Ford Intelligent Backup - detailed review by State of Charge

[wiffleballpractice]

I doubt you have a 50A AC. The compressor unit will have 2 ratings, “minimum circuit ampacity” (MCA), and “maximum overcurrent protection” (MOCP). MOCP is the largest breaker rating allowed and probably where you’re getting 50A. You need to look at the MCA.
If it’s less than 35A, it will probably work, but you might need a special “soft start” module to limit the inrush current. Most HVAC technicians are familiar with this because the same limitations apply to marginally-sized standby generators.

A heat pump system combined between the AC and air handler might be over 50A of MCA if it includes a beefy resistive heating element for aux/emergency. One of my systems combines to something like 64A, but 40A of that is the resistive heat kit.

I bring that up because in researching all of these solutions, I've found that modern homes with mostly all electric appliances can really be in a bind because any significant electric appliance (water heater, dryer, small central AC, oven) can draw almost 7.2kW by itself. ~9kW will reliably run most any major appliance, but you can only seemingly do that with the IBP. (I realize I'm mostly just repeating content from Tom).

Great video, by the way; I appreciate the detailed breakdown!

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[DiveMan911]

Spot on @tommolog!! I completely agree…(for my use) the for HIS was just too pricy, and thus I’m installing a manual transfer switch and will utilize ProPower on-board. I think it will work perfectly for me, and the cost is FAR more reasonable. Everyone’s needs will be different, but for me the decision was clear.

On a separate but related note…I’ve learned so much from your videos and I think you’ve been such an advocate for EV’s with real world testing and honest impressions. Keep up the great work!!!

 

[yed19]

Hey @tommolog , you get any updates on Fordpass working r when that might happen? Was told week of the 15th but no progress on my HIS working with my Fordpass yet.

 

[tommolog]

Hey @tommolog , you get any updates on Fordpass working r when that might happen? Was told week of the 15th but no progress on my HIS working with my Fordpass yet.

Yeah, I just reached out to Ford. WHile it was supposed to be ready by the end of January, it's not quite ready yet. Should be soon, but not yet. I will post here as soon as I hear anything.

 

[tommolog]

Spot on @tommolog!! I completely agree…(for my use) the for HIS was just too pricy, and thus I’m installing a manual transfer switch and will utilize ProPower on-board. I think it will work perfectly for me, and the cost is FAR more reasonable. Everyone’s needs will be different, but for me the decision was clear.

On a separate but related note…I’ve learned so much from your videos and I think you’ve been such an advocate for EV’s with real world testing and honest impressions. Keep up the great work!!!

Thank you!

 

[cwstnsko]

I loved the video, the complexity of your installation is very interesting, but probably not the most common setup, if there is such a thing

Have you seen any V2H/V2G targeted towards residential applications that support 800V EVs? I looked at the specs on the bidirectional DC system that Emporia is bringing to market soon and similar to the Ford/SunRun HIS, it is limited to 450V max DC input.

I just saw this was announced on 2/2
https://enphase.com/ev-chargers/bidirectional
This is what I am looking for. Hopefully it will work with The Lightning.
The specs are a little sparse, but it would integrate with the solar I already have and it looks to be more future proof with support for EVs up to 1000v.

 

[v2h8484]

Given all the reliability problem reports about HIS, I was curious to check some of the videos that purport to show HIS working. This is probably the first such video. Having watched it completely without skipping for the first time, I now see that it does not actually show HIS reliably working repeatedly (e.g. 10 out of 10 simulated outages). Also, the full system was never demonstrated to be working. Only an animation of the full system operation was provided. Even worse, the explanation of how the full system would work appears to have some serious and potentially unsafe elements. For example, 21:05 to 21:25 of the video shows that the generator and HIS outputs are tied together and working in parallel to provide higher total power to the loads. It's highly doubtful the full system would work this way reliably or safely in general. It's basically AC coupling the HIS directly to the generator which can result in power spikes from excess solar power that could damage the generator and/or trigger protection shutoff. Now I doubt the full system could practically work as explained. Also, based on the available HIS docs, this is not a supported configuration by Ford or SunRun. It's rather disappointing that SOC would put out such a video. I have enjoyed their videos on EV charging stations but this one is far below par.

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