Disclaimer: I mention vendors below and use them as an example and as reference. This should not be considered an endorsement of said vendors!
In light of Will's recent video and some of the comments both there and on the forum, I thought it would be a good idea to do a full cost analysis of a...
I'm writing this post since it seems there is a lot of confusion (especially in the comment section of a certain youtuber in Australia) on why both MOSFETs in a typical single port BMS are controlled individually and why/how this works when they're in the same series circuit. It will hopefully...
I thought this deserved some attention: the forum just reached 100k users!
Well done @Will Prowse and everyone else contributing to making this place excellent!
Ok, I need to get this off my chest. It's been bugging me for some time now, and a recent YT video made it worse.
Terminology matters. A lot. In engineering, words have specific meanings and these terms help us communicate ideas and concepts correctly. When people start assigning other meanings...
Keeping in line with the whole low-cost solar system, building my own braided bus bars, etc. I thought I would see what it takes to build a low-cost ground mount for those 500W 96 cell panels (1310mm x 1956mm). My goals were to make the whole thing simple to build, with minimal tools and simple...
This is a recalculation based on the situation today, of what I did last year.
Disclaimer: I mention vendors below and use them as an example and as reference. This should not be considered an endorsement of said vendors!
Let's start again with leveling the playing field. The EG4 is a 5kWh...
So after running my 32 EVE cells for the past 6 months I decided to pull my weakest cell and do a capacity test. Tester used was a CBA IV, at 20A discharge (can not really do a .2C test right now). Result:
Ignore the bump at the 50Ah mark, I tightened the nuts better around that time - but...
So, instead of just doing the usual and buying some Victron and Batrium equipment and calling it a day, I went shopping on Alibaba and Aliexpress to see if I could build my entire 32x280Ah and 10kW solar panels system for under 10K Euro, keeping in mind the power and charge requirements - so not...
Ok, this has been grinding my gears to the point where I'm annoyed with it, so I just wanted to write it down here.
I see statements like this all over the net when it comes to cell capacity testing:
- "you need to divide the Wh reading by the nominal voltage of 3.2V to get the real Ah...
As some of you may know, I'm in the process of moving my batteries into a new enclosure. Reasons: it's more organized, space is better optimized, and I can add more batteries more easily later if needed. This is the first time I took these apart since I built them somewhere early 2020. I bought...
I'm posting this in a thread here since it might be useful for people. Please keep in mind that the below calculator contains bugs and doesn't do error checking - it's literally been 5 minutes to put together. Ok, so what does it do? It calculates the maximum open circuit voltage you would see...
... than to go into discussion with SFK on Andy's YT comment section.
For context, the issue is that the JK (new one) resets its values after x amount of time un-powered. This is a bug, obviously, and the reset values of 4.2V per cell are very bad for LFP. So SFK commented under the video...
I've had numerous requests over the past year or two asking for more details regarding my set-up, how I built my place, what the requirements are for off-grid living in a cold climate, building materials, etc. Several people asked me to start a YT channel... I don't really have the time for...
It seems that cell prices are starting to really drop - for those of us in Europe:
https://www.nkon.nl/rechargeable/lifepo4/prismatisch/envision-ess-4lh3l7-280ah-lifepo4-3-2v-b-grade.html
Under 70 Euro per cell if you buy 16. Granted, they're not in stock right now, but I'm hoping this is a...
Time to do a another calculation again. (previous posts here, here and here) - but this time, I will go cheap (but with cells available in Europe - I'll do an international Alibaba version at some point).
Disclaimer, as usual: I mention vendors below and use them as an example and as reference...
@all,
It seems quite some people start getting frustrated with the amount of info hidden and spread out across multiple threads. Threads on interesting topics seem to grow very long, information is repeated, some of it lost in the noise. Would it be possible to integrate a wiki in this site so...
I'm posting this as a response to a comment from Paul F. Note: mR == milliOhm.
Hypotheses I proposed: MG Chemicals 847 can lower the resistance in a connection between bus bar and battery terminal, especially in cases where limited torque can be exerted, or where the two connections are not...
There are too many people asking general questions in the profile posts. Please don't! Just write them in the forum and you'll likely get answers from multiple people. Asking @Will Prowse or others in their profile won't get you any response.
Maybe we should make this a sticky, or add it to the...
After making a couple of posts detailing the costs for DIY LiFePO4 based on a couple of popular vendors, I though of making one that uses cells available for purchase in the EU, with only the BMS from Aliexpress.
Disclaimer: I mention vendors below and use them as an example and as reference...
So most of you know I have excess power in summer and early autumn, and one way to store energy for winter use is using the excess solar to process wood (cutting/splitting). That way, no fuels are used and the sound levels while processing are much nicer as an added benefit.
One other way to use...
New to the forum, but not new to off-grid stuff. I'm currently building my dream place here in Finland, my log house:
Off grid of course, but providing all the modern amenities my family would expect. Solar for power, own waste water treatment (slightly more than your typical septic system)...
Considering the amount of users this site is seeing and the amount of people that are embarking on building their own battery (and the repeating issues we see), we thought it would be a good idea to compose a clear and concise recommended (best practices) document. This document would explicitly...
All,
For various reasons, I'm going to take a break from the forum for a while. I'll still be around and do some moderation tasks, but I'm not going to actively participate in threads for the time being.
Instead of adding to existing threads and making them more convoluted, I thought I start a new thread with status updates on my order of 32 LiFePO4 cells from the company mentioned in the title.
First impressions: fast response, answered all questions. The person I talked to (@Anny jiang) is...