Lithium Batteries, who has them?

[dapope]

Moved minetoday from the lying down position to back to upright. Finally have a solid clamp arranement too. Now to put the inverter on top...

[campingnut]

I'm willing to make the jump to lIFEPO$ knowing the following

1. You need a high voltage cut out on your solar controller at around 14 volts or 90% state of charge thats switches to the hot water tank or similar (eg no float). Dingo 20 or 40 with a Victron state of charge meter.
2. You need a low voltage cut off (probably set by the inverter and the dingo) at around 12 volts.
3. You need something mechanical to hold them together.
4. If I connect them fairly low in state of charge to the alternator it might run the alternator so heavy that it could melt it -use something to reduce that amperage if your going to connect it to the alternator.
5. you use a device/devices that shut the system down or alarm you if the cells become unbalanced (use the first four terminals as the others draw power to run the unit Celllog 8?)
6, Use about 600 watts of panels for a 200ah battery (maybe overkill but who cares!)
7. A willingness to check the voltage diff between cells and fix it if it gets out of whack.
8. Use large wires and keep the inverter close to the battery,

What I dont know is if there is a suitable device that can equalize all the cells to the same voltage without me having to do it manually? slowhands device? relativites? any other contenders?

But I am willing to go ahead without it and do it manually (by paralelling cells at about half charge) if they start to drift.

Am I ready or should I give it away. I consider you guys the best in the business. I think I know enough -what do you think?

[T1 Terry]

I'm willing to make the jump to lIFEPO$ knowing the following

1. You need a high voltage cut out on your solar controller at around 14 volts or 90% state of charge thats switches to the hot water tank or similar (eg no float). Dingo 20 or 40 with a Victron state of charge meter.
2. You need a low voltage cut off (probably set by the inverter and the dingo) at around 12 volts.
3. You need something mechanical to hold them together.
4. If I connect them fairly low in state of charge to the alternator it might run the alternator so heavy that it could melt it -use something to reduce that amperage if your going to connect it to the alternator.
5. you use a device/devices that shut the system down or alarm you if the cells become unbalanced (use the first four terminals as the others draw power to run the unit Celllog 8?)
6, Use about 600 watts of panels for a 200ah battery (maybe overkill but who cares!)
7. A willingness to check the voltage diff between cells and fix it if it gets out of whack.
8. Use large wires and keep the inverter close to the battery,

What I dont know is if there is a suitable device that can equalize all the cells to the same voltage without me having to do it manually? slowhands device? relativites? any other contenders?

But I am willing to go ahead without it and do it manually (by paralelling cells at about half charge) if they start to drift.

Am I ready or should I give it away. I consider you guys the best in the business. I think I know enough -what do you think?

We as in the members of the private lithium forum, just to clear up any misunderstandings before they start
We do make an all in one charge controller "black box" that is custom built to use the equipment you have, that makes a lot of the issues self sorting. 12v batteries rarely go out of balance, 24v batteries are a different story but we are working on a number of different approaches to sort this issue. Balancing can be achieved by either draining a bit out of the high cells or adding a bit with a separate charge to the low cells. The second method is by far the easier of the 2. Low capacity warning and non essential equipment can be shut off using one of the facilities within the Victron BMV along with a warning alarm ( both audible and flashing) that warns you well before this lower level is reached. We can also add an audible alarm to warn is a cell reaches the acceptable upper or lower limits, so it can be tailored any where from a bare bones system to a full belt and braces system along with suitable bells and whistles Add auto or manual control to the package and I think just about all possibilities are covered

T1 Terry

[campingnut]

Thanks Heaps Terry - I appreciate all the forums you have written on and I dont get surprised when Im reading a new forum and I think -Wow this guy knows his stuff -only to look up and see its you again!

[nomads]

These are 2 posts I did on the other forum that may be relevant to this topic.

G,day all,

We are currently assisting our daughter and son in law with their harvest (canola- [finished], barley [in progress] and wheat, [due to start next week]).

We are in Temora area and todays temp is 32c.

We provide all the smokos, lunches and evening meals as well as being the general gophers for escort duty, filling fuel carts, moving vehicles etc, etc.

The day can start at 8 am and continue until after midnight (humidity/moisture permitting at either end).

We camp out in the paddocks and stay there o'night to give some security to the valuable machinery.

We camp in the full sun to get the advantage of the sun for the solar panels, (and the shade trees are not really safe to camp under) but they cannot keep up with the power usage as the a/c is needed from about 10am to 7pm, as well as the use of the kettle, microwave, constant opening and closing of the 230 litre compressor fridge etc.

The lithium batteries can cope with these loads for about 3 hrs, (obviously only running the a/c, kettle or microwave individually).

The real saviour at this time of the year is the Honda 2.0 generator ( and I only mention the Honda because that is what we have - no doubt other brands would operate just as well). The Honda easily starts and operates the Ibis air command air conditioner and once operating, I can also set the Projecta battery charger to charge at 12 amps at the same time.

The Honda, in an endevour to get it in the shade, may be located up to 30 metres from the c'van and this distance doesn't seem to impact on it.

We find that if we operate the a/c from around 10am, it will maintain an inside temp of 23c to 25c, irrespective of the outside temp.

If we wait until the outside temp reaches above 35c, the a/c struggles to maintain anything below 26c.

My system allows me to run the a/c etc off the inverter power (Projecta Intelliwave 2000w), whilst using the generator to power the Projecta 50amp at its 50 amp rate.

However, as the a/c is working hard in these temps, it does not cycle very often and the a/c's 140 amp draw (1550w?) is considerably more than the generator/battery charger can put in. It does, however, extend the run time of the Honda generator as it is only operating in Eco mode in this situation.

We have just finished 6 months on the road in outback WA (+85% bush camping) and only used the generator twice, and both times were to help others.

I guess the point of this post, other than to post info that may be of interest to some, is to say that generators have their place. Without one, we could not assist our kids each year at this time.

For anyone looking at the time of this post, I have had to go into town to look after my grand daughter for a couple of hours, so have used the break to post this info.

Regards,

Ian

G'day all,

Just an update on my original post.

Whilst I was in town looking after our grand daughter, my daughter phoned from the farm and said that the air con had cut out but the generator was still going.

My first thought was that the RCD or RVD had tripped. She checked this and no problem. She checked the lead into the Honda and at the c'van end and both good.

As I could not get out to the farm until my youngest g'daughter woke up and my eldest g'daughter arrived home from school (approx one and a half hours), I had to think of a way to keep the a/c going (temp had risen to 34c).

I asked her to change from mains power (the Honda) to battery power (the inverter).

The SOC meter showed 50%, the voltage was 13.3v and the amp hrs remaining was 200.

When I arrived out there about an hour and a half later, the generator was still running (I had forgotten to ask her to turn it off) but the red light was flashing so it was not supplying any power.

The generator was in full sun so I think it had just shut down supplying power as a self protective measure. It had been powering the a/c and the battery charger to 12 amps so had been working hard.

Anyway, the a/c was still operating and the inside temp was 25c.

The surprising thing was that even though the SOC was down to 11%, the voltage was still showing 12.6v.

As soon as I turned the a/c off, the voltage went back up to 13v.

That is as low as I have ever allowed the SOC to go and that only occurred because I forgot to tell my daughter to turn the a/c off after being on the inverter for an hour or when the SOC got to 20%.

Regards,

Ian

[cvtripper]

Ian,

It seems to me you could do with more solar and more battery capacity, but probably don't have the required real estate? Maybe some portable panels would help?

[T1 Terry]

Hi Ian, as you say, under normal operating conditions the solar and battery capacity are ample, but in that situation as camp kitchen without the back up generator supply you would need a lot more solar and battery capacity, so a generator is a good secondary supply. The Honda's do suffer from over heat and the load of the air con and charger would be pushing the limits of the Honda's continuous run capacity of 1800w and that would generate even more heat. Maybe a portable sun shade made from the light weight flexible panels to keep the sun heat off the generator and assist the charging might help, then it could be closer to the van and reduce the losses.
I'm surprised to hear you can get the Ibus to run on the Honda2.0i on a long lead, all the efforts we have tried refused to start the Ibus on anything but a very short and very heavy 20 amp lead, even then it was clear the Honda was non too happy about it.

As far as the 11% SOC and still 12.6v under load, that says the batteries are still alive and well with very little if any capacity loss, that certainly kills the nonsense about capacity loss of 10% yr on yr and working them hard shortens their capacity life, I think you system passed it's 1st birthday earlier this mth.

T1 Terry

[generdawg]

...I'm surprised to hear you can get the Ibus to run on the Honda2.0i on a long lead,

Did you mean "urbus".

My EU20i runs the Avan Ibis quite nicely plus other small items at the same time on a 20m 15A lead.

no sparks on this dawg

[T1 Terry]

I can only say what I have personally experienced with both a brand new Ibus and a 3yr old Ibus, neither would start from the generator unless the lead was very short and way over sized for it's length, not a hope on a 10 mtr 15 amp caravan lead, the Honda just spluttered and died under the load no matter what setting was used on the generator. The fan would run but as soon as we tried to get the compressor to cut in the generator spluttered and stopped. You were at Wongulla when we tried bob's generator on Gordon & Wendy's new Evernew with the roof mounted Ibus. Apparently Gordon tried his 2.4i Yamaha with the same result, yet the 2000w Projecta inverter ran the air con without an issue.

T1 Terry

[generdawg]

...You were at Wongulla when we tried bob's generator on Gordon & Wendy's new Evernew with the roof mounted Ibus. Apparently Gordon tried his 2.4i Yamaha with the same result, yet the 2000w Projecta inverter ran the air con without an issue.

Did some digging and it seems Aircommand is the brand with "Ibis" being one of seven models.

Aircommand models.jpg

Ibis logo.jpg

By the specs, 2.8kW should be outside the above units capabilities to run the a/c unit, but my Honda does.

Ibis aircommand specs.PNG

dawg who is just happy it works