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I’m new here, and shopped the market high and low for a 200Ah +/- lifepo option with consistent reliability and reputation. The good options are still pricey, the cheap ones cut corners. So I just ordered 230a eve cells from Amy and a Overkill bms and will build one myself. The knowledge base...

Just one of many SHTF trends. The car bubble finance is bursting - repo's skyrocketing. Car prices up 40%, homes 25%, rent 40%, groceries 25%. 20M people are about to be evicted - they can't pay their rent. A bazillion dopes bought a house at the peak with rates climbing and can't sell or...

As I commented up-thread, this is a super nice way to construct a DIY pack. I took design cues and adapted it for my project. I have a low space where the pack installs - 10 1/4" clearance and my pack is 10" tall. So instead of the bms on top it's on the front. For the compression rod covers I...

The virtue signaling is strong in this one. We're going to nominate YOU to pay all the student loans! And make sure you open up your yard for a homeless encampment. ?

So the DIY route is roughly a grand less? Worth it IMHO. Plus you get to learn all about how it goes together. And the battery is just one part of the whole package, if you're talking about a PV array system.

Amazing. And what a harrowing story. My wife's cancer is abating as well...nearing the end of the second round of chemo. The swollen lymphs are gone, and no side affects. She feels great. (y)

I pre-oredered Eve LF230 cells from @Amy Zheng on 11/30/2021 for stock inbound to their Houston warehouse. Got FEDEX tracking today. Very easy to deal with, very professional, response is very quick. I anticipate grade-A cell excellence. This is an outstanding source for a DIY pack build at a...

Got our Gen3 and setup for the RV - in a word, just outstanding. It's so simple and works so good, all tech companies should strive for this level of service and performance. Not only is the hardware excellent and easy to configure, the internet access, app and supporting service is nothing...

As a subscriber to Joel Skousen's World Affairs Brief I get the weekly publication. There's a section every week on preparedness, and a couple of weeks ago it was about DIY solar. I replied back to Joel that the best resource (unmentioned in the brief) was Will Prouse and this forum. So this...

I'm a proponent of DIY having done one, but the learning curve is pretty steep and I'm a very accomplished DIY'r with tons of tools and happy to buy more. For an awful lot of people I just don't think it's a good option. For many more that THINK they could do it, realistically they probably...

Here's another one... I have zero fear of my DIY battery pack catching fire. ZERO.

A Temco hammer-crimper is like $25. I consider that the very minimum. Two screws and a hammer isn't it. And you don't know what kind of crimp quality you're getting unless you cut it open, or put into service and measure resistance and heat. I get the shade-tree DIY angle for sure, I'm a master...

I think not. Everyone I’ve shown my diy pack to gets that deer in the headlights look. :oops: :LOL:

That would be 'tongue'...not 'tung'. ? A lot of people buy stuff if they think it's a good deal. My son's ex-wife was a shop-a-holic - if it was on sale or a good deal she bought it whether she needed it or not. At one point you couldn't walk through the garage, then they got warehouse...

I'm new here, starting a new thread on my 430W installation, so I can ask questions when they come up. This forum has been a wealth of information. I have also been scouring the 'net for, and learning about, LiFePo4 batteries as well. I'm not sure where I first saw strut channel mounting for...

https://www.docanpower.com/index.php?route=common/home I got four Eve LF230 for $454 delivered. Working very well. It’s a pretty steep learning curve on DIY battery building. I would never have attempted it without the help of this forum.

I have a pair of these fine-gauge crimpers for the RC leads we setup - worked just perfect for those super fine wires and terminals. I got uninsulated terminals, crimped, then heat-shrinked. Worked out dandy. And instead of putting a ring terminal under a battery post I tapped the bus bars...

I had a similar idea with the lexan guards and such, but starboard instead of plywood, and no springs. :cool:

Fairly new...although I did built a DIY pack and enjoying it and the process. A few points come to mind. 1. cost - none of the materials cost included a myriad of tools required to do this properly. Cable cutters, terminal crimpers, insulators, fuses, and on ad infinitem. I spent at least a...

We all have concerns. AFAIK my cells just got dropped off at the house (ring doorbell). Over lunch I'll inspect and put a meter on them, take a pic or two and report. EDIT: The inspectors are on it... :ROFLMAO:

"Whatcha wanna do..." You whipper-snappers are probly too young for dat. LOL Pure Prairie League

Victron FTW. Friends don't let friends buy renogy. PERIOD As so well explained already, you need a regular starting battery for your engine, isolate your house circuit with the lifepo4 battery(s) and a Victron DC to DC charger. Live happily ever after. Got a solar panel and charge controller...

I don't recall your battery size or type. For a lead acid battery an ANL or post fuse is fine, for lifepo4 a class-t is appropriate. It should be sized at 125% of your maximum current load to the battery. I didn't see an inverter size. A quick look says you have AGM batteries but going to a...

First you need to know how much power you use in a given time, over a day or night, or whatever interval you'll need to recharge for. A portable array is do-able, a couple of panels and a charge controller hooked to your batteries may well do the job. But you need some kind of estimate usage to...

My work around is to shut PV input down and change out the controller to a Victron. :)

If you're using compression rods, all-thread for example, just snug them up so the cells can't puff. They don't need actual compression. Don't over-charge them, don't over-volt them - that will prevent them from puffing in the first place.

I like the display for a quick glance. A meter also counts in and out so it is much more accurate than the bms. Which only reports SOC based on cell voltage. (EDIT: Also counts coulombs but fails back to SOC by voltage depending on use. More on this later in the thread.) A meter you zero out...

IMHO a 2A or 4A charge won’t make much difference- whatever charge voltage you set, they will taper current as the battery voltage reaches that setting. Some chargers have a duration, some sense tail current - a level that is decidedly full charge and terminate. Bleeding one cell at high knee...

Duckduckgo FTW. Google and msn are evil. As is all those silly social media sites. Just log off and be happy.

Pool remodel about twelve years ago, new tile and plaster - 3M quartz. They wanted about twenty grand to do the decks, which had some cracks in them. So they textured and coated, cut irregular cut lines to blend in with the cracks, and textured a fake rock coping. The coping needs to be...

Consider not complaining about what people post - just skip over them if you don't like them. And the 'excess electricity' is simply not utilized. Current flows or is drawn, it's not pushed. Why a 5A appliance plugged into a 20A receptacle doesn't blow up. A battery will only draw what it...

Batteries charged up in a couple of hours. By late morning I was getting 22A to them, pretty happy with that.

Acrylic/plexiglass is pretty easy to mill, more like wood, but you have to go slow to avoid heat buildup which makes the shavings melt. Lexan/polycarbonate is really tough, think about five times stronger than acrylic. It's much more difficult to cut and mill, and heat is a real problem. I...

Why bother. Please crimp your cables and wire terminals, cuz that's what's best. A quick search revealed: https://monroeengineering.com/blog/crimping-vs-soldering-cable-connectors-which-is-best/#:~:text=Crimping%20offers%20stronger%2C%20more%20reliable,is%20also%20easier%20than%20soldering...

What is the laptop operating system? You said you 'deleted' it, did you use program manager and uninstall it? If you've done that delete all the windows folders as well. If you've done that and you can't get the program to load you may need to clear all entries in your registry for that...

We have a 25k gl pool. Just run water thru a filter, or boil it..,good to go. Fully stocked RV parked next to the house has pretty much EVERYTHING. Got the prepper thing covered…lots of bullets too. LOL

Getting gen 3 and roam in a couple of weeks for the motorhome. Setting out around campsite for signal good enough. Best Buy sells them now too. $150/mo is getting steep. Can suspend account when not traveling though. Keeping cable internet at the house for now - $50/mo for 300mbs with no...

People only care that you agree with them. ?

Same - three of them. Mr. Cool DIY FTW. If you're installing yourself, without an hvac pro, this is hands down the best way to go. If you buy the tools to do a custom lineset, vac, test, charge and turn up, you still don't have a warranty cuz they won't support a DIY install. You might get a guy...

The problem is that the anti's and deniers are opposed to and disbelieve ANYTHING put out by .gov. PERIOD. It's hard to find truth when the people no longer trust their institutions. We have had a steady breakdown of trust of EVERYTHING. From sports figures to celebrities to politicians...

Johnny was snoozing in class when Teach asked about metric measuring. Teach - "Johnny, why don't YOU tell us what the difference is between metric and imperial measurements." Johnny - "Well let's see...what do YOU think?" Teach - "I don't think, I know!" Johnny - "I don't think I know...

Same. Already had a lot of the stuff. The temco hammer crimper I got worked just fine for this stuff. If I was doing high-current setup I would probly opt for something fancier. And I do too. So, why do I need another 230A battery pack in the RV??? Oh I know...so I can run the air without...

On battery chemistry... I know, this thread is about the PRO, but some readers coming along might be considering their smaller units as well. I just got a Delta Mini and really excited about it. I like what EcoFlow is doing. Those new whole-house pro/max things are amazing. (y) I had never...

The challenge is to keep all lfp cells balanced at high knee - near full charge. If one reaches full before the others its voltage will shoot up and the bms will cut off charging. So a lower charge voltage means current tapers off at that lower voltage and most bms have a balance feature that...

I've ordered a few things thru aliexpress over the years, and frankly I think it's a crapshoot. It's like Harbor Freight on steroids. Having a recommended vendor with a warehouse in the US to land product and distribute from there is worth a lot to me. Powerwholesale.net - Amy and her husband -...

I have never liked those tap thingies. And they can cut into the wire strands as well. Anyway, you may be able to snake a wire from one to the next. Or maybe just run a new wire to it from the fan circuit. I know, they are probably all switched together. Look at all that foam! Oh, and if the...

Just in case people have not had benefit of viewing Steve at Overkill's battery building manual... Appendix C: About Cell Balancing In Section Section 2.3 , we asserted that each battery cell must be top-balanced separately, before assembling the battery pack. Here, we will prove why. Q: But...

The default "LiBattery" settings in the Solar Station Monitor software is a good starting point. You can adjust duration and boost and float voltage to suit your charging and discharging methods and rates. You probably don't need a full 2 hours of boost, which is the default, maybe set that at...

Broke out the new power supply last night, installed all of the grub-screw terminals, hooked the cells up parallel, and put the charge on them, initially to 3.4V. They've been on for over 18 hours and have only gained about 2 tenths of a volt. LOL They started out drawing about 9A, now down to...

I DO have one and have programmed and tested with it extensively. IMO the button settings for parameters is beyond frustrating and confusing. I would encourage asker to source the proprietary RS485 cable and connect to it with a laptop or tablet. The programming window and app is much easier to...

I did not want to build a battery. My RV house batteries, the golf-cart lead acids were 7 years old with one cell starting to drop SG. I was simply going to replace them with Crown or Trojan of the same type. We've owned the coach since it was new in 2004, the deep-cycle marine ones it came with...

Funny, I wrote that two months ago, and here I am with a DIY lifepo battery up and running in the motorhome. Scads of power, it just goes and goes and goes. Three months ago I had never even heard of lifepo batteries, and I couldn't figure out what the 'life' and 'po' was about, maybe...

I did miss that... How 'bout 'SPARKY' :p Or 'NeverReady'.

I have since re-wired my balance leads, tapped the bus bars instead of putting them on the cell terminals, and changed out the main +/- leads with tin-plated lugs. Added aluminum washers to the posts first to increase contact area. And added blue led lights for the compartment. The blue glow of...

Agreed. Some common sense after all. (y) And why I put some screws in long mounting struts. There's no way I want to lose a panel on the hiway. I'm just not one to horriblize. I'm way too practical for that.

Q. How can you tell when a politician is lying? A. When their lips are moving. "Follow the money" tells you all you need to know. "Know your place you plebe. Your opinion doesn't count." "Rules for thee and not for me." And I have to wonder why celebrities actually think their opinion...

Lipo is worse - recommend charging in a fireproof enclosure, not indoors. We play with them all the time with RC cars. Not for unsupervised children. ? Respect > fear.

Sure. Watch for the magic smoke! :giggle:

Gel is not LifePo4. You are summarily dismissed! ?

^^ This. AFAIK - unless they changed the requirements drastically. You take your plans to the building department in your city/governing agency for permitting. And I think you need a licensed electrician to connect to the grid, and a special meter. And sufficient cable size supplying grid...

A guy starts a dumpster fire then says he’s leaving cuz there’s a dumpster fire! ?

I think he/they mean for storage - as in 'non-use'. You charge it when you're going to use it. It doesn't have to be 40% - can be anything 40-70%. Just not empty and not full. Unlike FLA's that need to remain at full charge to keep healthy. I lot of 'home standby' gets charged to 85-90% and...

Exactly right. I actually got SS M5 screws and tapped the busbars - worked out very well. Everything is solid, everything is coated with oxgard. I used half of one single layer bus bar and put those on the main terminals, put a nylock on those leads. The other three balance leads cinched up...

Yes - craftsman drill. I don't have a drill press. I lent my table saw to the neighbor a couple of years ago, and sold my bandsaw many years ago. LOL Harbor-Freight hole-saw baby. :ROFLMAO: And yes it was difficult. New hole-saw, but even so, once it got thru it was so hot the plug stuck in the...

Got a recent like on this post so I thought I would update... This was from January 2022, so this battery has been in service for two and a half years - 20 charge cycles indicated, it works absolutely perfectly. We have all the power we could want for our little camper. Here's testing out our...

If my battery cells were constantly getting out of balance I would be installing an active balancer as well. Easy-peasy.

You could also replace the alligator clips on your charger leads with ring terminals.

^^Analyzed and decided. (y) I would have utilized a ANL block at the battery, but lots of clamoring here about a class-T. Being an electrical dunce, I followed along. Then, does it go before or after the master cutoff...EVERYTHING I could find said before. Then someone comes along and says it's...

An upright freezer is another option, and they have a bottom drain for any coil condensation. I too am a home-brewer and have two of these, and two of the Johnson controllers - they're outstanding. I keep one at 65* for fermenting, also our bread, fruit, and alkaline batteries live in there. The...

I ordered the Overkill 120A bms with screw posts for the wires. The bonded ones they offer are 3X8awg. I made up some copper pipe bus bars for single 4awg wire on bms, but I have decided to use 2x6AWG cable instead. Found some blue and black wire in 6 guage, and red 2 guage for the plus-side...

You may want to keep an eye on bms contact temps at full load. The lead connects are designed to be load sharing, with the first option to have 3 wires. The screw-post option is for two, you're using just one of them. Initially I was going to do the same thing, only add a bus bar to the other...

I have installed three Mr. Cool mini-splits in our 4-bedroom home. I have about $4K in them altogether - HVAC contractors wanted from $12K to $20K for a new central system. They are nothing short of fantastic. I highly recommend them. I have a 2-ton unit in the main part of the house, a 1-ton on...

Weird. I use LPG. [shrug]

"I'll be right there honey...I gotta post this funny thing on the internet." BTDT, got the t-shirt. If I'm TOO prompt then it's not really done/ready. Thirty years is a long time to become familiar with your spouse. :love:

Well it took another ten hours from when I said up-thread I probably needed another 8 hours of charging. It took FOREVER. Top balancing without pre-charging them is not recommended, it just takes way too long, even for four cells. I can't imaging doing it that way with those bigger 8 and 16 cell...

Nope. My 230Ah's have been in service for about a year and never been below 50%. They just work really well, cells are well balanced, and they keep the lights on in the RV. One happy camper. My four cells were $450, not too much more than a quality pair of Trojan golf-cart batteries, with twice...

I'm not in the same boat as the general population either. But my retirement account is liable to dip quite some before it bounces back. Oh well, I can wait. The point is, for a LOT of people, most of the entire population of lower and middle income earners, are getting pummelled, and I don't...

That would be my best guess. I was doing it today - re-wired my pack, changed the bus bars and balance leads, replaced the main +/- leads that had copper lugs with tinned lugs, put it all together and charged it at 50A to 14.2V. Two of the cells reached full charge before the other two. Bms...

I made quite a number of crimps with mine, happy with the way they turned out. I hammered the crap out of them with a BFH. LOL The die-type crimpers make a much nicer crimp - they're round and symmetrical. However they're expensive and the dies don't always fit right. There are plenty of...

I had never heard of SCC HZ, so had to go look that up - it's the frequency of the pulse of supplied power and off during the charging mode. Here's a decent thread with explanation: https://www.motorhomefun.co.uk/forum/threads/help-with-if-to-set-25-50-or-100-hz-on-solar-controller.108078/...

For seeing watts in and out, and relative remaining capacity, it's just an outstanding value. I don't use any of the switching capability, and not sure if I would want to rely on it for highly sensitive high value systems, but for the RV it's just dandy. (y) BTW, it's pronounced 'joontek', not...

Here's a re-packer/seller on ebay - you should be able to get your 80' for about $75: https://www.ebay.com/itm/163076710553?hash=item25f8212099:g:syMAAOSw0Yxe~OVX And yes, you want to use tape, not construction adhesive. The latter is too difficult to control the glue joint. The tape is super...

Yes on insulating. No on off-brand electronics. You surely don't need an 80A SCC when your 80W panel will put out about 4A. You'll want a heat-pump or scroll compressor type AC unit or you're likely to get in-rush current that will over draw such a small system. The smallest units pull about...

A DIY build from 3.2V prismatic cells. I got talked into it here, it's been fantastic. I never really added everything up, but estimate cost for everything to make it to be about $750 for a 230Ah battery pack. I spend another ten or fifteen hundred on other system upgrades for the RV, including...

Finally got a free day yesterday to hook everything up. Did a major cleanup on the wiring mess under the fridge - should have gotten a photo. LOL Made a positive side bus bar out of copper pipe - had never seen that done before - youtube to the rescue again. The remote post in the...

All I know is if I'm driving the motorhome and the grade is 6% or more I better shift down. ?

Copper lugs are fine unless you’re bolting to aluminum - then they HAVE to be tinned. Copper on aluminum = galvanic corrosion.

There are several threads discussing this, try a google search with this text: battery compression site:diysolarforum.com Lots of results. The bus bar hole distance should accommodate your cells side by side. If that's not the case perhaps you got the wrong ones. It's not so much to...

Most people are unaware of what mini-splits are, unless they're exposed to HVAC technology. They don't even notice them when they see them in use - they're all over the place, small restaurants and shops, stores, etc. And they're silent. Even the outdoor unit is like 50db. If you point out the...

Stacking no more than 3 ring terminals on a post is a general rule. An inline ATC fuse holder can be utilized. Or just wire in a fused terminal block and connect your loads to it.

Only if it was all the way discharged. ;)

Okay, did a lot more testing over the weekend. I'll outline the load test and results, and then some charging concerns in the next post. Spent Saturday moving the inverter from 10' away from the new lifepo4 battery to right next to it. There was room there, it's a lot cleaner setup, and not...

You'll need a crimper. Copper is good on copper, not so much on aluminum.

My cells have been in service for nearly a year...still have not 'tested' them. They just work. Build the pack and go.

It's the knock-off version of a victron. LOL Yeah, sorry it has a 'k' not a 'c'. The forum deleted the vendors - we had a lot of data there. The vendor had a intro/forum discount(40% off?), but you could PM him for one - @kang lee Found them on aliexpress...

Like this... Or this... Here's another forum thread on setting up this type of system: https://www.sportsmobileforum.com/forums/f24/300watt-sliding-solar-install-space-saver-18662.html

Cool. Now tell us how YOU measure that.