help! Prosine 2.0 display went blank

[vtpeaknik]

I knew electronics where finicky but this is ridiculous...

My small on-grid PV system includes a BZ MPPT500 charge controller and a Xantrex Prosine 2.0 inverter/charger.  Recently the BZ malfunctioned, it passed the PV current through but failed to do the voltage-conversion trick (50V panels, 12V batteries).  I sent it to BZ and they returned it, fixed, hopefully.  So I re-installed it this evening, hoping for sunshine tommorrow to check it out.  To make room in the batteries for a charge, I turned on the inverter.  Other than a soft glow of the backlight in the remote display, it shows nothing, no LEDs light up, and it does not respond to any of the switches.  Last time I used it, a couple of weeks ago (AFTER the BZ failed) it worked fine, both as inverter and as charger.  Now the only sign of life, other than the glow, is: if I plug it into grid power, after several seconds I hear the transfer relay clicking.  So perhaps the main unit is OK, and only the display is not?  Tried replacing the communications cable (it's a standard 4-wire telephone cable), same thing.  What to do now?  I bought the Prosine used, so I don't expect a warranty?

[vtpeaknik]

Having nothing much to lose, removed the back cover of the display unit, and gently re-seated the connector to the LCD (could only get it part-way unplugged). Also gently pushed the main microchip into its socket, although it did not seem to move.  Now it is working again!  Perhaps this will spur me to finally mount that display up by the basement door - sitting on the battery box is probably not a great environment for it.  Anyway I hope this is useful info for other Prosine owners.

[vtpeaknik]

BTW, the BZ charge controller (MPPT500) has been fine since returned from fix-up.  I think the display is not very accurate, but not too bad:  The voltage shows a bit higher than my DVM or the voltage display on the inverter, and the currents displayed don't quite make sense sometimes.  E.g., if the input (PV) amps is 3 and the output (battery) amps is 15 that's an impossible 5x "current boost" as the voltage ratio is only 3x or so.  But it does seem to charge the battery well, with peak output current on sunny days around 20A as it should be, and even on cloudy days and at dusk the battery is up around 14V.  I reduced the float voltage a bit from the factory setpoint, to about 13.8V (by my cheap DVM) - or about 14.1V as displayed on the BZ.

[vtpeaknik]

Still running ye olde Prosine 2.0 with it's reconstituted remote display.  I still have a problem though: after a random length of time, between an hour and several days, the display changes to an error report, seems to be about a communications problem.  The inverter is still running OK, and the LEDs in the display still function, but the LCD only displays the error message.  If I turn the inverter off and back on it returns to normal, for a while.  I've written Xantrex about this, a few years back, and they more or less shrugged, saying it happens sometimes, there's nothing they can do about it, etc.  Is there really no fix for this?