Off grid power options and what do you use?

[sonya123]

we have 1600 watts of solar panels , one 800 watt set and 2 400 . It's enough to run our refrigeration which is all we really need power for other than minor stuff like charging phones
we have enough batteries to keep it going for a few days of no sun too
plus a large but old generator that's 5000 kw
The solar is 3 separate systems and we run power cords from where they and the controllers and inverters are to the house. It was cheapest that way and safest ( no huge voltage anywhere or whatever, husband set it up)
Plus if one system fails we have 2 others

my brother told me in the EU you are not allowed to set up your own solar panels like the way we did. They have to be installed on the house, by some certified electrician , and be attached to the grid. Wow, that sucks. I don't suppose there is such a thing as living off grid in Europe
They are going to be SO screwed if anything ever happens to their grid!

 

[Mountain trapper]

Bolding in your post is mine.
Speaking for my system (Renogy panels & charge controller) with 4 LiFePO4 batteries, the manufacturer says to do connections in this sequence:
Connect battery to charge controller first. Connect (-) then (+)
Set the battery type on the charge controller.
Cover the solar panels before connecting to charge controller or keep them face down.
Connect panel (-) to charge controller cable (-)
Connect panel (+) to charge controller cable (+)

The underlined one is the most important. If you connect your panels to the charge controller first, you've juiced the controller but it has no place to send the output (to the batteries) and it could then damage your charge controller.

Going to your issue of the fault at the inverter
When I've gotten that issue, it was the battery. Check the battery voltage using a volt meter. If it reads good, get a load test done on the battery to see if it has adequate AMPs to run the inverter.

Or, take your inverter and connect it to a known good battery that can handle the inverter (e.g. your vehicle battery) and see if you still get the fault.

The battery is brand new. Before I installed the battery I put it on the charger. It reads 14.4 volts. The solar panel keeps the battery fully charged.
I have two other solar kits of the same brand. One is connected to a gate opener with a deep cycle battery, but no inverter. The other solar kit is used at the pump house to keep the generator battery charged, again with no inverter.
Just out of curiosity, I took a spare battery and clamped a 300 watt inverter to it, then plugged a 43 watt LED light bar to it. The same light as in the chicken coop. I turned the light on. It worked fine for awhile, then the inverter had a fault. I'm thinking maybe the lights are the problem. I'll try to find an incandescent light bulb and try that.

 

[zoomzoom]

Just out of curiosity, I took a spare battery and clamped a 300 watt inverter to it, then plugged a 43 watt LED light bar to it. The same light as in the chicken coop. I turned the light on. It worked fine for awhile, then the inverter had a fault. I'm thinking maybe the lights are the problem. I'll try to find an incandescent light bulb and try that.

Do you have a link for the light you're using?
Do you have another (bigger) inverter to use for testing?
It sounds like the inverters built-in protection circuit doesn't like the light. Although the light says 43W, does it have internal circuitry that may have a larger draw than the 43W?