Switched out inverter, some breakers won’t work

Hello,

I’m hoping someone can provide some insight. I have a 400 watt solar panel system with a 50 amp charge controller, two deep cycle marine batteries with a 1000 watt inverter. I’m trying to upgrade my system little by little. I bought bought a 3000 watt pure sine inverter. I thought it would be just an easy switch out by just replacing the inverter itself. The only change I made was instead of plugging in my circuit box is wiring it into the inverter. We tried also plugging it in. The issue is the inverter keeps tripping and according to the manual the GFCI is tripped but I don’t have GFCI. Also we have power coming in to the inverter and I can plug small devices in the outlets of the inverter but once it gets to the circuit breaker box and I turn on certain breakers it trips. For instance it will be fine for the first breaker and it gets power but once I turn on the second breaker it trips. Anyone have any ideas on why this happens. Do I need more batteries?

Hi Diane;
Well, it sounds like one thing or another is currently malfunctioning.
Your brand-new inverter would be my first guess.
larger/more batteries are always nice but they are not your problem.

If your whole system was up and working correctly, changing inverters should have been as easy as you thought.
I would check each circuit one at a time to see if there is a fault.
If each breaker can come on and all things on that circuit work then I would hook your old inverter back up and see if everything works correctly.

If so, I would call the tech help at Renogy and see what they think.

You moved up in size on your inverter which may be an issue...

Can you give us a pic of your cables that are going to the battery?        If you are going up to 3000 watts   if you are at 12V   that would require cables that can handle 250 amps  of power.

It has been my own experience when I had too thin a cable, or my connections to the battery were loose that the inverter would not work properly.

Chinese inverters typically only give 1/2  to 2/3  the rated amount  ( with few exceptions )   has been my experience..    

But your Reneogy inverter there is a solid inverter....

Diane Frenser wrote:Hello,

I’m hoping someone can provide some insight. I have a 400 watt solar panel system with a 50 amp charge controller, two deep cycle marine batteries with a 1000 watt inverter. I’m trying to upgrade my system little by little. I bought bought a 3000 watt pure sine inverter. I thought it would be just an easy switch out by just replacing the inverter itself. The only change I made was instead of plugging in my circuit box is wiring it into the inverter. We tried also plugging it in. The issue is the inverter keeps tripping and according to the manual the GFCI is tripped but I don’t have GFCI. Also we have power coming in to the inverter and I can plug small devices in the outlets of the inverter but once it gets to the circuit breaker box and I turn on certain breakers it trips. For instance it will be fine for the first breaker and it gets power but once I turn on the second breaker it trips. Anyone have any ideas on why this happens. Do I need more batteries?

I would say your inverter is a floating neutral type notade for hardwiring into a panel. Looking at your panel your ground wire and the neutral bar are linked as is normal for a panel. You would need to break this link and have the white neutral wire "float" separate from the ground. In portable inverters the linking of the ground and neutral happens in the inverter not the breaker box and it freaks out the ground fault plug on the front....
Cheers, David Baillie

Nice pictures Diane. Pictures really help out trouble shooting. Great catch David.  While I was looking at the box the neutral and ground look like they are bonded, you already got to it.  This is a common problem with this type of inverter. I have found the ground will shock me with about 60v.