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Post by Admin on Mar 2, 2023 17:54:20 GMT -6
*****Show Off Your Battery Builds*****
Even though were are striving for free energy in the present time we still need Batteries so show your builds.
Regards, Marathonman
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Post by Marathonman on Mar 3, 2023 12:19:31 GMT -6
Here is a LIFePo4 battery I am building. It is 24 volts and 34 ah with 26650 cells @ 5 ah. Actually the cells are testing at 5.7ah. It was originally for my four wheeled buggy I am building but I changed my mind and decided to go 48 volt instead. So now I will use this system for some lucky kid's kart that will go like a bat out of hell. I love scaring the hell out of kids but in a good way LOL! Unfortunately there is a shortage of blue shrink wrap for the DIY battery builder. *Imagine that!* so I am waiting for that to finish the bat and system. The tabs on the side are for the BMS balance wires so the ones that are not used will get cut off. I am not bragging but I always overdo things I build. Each cell has 8 spot welds each and the nickle trace is as wide as I can find Taking almost 10 amps per trace. The ends will have strips of aluminum or copper covering the entire length to attach a 8 to 10 awg wire so this battery build can take 60 amp continuous when I am done. Hows that for quality workmanship. Isn't she pretty lol! 24 volt Bmac 600 watt.
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Post by Marathonman on Mar 3, 2023 12:27:30 GMT -6
And here is another 12 volt 70 ah battery I am building for a friend of mine daughter's buggy. I might make it 24 and swap out the motor, maybe!
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Post by Marathonman on Mar 3, 2023 12:36:27 GMT -6
Here are the cells I am using to building my 48 volt 57 ah battery for my four wheeled buggy.
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Post by Marathonman on Mar 5, 2023 15:30:49 GMT -6
The batteries that usually come with hand tool set are really crap especially Porter tools now a days. The garbage 1ah battery is pure shit and last like less than 30 minutes. If I use the Zaw Saw it is like 15 minutes, how pathetic as is the 4ah battery that will not work on anything except the flashlight. So I found some replacements at Battery hookup that are 10 amp capable at 3.3 ah. with the security key kit coming I will replace then making the 1ah a 3ah battery and the 4ah will be a 6ah. Porter Cable are 20 volt batteries so that is 5s which is 5 in series. I have a 4ah battery acting up so I will be redoing that one also which will make it a 5s2p for a new total of 6ah. On a side note, I am making a battery for larger jobs that will be 20 volt at 27ah. I am sacrificing one 1 ah battery gutting it and running 12awg flexible wire from a small backpack to the gutted 1 ah battery. It will be able to put out 27 amps at 20 volts for extended jobs. It will have a velcro arm band that I can disconnect the empty battery case and stick it to the arm band when not using. here is the cell I will use for that in a 5s6p.
The cells are 2"x3" x .25" thick @4.5 ah so the whole pack will be 2"x3" x 7.5" all 30 of them that are still on the original packaging. The BMS was 10 bucks and the cells were .99 cents a piece. I am trashing the single BMS from the cell and installing a 5s for the pack with direct tab attachment.
I might have the base case of all power tools redone with a cad program to accommodate larger ah. Yes, I am going in business repairing Lipo batteries in my area.
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Post by Marathonman on Mar 7, 2023 14:40:46 GMT -6
Ah YES!, I love it when things go right. I have given life to my 24 volt 34 ah LiFePo4 battery in the first post. It sure pays in the long run to pay attention to very experienced builders. The balancing is to say "PERFECT" as within .005 voltage and I have it all to blame on my charger below. Of course they are new A1 cells from Battery hookup! link to Battery Hookup They better be good lol! 5,000 mah testing out at 5,700 mah, can't beat that for quality!.
The BMS has a feature called LiFePo4 lite which eases up on the charging parameters which is basically where I like it. There is absolutely NO reason to charge a LiFePo4 battery to 3.65 volts or discharge it below 3.1 to 3.0 volts. When charging or discharging into the knee of the curve reduces the life of the cells so charge and discharge just to the knees and be good with it cuz your cells will thank you in the long run lasting way, way longer.
The pink area's are the knee of the curves and should be avoided if you want the longest life from your batteries.
Regards, Marathonman
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Post by Marathonman on Mar 8, 2023 16:37:16 GMT -6
Talk about luxury, I bought a 10 inch new tablet just to connect to my BMS's so I can read them without glasses.(Old Fart lol!) All other useless crap was either taken off or shut down and no permission to run. This tablet is for BMS's only including very large household systems. When I do calls, installs or battery builds I carry my tablet with me. I have all my cheat sheet calculation on here as well as calc tools I need to do the install. I also have my Aquaponics system support sheets and calc also as I help people with their systems.
All in all I would suggest everyone get a tablet when connecting to your BMS, Trust me when I say it is a life saver as I have multiple BMS software on it allowing me to connect to anything lol!
Regards, Marathonman
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Post by Marathonman on Mar 9, 2023 16:14:45 GMT -6
I CAN"T BELIEVE THIS
I have started my battery repair with my security bit coming in today. I took a Porter Cable 4 amp battery apart and was completely shocked at what I saw. If you look at the pic the nickle trace on top has a cutout which will act as a fuse when over current situation. The thing is the part that is used as a fuse is so thin there is no way this will hold up under any standards what so ever and will burn out in a heart beat.
Looking close you will see lots of discoloration and bubbling from the fuse section getting way to hot.
Apparently Porter Cable is purposely making their batteries to fail within a short time by the looks of the above pictures. Looking at the pics below you can see just how small the traces are and it is mind boggling knowing the amount of current the tools are capable of drawing. The one that draws the most is a zaw saw. It will drain the 2ah battery in 15 minutes. Yes I thought it was 1 amp but after investigation it was 2 ah.
Just look at the Nickle traces, the balancing traces are almost as thick as the main current traces. These cells are EVE ICR 18650/20P cells which are 2 ah with a max 30 amp draw. While the cells aren't bad the rest of the battery setup was designed for failure. I will be contacting Porter Cable on this one. I think they are owned by Black & Decker.
Another thing you will notice is the board on top is NOT a balance board, It is just a distribution board so all the balancing is done by the charger which is so cheap it is not real. This is the reason for the fuse trace because they are to cheap to install a BMS on their batteries. PORTER CABLE YOU SUCK!
I am replacing them with 3.3 ah cells that have a less max current draw but are most capable especially in a 2p5s setup like this. This kind of workmanship is pure pathetic and inexcusable to say the least. One thing I did see in their favor is they have four spot welds per cell. I watched a youtube video of a guy repairing a Porter cable battery and it had only two spot welds per cell.
Another multinational company which put profit above all else.
Regards, Marathonman
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Post by Marathonman on Mar 11, 2023 14:43:16 GMT -6
WHAT A FIND
I was looking for things in a pawn shot today and I absolutely couldn't pass this up. 12 feet of 8 awg stranded jumper cables for just a few bucks. If I was to buy this cable it is like almost 2 dollars a foot so I saved 20 bucks. I will use this silicon wire for a few battery builds I have coming up. Good deals are everywhere just keep a look out for them.
Regards, Marathonman
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Post by Marathonman on Mar 11, 2023 17:47:45 GMT -6
What "NOT" to do in a battery build
I can NOT believe this bull crap I find on the net. I mean what in the world were these bone heads, (Idiots my thinking) thinking of when they built these battery packs. There are golden rules to follow so you do not end up burning to the ground. And you wonder why there are so many battery fires lately DUH!
1. "NEVER" solder directly to the battery. 2. "NEVER" spot weld directly in the center of the battery. 3. "NEVER" over charge. 4. "NEVER" completely drain especially a Li-ion 5. "NEVER" build or use a Li battery without a BMS 6. "NEVER" Mix different ah cells. 7. "NEVER" Mix cell chemistries. ie L-ion with LiFePo4 or Nicad. UNLESS the Manufacturer states specifically it can be done.
The reason for this is Li-ion batteries are very finicky and fragile with the least bit of aggravation or abuse and they catch fire and explode. You can not put these out when the come to this point. All you can do is stand back and watch the free fireworks lol!
The electrode inside of the battery are attached to the center of the positive and negative caps and any large amount of heat can cause separation of that electrode which leads to massive heat build up from high resistance which leads to fire and explosion.
Irregardless of the size of the build it is complete insanity to build a battery like this and expect it to NOT FAIL. If you do and not catch fire you are one of the lucky ones. Here is a Li-ion battery fire that overheated like many others on youtube. Once it starts to burn and pop like pop corn all you can do is stand back and watch the expensive fireworks LOL!
The sad thing is most fires are the results of multinational corporate failures not the DIY'ers. This is what putting profit above safely looks like.
When I find the popcorn video i will post it here
This is the correct way to apply to a Li-ion cell using a spot welder. As you see in the pic below the cutout in the center of the cell is to avoid the electrode all together and even that has only four spot welds, mine has 8. The tabs on the side of the battery row is where the balance wire will be soldered to NOT the battery it self.
Please use sound judgement when building pack because if you do not your pack will certainly let you know.
Regards, Marathonman
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Post by Marathonman on Mar 13, 2023 18:47:12 GMT -6
Well I am almost there with my 24 volt battery build. The padding came in today so all I need is to hook up the BMS then shrink wrap but I can't decide of I want the BMS on the inside or the outside. The darn thing can handle 100 amps so it can handle this battery with ease without breaking a sweat. At a little over 2 dollars a sheet this padding is heaven sent which comes in 17 1/2 x 8 1/2 sheets especially since the sticky back board is really expensive. The Sides have two layers and I an thinking about an edge piece also.
If you look in the background my new 230 watt solder gun came in today. I can't wait to use it on the BMS to attach the stranded 10 awg silicon wire.
Regards, Marathonman
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Post by Marathonman on Mar 21, 2023 12:27:02 GMT -6
On further inspection it seems the battery pack I am working on for tools were actually thick traces. I am almost sure they are .070 inch thickness which according to my sheet is like just under 1.8 mm which is very thick. At this thickness it puts it into the 30 plus amperage rating capabilities, WOW!. What this means is in order to repair these batteries I need to purchase a new spot welder just for these heavy traces. I will use them exclusively for these type of packs.
On another note I am building new pens for my spot welder. I ordered the copper rods and small chucks that can be had off of ebay. Below is a pic of my mini spot welder which does well and the new pens I am building.
As you might have noticed the input to the spot welder had a nice upgrade with 32 inch 8 awg leads and battery clamps not shown. The pen leads are to short for my taste so I decided to build them myself. The leads will be a few feet longer and will not get warm with repeated use. Yes this is the spot welder people have been complaining about blowing the transistor. I used a quick fix from an Asian guy on youtube and have had not one problem since.
I remodel houses for a living and I love researching free energy. I have started another business repairing battery packs and I am very excited to say the least. My motto has always been to build it better then you can buy it or at least copy it because making it is so much fun and gratifying. I also do as much as I can for my community helping people when I can. I also help people with Aquaponics and Hydroponic systems with automatic heater beds and misting systems. I love to see their faces when they experience the fruits of their labor, Pun intended. I have been in horticulture since the 6th grade lol!
I will post graphs I use for my builds concerning amperages and thicknesses of traces that hopefully will help the DIYer lol!
Regards, Marathonman
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Post by Marathonman on Mar 24, 2023 8:54:11 GMT -6
Here is the ampacity chart that everyone can use with the copper and nickle being the most valuable.
Also for copper bus bars Here is an ampacity chart. On a side note the difference between AC and DC are so negligible that it wasn't worth posting both being they are just one to five amp difference. The reason I posted the AC version is because the DC amp chart did not have 1/16 thicknesses. Ampacities are still the same.
I did not post ampacity charts for Aluminum, just multiply ampacity of above trace by .60 to get Aluminum ampacity rating. Aluminum is 60% that of copper. Example; Say your using 1/16 inch x 1/2 inch Aluminum bar, take above figure of 103 @ 70C then multiply by .6 which is 61.8 amp.
Regards, Marathonman
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Post by Marathonman on Apr 1, 2023 13:56:22 GMT -6
Just a little word of caution;
Certain suppliers of DIY battery part are giving out false or incorrect information when it comes to the ampacities of their nickle fuse strip. The strip in question "NICKEL FUSE 2P-6P WIDE" has a has a small nickle strip right at the attached cell. The fuse strip is safely rated for 3 amps but the surrounding strip trace is rated for 10 amp. This is all fine and dandy but they are rating the entire nickle strip at 10 amp which is true for the section yet not for the fuse.
Example;
Quote; " If you had a 20 cell parallel pack 2 cells wide by 10 cells tall you can carry 10 amps from each row of 2 cells times the 10 rows tall for a total of 100 amps considering you connected your main positive or negative up and down connecting to the 10 rows to evenly distribute the 100 amps, 10 amps per row."
This is completely false because the individual fused cell can only handle 3 amps so at max the pack will safely handle 3 amps X 20 cells = 60 amp max. Even though the trace between the cells can handle 10 amp each individual cell can only output 3 amps max without heating irregarless of the cell used.
Buyer beware of what you are buying at all times and read the fine print or between the lines. Try and draw anything above 60 amps with the above example and see what pops first, your bag of popcorn or your pack!
While this is a good safely feature when using any amount of large cells in parallel (Think Tesla's battery fires) you still must consider the ampacity rating of the fuse it self.
Regards, Marathonman
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Post by Marathonman on Apr 1, 2023 14:23:47 GMT -6
Replaced my old thin cheap leads that came with this CC/CCV power supply with these new 10 awg silicon wire leads with heavy duty clamps. I can easily charge up to 10 amp now. Just to test them out I took a 35 ah 3.2v LiFePo4 pouch cell to the test. The difference in charge time was simply amazing watching the amps fall very fast as it charged.
I simply love these new leads as they are wet noddle soft yet pack a punch and are now 3 feet long. next up my pen leads lol!
Compressed ring eyelets and mini clamps Home Depot both clamped and soldered both ends with my new 230 watt solder gun from previous post. I can't complain, this Tack has been flawless since I received it even though I once connected up a 60280 57 ah cell backwards with a little smoke. That was the reverse polarity diode telling me I was stupid lol!, color code is my friend. I can charge at the full 10 amps capabilities of the Tack now.
Regards, Marathonman
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