IanD

If it's the new Orion XS then this is likely to happen via a firmware upgrade: https://community.victronenergy.com/t/power-supply-function-on-the-orion-xs-dc-to-dc/3321/2 Matthias Lange is one of the Victron staff responsible for stuff like this, so this is straight from the horse's mouth: See my reply -- if it's an Orion XS your wish may soon be granted... 😉 (but no date for this feature has been announced yet, so you might have to wait some time...)

Before I report your post for breaking the forum rules, has it occurred to you that there are people out there who actually design the circuits that go inside those little black boxes with legs on (or more commonly nowadays, balls underneath...) that are at the heart of so much stuff today -- including SMPS, and the chips inside whatever you're writing your posts on, and the devices that zip data around the world so you can see this? And that you might be having this argument with someone who has being doing exactly that for many years, and actually knows what they're talking about -- unlike you, it seems? When in a hole, stop digging... 😉 Nick's the one making incorrect statements and now calling me a liar -- so maybe you should tell him to shut up... 😉

I'm perfectly aware of discontinuous mode, having implemented it. Are you aware of architectures like Cuk, LLC, series resonant, multiphase? All meat and drink to those who actually design SMPS -- by which I mean the circuits themselves, not "plonking a chip on a board" -- I was working for a company similar to Analog Devices and designed not only the controller and switch drivers but even the custom inductors integrated into the package for powering a CPU... 😉

You were wrong about that too... 😉 (BTW buck-boost converters are inherently bidirectional as the video explained, it's a fundamental feature of the architecture, hence the name -- but in many the controller is configured to only allow power/current to flow one way) Might I suggest that arguing about SMPS with somebody who has actually designed them from scratch -- including controller and switch drivers -- is not likely to be a winning strategy? 😉

Doom Bar and good don't normally occur in the same sentence...

Or you could admit that what you posted was wrong. Oh I forgot, never going to happen... 😉

13.5V will never read as "100% SoC", the SoC counter only gets reset to this when you get a periodic "absorption" cycle (e.g. to 14.3v) -- charging then stops (e.g. after 2 hours) and the discharge current is then integrated until the voltage drops to the 13.5V "float" voltage, in my setup this reads as about 99% SoC. If there's enough solar to meet demand it will sit there at the float voltage, then when the sun goes down the SoC and voltage start to drop overnight (e.g. to 85% SoC). In the morning solar charging restarts and the batteries charge back up to 13.5V and then stay there (if there's enough solar) -- this usually happens before noon in my case.

Sorry Nick, but you don't know what you're talking about... 😞 A buck-boost B2B converter -- like the Sterling, or the Orion XS -- can step voltage up or down, and transfer current in either direction. There's only one full-bridge switching stage and one inductor inside it, the voltage ratio and direction of current flow is all defined by the switching controller inside.

You said B2B current can't flow bidirectionally, which is categorically not true -- as I said, it can for B2B (or charger/inverters) designed to support this, and these do already exist, for example this one: https://www.bimblesolar.com/Sterling-BB1210 The Orion XS hardware is capable of bidirectional charging but Victron are still debugging the firmware; no doubt they'll release this when it's ready, because it will make the product more attractive to buyers.

The blind ones, presumably? 😉