Solar Wattage Mixed polarity

Started installing Sense yesterday. I wasn’t able to get Sense to detect solar as it was already dusk (skipped solar setup). It did show electricity usage in the house in the evening, and it was learning…
About an hour after installing, I got a message:
"uh oh. Sense has detected an installation problem that we are unable to fix automatically. Sense Support has been contacted and is taking a look for you."
Well…almost 24 hours and no word. It still continued to show consumption…then the sun came up, and my entire usage went negative.

So…I went home for lunch to install the solar in bright daylight…followed steps and received the error message “Solar Wattage Mixed polarity”. Now, waiting for tech support on this too.

@RayshawnAtSense @BradAtSense

These guys will help you out. May not be until tomorrow since it’s late.

Sounds like your CTs may be misplaced somehow, you might want to post some pictures of your install if you can to help out.

So, the sensors are facing the same way…the way it’s wired in, I didn’t have access to wires, but was able to put CTs on the buss bars right after the main.


CTs for solar are on wires as they come from solar disconnect into the main

Sorry for the troubles here, @andrew1, and for our delay in getting back to you!

@RayshawnAtSense will be able to make sure someone from support gets in touch with you today to get this straightened out. They’re usually able to look in more closely on the data being reported from the monitor (with your permission), and get an idea of what might be wrong to help figure out a solution.

Hope to get you up and running soon!

I had the same problem when I installed mainly caused because my inverter has a 10 min delay before it turns back on. The setup program times out and gives that error message. The csr’s turned the solar on manually and also found a bug in my configuration file that they corrected.
It has been working great ever since . I have one small quirk. The solar meter shows 4 Watts even at night and I know the inverter is off. The suggestion was to restart the Sense but I don’t want to loose any of the detections I have accrued so I will live with it 4W out of 5,000 isn’t a significant error for me.
I am sure they will have you up and running soon.

Changed the breaker for power supply and seems to lost the error. Is it normal for solar to appear as a positive?

Is it normal for solar to appear as a positive?

That’s the goal, right? :wink:

Thought I had it, then after 5 hours, it said it needed tech support intervention.


Any idea how long they take? Been almost a day with no input.

Always call out @RayshawnAtSense and @BradAtSense for quickest attention :slight_smile:

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Hey @andrew1 We’ve got a tech agent reaching out now to help you resolve this ASAP. I’ll monitor the status of that support ticket to make sure it goes as smoothly as possible!

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Just adjusted to rectify possible open CT. It appears mains were slightly open and picking up solar too?

I installed solar last Sunday (it’s Tuesday now) so it has been through two night cycles. Both nights the solar meter showed 4 watts. Any other solutions that you know of? Maybe someone from Sense can chime in.

I still see 4 watts on my solar overnight as well…I’m guessing it’s a stray signal somewhere…a common occurance I understand.

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4W is essentially measurement noise. I think my solar settles in at -3W at night, but does it really matter in the scope of your power usage ?

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Here’s an explanation from Sense support:

“That would likely be overcompensation by the Sense monitor in attempting to zero out the inverters. Typically the inverters have a constant negative solar drain which the monitor attempts to correct for so that their usage doesn’t impact the overall solar readings. Sometimes the monitor can over-estimate the amount of energy from the inverters and shows it as a low constant positive value instead of a low constant negative one.”

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