Sourceforge page User information Download (v 1.07)
Aurora Monitor is a graphical application which continuously monitors the power output and other information from either one or two Power-One Aurora inverters. ( http://www.power-one.it/ ). It runs under Linux and Windows.
It is intended for use with Aurora power inverters in domestic solar-voltaic power generation installations.
Aurora Monitor displays continuously updated graphs, numerical values, and alarm status.
It can send data to www.pvoutput.org every 5 minutes.
Aurora Monitor stores the data so that graphs from previous days can be displayed or analysed.
Aurora Monitor on Linux needs the wxWidgets libraries (libwxgtk2.8) to be installed. The Windows version is compiled to include the wxWidgets libraries which it needs.
The Aurora power inverters provide a serial data interface using RS-485. I use an RS-232 to RS-485 adapter plugged into the serial port of the computer. Aurora Monitor then communicates with the inverter through the serial port.
For computers without a serial port, you can use a USB port and a USB to RS-485 converter, although this may be less reliable. It would appear as an extra serial port on the computer (an extra COM port on Windows, or a device such as /dev/ttyUSB0 on Linux).
Chart of input power. The red and purple areas between 14.00 and 15.00 show shading from a televsion aerial on a neighbouring house. The pink is input power equally from both strings of panels. The purple area shows where string 1 gives more power than string 2, and the red area shows where string 2 gives more power. The red curve shows the change in sun elevation during the day.
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Chart showning the input voltages of the 2 strings of panels (pink and purple).
The blue graph shows the grid voltage.
The output power is shown for reference in dark grey, in the background behind the grid.
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Histogram of daily energy production.
Power-One provide an application called Aurora Communicator for use in monitoring their
Aurora power inverters. ( http://www.power-one.it/digilab/Digi.aspx?Code=15 ).
However, this is only for Windows and is not open-source.
Aurora Monitor is open-source. It runs on both Windows and Linux, and potentially on other architectures.
There is a command-line program for Linux called aurora which can be used to collect data from Aurora inverters. ( http://www.curtronics.com/Solar/AuroraData.html ). It is also available in the Ubuntu respository.
I am greatful to Curt Blank for his work on this program which has been very useful to understand how to communicate with and retrieve data from Aurora inverters.