A lithium battery DIY experiment.

Interesting. Might make up a 12v battery pack for my workbench to use for testing projects and other stuff. Went on the website. Which batteries are these that you used? Thx!
 
You will have to watch, when these came up I grabbed them, they sold out within the day.
https://batteryhookup.com/products/...4&_sid=046a22d3a&_ss=r&variant=28616328413263
Battery Hook Up is an interesting start from nothing, business story.
We went rock climbing instead of taking the bike out yesterday, simply spectacular October weather. Today Allison and I are doing a fall ride on the road sofa. I do have a "full function" LIPO battery charger from when I had the EBR with a lithium battery. I cranked ole' Madness to life then shut it off several more times yesterday so this battery is showing to be reasonably tough.
Thinking of putting 4 digital voltmeters, one to each cell, up on the bars.

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25 miles and all is well, battery now showing 13 volts bike off. Two volt meters one from cluster one direct to battery tender wire, it was possible to see the battery charging taper off after about 10 miles, the numbers converged then crossed with battery voltage being higher at the end of the ride.. Afterwards battery cells were no warmer than the surrounding frame etc.

the youtube video of a guy starting a V6 car showed significant voltage drop under starter load. I'm seeing a bit of that also. Will investigate a bit more after I am confident the cells are fully charged. I have enough bus bars to double them up. so may see if that makes any difference.
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Sounds great Gary....but I would still keep a fire extinguisher handy.

I'll continue to drink lots of fluids.............;)
PS both voltmeters stayed below 14 volts. Batteries are rated for 14.6 volt charging @80 amps I suspect the XS alternator will keep "a bit" below that.
 
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sport or trad climbing? can’t see the entirety of your gear rack in the pic...

either way, awesome. I haven’t been on real rock in years - probably couldn’t properly flake my rope if my life depended on it at this point.
 
sport or trad climbing? can’t see the entirety of your gear rack in the pic...

either way, awesome. I haven’t been on real rock in years - probably couldn’t properly flake my rope if my life depended on it at this point.
Just top ropers for the last few years :rolleyes: Devils Lake, a midwestern climbing mecca, is 3 miles from the house. :)
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Li Battery Fires: From what I have read these fires are caused by charging at temperatures below 0 Celsius. During charging the Lithium is absorbed into the electrodes but this process becomes inefficient below 0 Celsius resulting in Lithum building up on the electrode surface and shorting through the insulating membrane to give...

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Hate to report this, but all things are not balm in Gilead this morning.
Switched handlebar voltmeter shows 13, that's good. Iggy on, hit the starter; click, all the lights go out.
then they come back on. rut roh. repeat, same result. Fuggle around, remove, double check everything, double up the bus bars, repeat; same result. A 13 watt test light does fine but starter load makes it go open circuit.
:wtf:
It's out of the bike, on the concrete driveway and fancy dedicated lithium charger now will see what happens later today.
Put the lead acid back in and vroom vroom....
my only niggle was; getting the bike's hot lead screwed onto the last cell was a bit of a stretch. Hope I didn't mechanically stress something in that cell.
Will see If I can rig up some more or less progressive test loads and experiment.
It's not an adventure if the outcome was never in doubt. :sneaky:
 
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So kinda back burner messed 'round trying to get that battery back to life, no go. Finally emailed BatteryBackup and they are sending a replacement cell.
meantime I ordered a 4 series 100Amp battery management System and will install that along with the new cell. This cat ain't dead yet.
 
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Need to set the background; Batterybackup is a "surplus salvage" operation. They are buying batteries from big companies that use lithium batteries in their products, cells, batteries, power modules with; use by date expired, inventory that is no longer needed, high reliability product that gets periodic battery changes even if they have never been used. Design changes.... The usual gamut of surplus inventory.
The cells I bought were priced at well less than half of "retail". Just like new product but with a failure rate you might expect to be a bit higher, there are going to be units units that don't meet spec or fail. That they are willing to replace, even though the cells I bought were "sold out" within hours of becoming available, to me sez they hold back some product to take care of "issues". I'm thinking that's an impressive way for a surplus business to operate/act. This is an experiment for me, a bit of risk acceptable.
 
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PS I picked these cells for their (appears to be) rugged architecture. For no special reason (Pete):rolleyes: I'm a bit concerned about the effect of vibration and a generally rugged environment on battery life.
 
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