Lux ac battery controller

EVandPV

htsoft said:

EVandPV said:

htsoft said:

EVandPV said:

Solarchaser said:

Yeah, as was I.
Infact I had a plan of buying old laptop batteries to replace any dead cells I found... thats oot the windae!

You could replace one of the 3 packs with 3.2v cells, but of course you'd need to replace a whole pack at a time meaning 5 of the 3.2v cells at a time.
I take it there's no way to get at each 3.2v cell and charge them individually ?

Actually, 10 cells in each pack: 2P5S setup.

That can't be right, surely ?? 
10 cells would be 32v and 3 packs would give 96v ??
Happy to be corrected though.

5 pairs in series.

So are the 10 cells 1.6v each then ?

htsoft

So are the 10 cells 1.6v each then ?

No, the voltage remains when you connect them in parallel, the capacity will double, that is how we have 50 AH (2x25AH pouch cells) in our US2000 batteries.
It looks something like this:
(sorry, just a quick sketch in Paint.... lol)
So, cells 1-2, 3-4, 5-6, 7-8 and 9-10 are soldered in parallel, then the pairs are connected in series, adding 5 times 3.2V = 16V (ish).

EVandPV

htsoft said:

So are the 10 cells 1.6v each then ?

No, the voltage remains when you connect them in parallel, the capacity will double, that is how we have 50 AH (2x25 pouch cells).
It looks something like this:
(sorry, just a quick sketch in Paint.... lol)

Ah right, you said 5 pairs is series so thought you meant 5 pairs at 1.6v which would be an odd configuration certainly.
So each of the 10 cells is 25ah at 3.2v, parallel connected in pairs of 50ah.
We assumed 15 cells as the Batteryview app reports 15 but physically its 30 at 25ah and the BMS sees it as 15 cells at 50ah. 👍

htsoft

EVandPV said:

htsoft said:

So are the 10 cells 1.6v each then ?

No, the voltage remains when you connect them in parallel, the capacity will double, that is how we have 50 AH (2x25 pouch cells).
It looks something like this:
(sorry, just a quick sketch in Paint.... lol)

Ah right, you said 5 pairs is series so thought you meant 5 pairs at 1.6v which would be an odd configuration certainly.
So each of the 10 cells is 25ah at 3.2v, parallel connected in pairs of 50ah.
We assumed 15 cells as the Batteryview app reports 15 but physically its 30 at 25ah and the BMS sees it as 15 cells at 50ah. 👍

Correct (sorry about my poor English, I didn't explain it well....but we got there finally).
I'm guessing the US3000 is using the same size cells (physically) but 30AH(?) instead of 25AH each. Not sure though, never had a chance to see one.

EVandPV

htsoft said:

EVandPV said:

htsoft said:

So are the 10 cells 1.6v each then ?

No, the voltage remains when you connect them in parallel, the capacity will double, that is how we have 50 AH (2x25 pouch cells).
It looks something like this:
(sorry, just a quick sketch in Paint.... lol)

Ah right, you said 5 pairs is series so thought you meant 5 pairs at 1.6v which would be an odd configuration certainly.
So each of the 10 cells is 25ah at 3.2v, parallel connected in pairs of 50ah.
We assumed 15 cells as the Batteryview app reports 15 but physically its 30 at 25ah and the BMS sees it as 15 cells at 50ah. 👍

Correct (sorry about my poor English, I didn't explain it well....but we got there finally).
I'm guessing the US3000 is using the same size cells (physically) but 30AH(?) instead of 25AH each. Not sure though, never had a chance to see one.

No worries mate, your English is perfect. I had no idea it wasn't your first language. 👍
And yeah, I was forgetting Solarchaser's battery is a US3000.

cool_techie

Hi @Solarchaser,
Just wondering, if you managed to get the Batteries working?
Regards, CT

Solarchaser

cool_techie said:

Hi @Solarchaser,
Just wondering, if you managed to get the Batteries working?
Regards, CT

Thanks to EVandPV, my us3000 now lives 😁😁

Thanks very much for the links, especially to the lad advising about charging as nimh instead of Li-on.
The charger just showed a fault when I went to run it as li-on, but I charged each pack on the nimh setting. 
My god it took its time.
Batteries all went from 6.5 to 12v in about 10 mind, then about 4 hours each to get to 16v.

It's been a long couple of days, because I was rather concerned about them melting, I had to keep checking them for heat every 10 mins or so.
In truth none of the packs ever showed any signs of heating up at all, but I could only feel the outside, so couldn't tell if the internal was heating up.

When they were all at 16v I left them for a couple of hours and made sure they weren't dropping off.
In theory the wee charger should have then recognised them as li-on batteries,  but it would only recognise 4 out of 5 cells, and so I got a bit bored with it, bearing in mind I spent over 12 hours checking them every 10 mins or less.
So I thought, well 16v across the 3 is 48v, I wonder if the bms will recognise that, and short answer is yeah it did.
So it came on, no charge lights, but flashing run light, so I got one of my 2.4's and used it to bump the charge for about an hour and then I could see the first charge light.
This was about 9pm last night. 
So I thought, meh why not, plugged it into the lux and let the go faster charge it up at 1kw for a couple of hours and stopped it at 85%.
I then let it run the house all night.

So, it works, happy days,  I dont think I have full capacity,  but hopefully that will come back in a couple of cycles. 

Micky does your lux register your 3000 as 70ah? Because mine is reporting it as a 50ah same as the 2.4, and I'm hoping that's a lux reporting error rather than it telling me I've lost a third of the capacity.


So once again, massive thanks to EVandPV, great advice and looks like I have another working battery.

Now my problem is the shelf I made for the 8 batteries, has no room for a 9th.
1st world problems eh 🤷‍♂️😁

EVandPV

Phew, good to hear SC. 👍
So you now have a very cheap Pylon, a Pylon serial cable and a Lipo charger. Result ! 😁

Starfrog

thats brilliant news and a real show of the strength of community and working together. Nice to hear a good positive came out of all the work.

EVandPV

Starfrog said:

thats brilliant news and a real show of the strength of community and working together. Nice to hear a good positive came out of all the work.

Indeed.
And now we know what to do with all the dead Pylontechs on ebay. 😎