diy solar

diy solar

Price per watt hour-diy versus 48V rack battery

No one looking at or talking about the Silicate Chemistry batteries at watts247 ?
What is not to like about them ?
Well that’s interesting. I think it’s the first I’ve heard of it.

32 cents per watt hour but pretty temperature proof and no bms?

 
Edit-watt hours not amp hours

I’ve been digging around and thinking about diy or buying a rack battery like the EG4.

Here what I’m seeing. The representative “rack” battery is the EG4 at about $1500. Shipping and taxes not included.

The DIY option are cells from Shenzen Luyuan Tech, 4pcs EVE 304AH LiFePO4 (LFP) 3.2V Cells Battery (Fully Matched&Batched)--Genuine Grade A. Shipping and taxes not included.

EG4 type-$1500 for 4800 watt hours (wh)
= 31.25 cents per wh

DIY
-16*$137 each=$2,192 + BMS (overkill at about $175 all in) + $100 (capacity tester and power supply)=$2,467 for 14,592 wh
=17 cents per wh


I’d appreciate any input on firming this up. Did I miss anything?

I’m thinking of picking up 32 (or 34) cells in Houston.
Funny: https://diysolarforum.com/threads/future-of-diy-lifepo4-looks-bleak….32157/page-8#post-411128
 
No one looking at or talking about the Silicate Chemistry batteries at watts247 ?
What is not to like about them ?

Please share what you know about them.

Some discussion here :

 
I looked around for a fairer comparison battery.

The Fortress Power eVault is 18.5 kWh. It comes in at 72.5 cents per wh.
I should add that Fortress Power batteries are really nice. Opened one up last week at a friends warehouse and it had a T class fuse internally, it was waterproof and has every certificate/UL you can imagine. Very expensive, but a fantastic battery.
 
I should add that Fortress Power batteries are really nice. Opened one up last week at a friends warehouse and it had a T class fuse internally, it was waterproof and has every certificate/UL you can imagine. Very expensive, but a fantastic battery.
I hope you filmed it for an upcoming Video?
 
FYI - Wh (watt-hours), not Ah (amp-hours)

The EG4 is 48V (51.2V) 100Ah which is 5120Wh (not Ah). At $1,500 that is $0.29/Wh
The 16 3.2V 304Ah EVE cells would be 15,564.8Wh (not Ah). At $2,467 that is $0.16/Wh

DIY gives 3x the battery at less than twice the price.

Don't forget the EG4 is ready out of the box. The DIY needs lots of effort. Save time or save money.
exactly, DIY and own some tools. save a lot, unlikely any so-called warranty will be worth anything in the 13-year life of LiFePO4 cells. at which time they will theoretically be at 80 percent of new capacity. EVE 280K cells have a rated 6000 cycle lifespan.?
 
exactly, DIY and own some tools. save a lot, unlikely any so-called warranty will be worth anything in the 13-year life of LiFePO4 cells. at which time they will theoretically be at 80 percent of new capacity. EVE 280K cells have a rated 6000 cycle lifespan.?
Lifetime warranties in Oregon are defined in the law as 7yrs. I know this because I bought a Lazyboy chair with a lifetime warranty and at year 9 the mechanism broke and they informed me - too bad. So beware on warranties but rather concentrate on quality of cells (in my opinion).
 
Lifetime warranties in Oregon are defined in the law as 7yrs. I know this because I bought a Lazyboy chair with a lifetime warranty and at year 9 the mechanism broke and they informed me - too bad. So beware on warranties but rather concentrate on quality of cells (in my opinion).
Man! What legislature member was covering their business with that law?
 
I am an American living in the United Kingdom, and I get a bit jealous of what is available for choice in the USA compared to here. The only choices are importing either a server rack battery or cells from China, as there are few selling either here, and what there is is faily expensive. And the import duty and tax will add 25% to whatever price per unit and shipping.
 
I am an American living in the United Kingdom, and I get a bit jealous of what is available for choice in the USA compared to here. The only choices are importing either a server rack battery or cells from China, as there are few selling either here, and what there is is faily expensive. And the import duty and tax will add 25% to whatever price per unit and shipping.
yes, the old import tax is the politician form of highway robbery. when I take tools and expensive things into Bolivia South America from the USA they charge me a 33 percent import tax at the airport and hold all your stuff in lockup until you pay...
Where is Robin Hood???
 
yes, the old import tax is the politician form of highway robbery. when I take tools and expensive things into Bolivia South America from the USA they charge me a 33 percent import tax at the airport and hold all your stuff in lockup until you pay...
Where is Robin Hood???
Yes, just did the caculations, it would be the equivalent in GBP (£1830) or $2500 for a unit shipped in taxes paid. Yikes. For £400 more I can have 16 EVE 280, and though it is a lot more work, to get over 13kwh for £2200 vs £1800 for 5kwh.....
 
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Well.. I hate Will P. for posting this video.

I was all convinced that I needed to spend the $300/KWH for EV4 rack batteries , especially since they are now fully UL approved and listed. He has all ready indicated that they are "taking over" the DIY battery arena, and for that low price, why bother building a roll your own battery.

Then Will Posts this video... which kind of contradicts his just buy a rack packaged battery pitch.


30Kwh of batteries on a cheap but heavy duty $200 shelf in his garage. BMS , hanging from zip ties, Class T fuse for safety, none of the batteries in a case , no compression, just batteries on a rack charging his Tesla. Sheesh....
He even pitches this as a nice big whole house UPS.

I know DIY is more work.. but I bet if you had all the components listed in that video you could build that rack of cells, with the cables in 1 day or less. So.. the amount of DIY effort is quite small.

But when I do the math.. to Get 30Kwh of EG4 battery storage, I need to buy 30*$300= $9000 dollars in EG4 rack batteries....That's a big chunk of change.

I just got a quote from Docane power on batteries delivered to my house from China, and the price is $129 per 280Ah Eve battery. (or 15% premium for US sourced batteries shipped from Houston if I needed them quickly)

So 32 batteries delivered for $4100, + $200 for the Rack, + $200 for 2 BMS, plus $70 for 200A class T fuse, and another say $400 for cables, and I am at around $5000 for 30Kwh of home built storage.

$5000/30KwH = $167/KWh vs $300/KWh for the Rack solution.
Or 17 cents per Wh DIY, vs 30 cents per Wh for EV best price rack solution.
45% less.. cost for the battery storage with very very limited DIY effort.

A savings of $4000 that can be used to purchase an AC coupled inverter I need for my recently installed Enphase Solar Array.

So if I go with the brand new Sol-Ark hybrid inverter , 15Kw at $8000, I can have an inverter large enough to run my entire house , and 30KwH of home built batteries for $5000, a very nice AC coupled solution and large battery backup for $13,000

Compare that investment to calling up the OEM battery sellers and asking them to come to my house and install 30KWh of batteries.

Now I need to make some decisions.

Does anyone think the setup Will shows will catch fire, or blow up, because my wife would be very unhappy with me if I went down that path and put that rack in my basement?

Could I mount some kind of fire extinguish (Halon?) above that cheap rack and add some level of safety?

I cannot imagine why it would be in any way dangerous but.. I need to ask that question.

Thanks Will... :)
 
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Well.. I hate Will P. for posting this video.

I was all convinced that I needed to spend the $300/KWH for EV4 rack batteries , especially since they are now fully UL approved and listed. He has all ready indicated that they are "taking over" the DIY battery arena, and for that low price, why bother building a roll your own battery.

Then Will Posts this video... which kind of contradicts his just buy a rack packaged battery pitch.


30Kwh of batteries on a cheap but heavy duty $200 shelf in his garage. BMS , hanging from zip ties, Class T fuse for safety, none of the batteries in a case , no compression, just batteries on a rack charging his Tesla. Sheesh....
He even pitches this as a nice big whole house UPS.

I know DIY is more work.. but I bet if you had all the components listed in that video you could build that rack of cells, with the cables in 1 day or less. So.. the amount of DIY effort is quite small.

But when I do the math.. to Get 30Kwh of EG4 battery storage, I need to buy 30*$300= $9000 dollars in EG4 rack batteries....That's a big chunk of change.

I just got a quote from Docane power on batteries delivered to my house from China, and the price is $129 per 280Ah Eve battery. (or 15% premium for US sourced batteries shipped from Houston if I needed them quickly)

So 32 batteries delivered for $4100, + $200 for the Rack, + $200 for 2 BMS, plus $70 for 200A class T fuse, and another say $400 for cables, and I am at around $5000 for 30Kwh of home built storage.

$5000/30KwH = $167/KWh vs $300/KWh for the Rack solution.
Or 17 cents per Wh DIY, vs 30 cents per Wh for EV best price rack solution.
45% less.. cost for the battery storage with very very limited DIY effort.

A savings of $4000 that can be used to purchase an AC coupled inverter I need for my recently installed Enphase Solar Array.

So if I go with the brand new Sol-Ark hybrid inverter , 15Kw at $8000, I can have an inverter large enough to run my entire house , and 30KwH of home built batteries for $5000, a very nice AC coupled solution and large battery backup for $13,000

Compare that investment to calling up the OEM battery sellers and asking them to come to my house and install 30KWh of batteries.

Now I need to make some decisions.

Does anyone think the setup Will shows will catch fire, or blow up, because my wife would be very unhappy with me if I went down that path and put that rack in my basement?

Could I mount some kind of fire extinguish (Halon?) above that cheap rack and add some level of safety?

I cannot imagine why it would be in any way dangerous but.. I need to ask that question.

Thanks Will... :)
Yikes. Where should we start first.

You are an adult, so you can make decisions on your own. That is the first thing you need to understand. Do not blindly follow any youtuber or source of information online. Learn the science behind these systems, and draw a conclusion on your own.

Next, just because diy is easy, does not mean people are choosing to do it. Going by sales alone, server rack packs sell 10X more than my raw cell affiliate link sales. Maybe andy from offgrid garage is catching more of the market, but I personally doubt that.

Yeah, I love my new UPS system, haha! It is lovely. And dirt cheap! But look at the views, no one cares about it. The systems that I personally like, and the systems that my viewers respond to, are totally different.

People buy the server rack for convenience. And the warranty. If something goes wrong with my raw cells, it is on me. There is real value to that.

And it is LiFePO4. So no self-propagating thermal runaway effect. The electrolyte can burn but you need to get it hot enough. I consider lifepo4 cells as safe as a stack of wood. The big problem is that it is still a battery, and incorrectly wired, you can cause a fire if something overheats and is close to a combustible material. So in that video, you'll notice I have cement board on my wall. If something were to occur, I have the system in a metal rack, on concrete, with cement board on the sides. So it should be fine.
 
I think the “hate” was tounge in cheek.

I really like the simple presentation and design of that system. No worrying about compression, buy the rack, hang the bms, no bs, awesomeness!

For some reason, I’ve been stumbling over getting out the table saw and building a box.

at your stage of guruness, tell it how it is, not what they want to hear.

rock on!
 
It's not one or the other. Personally, I would never go for the rack mounted batteries for reasons I've mentioned in multiple posts before (I like to know my system and swap out a cell if needed, I need heating so I have to build my own insulated box anyway, they're not readily available here let alone at $1500, I want to pick my own BMS, etc.). I also have no issues DIYing these systems.
In the end, you need to decide what works for you - you can only get different points of view from watching (among others) Will and Andy, and reading posts here on the forum. They all have their advantages and disadvantages. There is no 'one size fits all' - and that's a good thing.
 
There is no 'one size fits all'
Despite what my company says about boiler suits. :D

@Will Prowse : Watching the video, at about the 2:15 mark you mention that the only thing you don't like about toe 6048 is the low solar voltage. I remember a while back you were working with the 5048(?) I think and had trouble charging it because it required a 240v split phase input. I seem to remember you put in a jumper and could charge from 120v. Is that my crack habit flaring up and does the 6048 have the same workaround?

Doing the math, 60a utility charging on a 48v battery system is under 3Kw with losses, but it's really really hard to find a 3Kw or 3.5Kw generator that has split phase 240v output, and the ones that do are gas hogs for the low loads involved, you've got to step up to the 5Kw+ units that burn a gallon an hour just to exist.

The newer 5Kw single-output AIO's that are coming out like the PowMr and the EG4 are pretty exciting for us off-grid types that only run a single 120v setup in our cabins and barns. Having a 6Kw inverter really doesn't do us much good if we can only use 1 leg of it, ya know? :)

Anyways, can the 6048 use the jumper trick and charge from a 120v source?
 
Despite what my company says about boiler suits. :D

@Will Prowse : Watching the video, at about the 2:15 mark you mention that the only thing you don't like about toe 6048 is the low solar voltage. I remember a while back you were working with the 5048(?) I think and had trouble charging it because it required a 240v split phase input. I seem to remember you put in a jumper and could charge from 120v. Is that my crack habit flaring up and does the 6048 have the same workaround?

Doing the math, 60a utility charging on a 48v battery system is under 3Kw with losses, but it's really really hard to find a 3Kw or 3.5Kw generator that has split phase 240v output, and the ones that do are gas hogs for the low loads involved, you've got to step up to the 5Kw+ units that burn a gallon an hour just to exist.

The newer 5Kw single-output AIO's that are coming out like the PowMr and the EG4 are pretty exciting for us off-grid types that only run a single 120v setup in our cabins and barns. Having a 6Kw inverter really doesn't do us much good if we can only use 1 leg of it, ya know? :)

Anyways, can the 6048 use the jumper trick and charge from a 120v source?
I do not have the 6048 to verify that jumper trick. I did find something else out that you will find interesting. on the 5048, it requires neutral to charge. If not, it will show 151V? On each leg. I was using nema 6-50 that does not have a neutral, and I fixed it with a jumper to ground ? how funny is that? Also found that some transfer switches control circuit is powered by neutral, and won't work without it. Which is why I'm sadly using nema 14-50 on one of my loads now
 
Yikes. Where should we start first.

You are an adult, so you can make decisions on your own. That is the first thing you need to understand. Do not blindly follow any youtuber or source of information online. Learn the science behind these systems, and draw a conclusion on your own.

Next, just because diy is easy, does not mean people are choosing to do it. Going by sales alone, server rack packs sell 10X more than my raw cell affiliate link sales. Maybe andy from offgrid garage is catching more of the market, but I personally doubt that.

Yeah, I love my new UPS system, haha! It is lovely. And dirt cheap! But look at the views, no one cares about it. The systems that I personally like, and the systems that my viewers respond to, are totally different.

People buy the server rack for convenience. And the warranty. If something goes wrong with my raw cells, it is on me. There is real value to that.

And it is LiFePO4. So no self-propagating thermal runaway effect. The electrolyte can burn but you need to get it hot enough. I consider lifepo4 cells as safe as a stack of wood. The big problem is that it is still a battery, and incorrectly wired, you can cause a fire if something overheats and is close to a combustible material. So in that video, you'll notice I have cement board on my wall. If something were to occur, I have the system in a metal rack, on concrete, with cement board on the sides. So it should be fine.
Will

Sorry... I was mostly teasing you.. and I fully understand your reply.. and don't expect you to protect idiots who play with batteries from themselves. And in this field I am surely a rookie and sometimes an idiot.

I spent several weeks reading and learning about LiFeP04 Batteries and installed a class T fuse in my RV battery bank, and 8 280Ah Batteries under my steps to replace inadequate 12 wet cells that factory installs. I have watched Andy put the current meter between a full cell and an empty cell and then slowly short them together and demo > 100A flowing from the full battery to the empty battery.. That's kind of scary, and a wake up call to your constant reminding of "don't drop a wrench" on your terminals you won't like the result.

The entire top of the RV battery install is fully covered with a large slab of 1/4 thick G10-FR4 (circuit board insulating material). The 200A BMS is mounted with plastic screws to the G10-FR4 slab and so my exposed terminals are minimized and protected.

With that as background your comments that batteries as you demo in the video, represent a very simple DIY, and are on a metal rack, surrounded by non-flammable materials, and correctly wired, and protected with a Class T fuse.

You also make the point the these batteries (correctly installed and utilized) are about as dangerous as a stack of wood.

I fully agree.. thank you for making that statement. I also agree that my wood stove in the corner of my basement is likely a higher risk to burn my house down, if I forget to clean the chimney, or use a shop vac to suck up burning embers.
Burning embers sucked into shop vac result in a shop vac fire. (Don't ask me how I know). :)

My option is to place a similar rack in my concrete basement, next to a concrete wall well below my main circuit panel. I could easily place a Wyze observation camera over the unit, and a smoke alarm, and have remote notification if the alarm goes off. (Wyze hears the alarm and notifies me)

This option gets me 30Kw of backup power, is ugly, hidden, but very useful inexpensive and functional.
And as you stated, I doubt you spent more than 8 hours building that bank.

I am not an "influencer" and don't really care what is popular, just a little concerned about doing things safely, and you have addressed that concern.

Thanks for the reply, and sharing.. and sorry if I hurt your feelings.. but I don't think I did.
I appreciate your sharing on your battery and solar adventures.

Cpu

PS.. I have captured a screen shot of your reply for my lawyers when my house burns down.
:) :)
 
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