue too.

Tap on the photo of yourself in the upper right corner of the app to display your Tesla cars and Powerwalls, then pick the one that you want by tapping on it. As you can see I have two Powerwalls, but one is inactive.

 

[bob_p]

After the new motherboard was installed, the new Gateway showed up in our app pretty quickly - as well as the old Gateway.

I called Tesla energy support - and they were able to remove the old Gateway from our account.

It's been 5 days since the new motherboard was activated - and we still don't have full access to the Gateway PowerWall settings - only the reserve %.

I called Tesla energy support on Thursday and they said it would take 48 (Thursday) or 72 (Friday) hours before the app would be able to change all of the settings.

We're now two days past that - and still can't configure the Gateway for our Free nights plan ($0 between 9PM to 9AM). So I'm manually adjusting the reserve percentage at 9PM and 9AM to prevent discharging the PowerWall during the free nights period.

Today, I tried a full cold start of the Gateway - turn off the PowerWalls, throw the breakers for the solar inverters and PowerWalls and then throw the grid power switch - wait 5 minutes - and then reverse the process to bring everything back online.

And that didn't change anything - still can't access the Gateway's settings.

It's unfortunate Tesla doesn't provide access to those settings through the Gateway's web interface...

Will call Tesla energy support again tomorrow (Monday) and ask for their help.

It's great to have the PowerWalls online again.

Now if Tesla can get us the past the last step - and allow us access from the mobile app...

 

[BGbreeder]

@bob_p FWIW: I have noticed similar delays in getting access to features here, and that the Tesla database for items like firmware level appears to be very slow to update new information. It is almost as if the Tesla backend database is updated on a schedule that isn't particularly frequent.

All the best,

BG

 

[bob_p]

Well...

We're getting close to 3 months since our PowerWalls went offline.

While we were able to get the PowerWalls operating again last week after the Gateway motherboard swap - 7 days later, we still can't change any settings (other than reserve percentage).

Called Tesla energy support yesterday. The response was something like - "Yes, I see there's a problem, but I can't help you." The issue was forwarded to the next support tier - which could take 5 to 10 business days before they respond.

At least the PowerWalls are able to charge & discharge. All that we're missing is the ability to automatically stop discharging between 9PM to 9AM when our electricity is completely free... Plus, we can't use Storm Watch - though with the hurricane season over here, the odds are very low that we'll need Storm Watch until a winter storm in January or February.

It is likely unusual for Tesla to do a motherboard swap - so this is probably something that doesn't come up very often.

 

[BGbreeder]

Don't you love being told that Tier 2 has it and that "they have 3-5 days to get back to you"? (Because why? Special dispensation from the high overlord? They have gold lapel pins? It is a union make work rule? ( Doubtful...)) I do find the target date phrasing to be very unfortunate phrasing. Why not something more professional and perhaps realistic such as "Tier 2 is backed up at the moment and this could take 7-10 days..."?

Motherboard swaps may be unusual, but it seems to me that it is unlikely that you are the first, and one would think someone took notes when the engineers tried it out the first time. (...Step# 79, "And now we need to update the ownership record in the database for the new motherboard to yield end user control." Although I do suspect the central database records are not updated often, or why would the installer app show that an upgrade performed 24 hours earlier still needs to be done?)

Good luck @bob_p!

Still playing whack-a-mole with the neurio reporting in and the TEG2 keeping all the current meters running,

BG

 

[aesculus]

Don't you love being told that Tier 2 has it and that "they have 3-5 days to get back to you"? (Because why? Special dispensation from the high overlord? They have gold lapel pins? It is a union make work rule? ( Doubtful...))

My guess is that they have inadvertently exposed their internal audit rule to gauge employee performance. If they don't respond in 3 days to an issue their individual or group score takes a hit. And the 5 days is because they get a pass 2 day pass if the 3 days spans a weekend. I am just speculating on this but have seen this very thing applied in many businesses.

 

[bob_p]

Well... This morning when I checked the Tesla app - we can now change the PowerWall settings - and have updated settings to support our Free Nights plan.

The app just started working - didn't receive any notification from Tesla.

Hopefully we won't see this sort of problem again - and lose full use of our PowerWalls for 3 months - most of which was waiting for our 3rd party installer and Tesla to coordinate sending us the motherboard plus the additional week to get the 2nd tier support to fully activate the system on their end.

The Tesla app has made it very easy to get assistance with S3XY vehicles - you can schedule service through the app - and most of the service can now be handled by their mobile team that comes to you.

For their energy customers, they basically send you to the website for information - and then rely on phone calls to report issues. They should update the app to automate this - plus because they have 3rd party installers involved for some of the systems, they could automatically forward non-Tesla issues to those installers - and make the process much smoother, without having to hire more phone support staff.