Daddy Tanuki
Solar Wizard
so due to the fact I cannot leave well enough alone, I have pulled my cells from the battery shack and am moving them into the shop proper.
reasons:
more space to tinker with them: being bent over and twisting myself into knots to get into the battery shed that was built originally for AGM batteries is getting as old as my back...
I plan on buying 32 new winston 400 a/h cells in the future and need room to grow (I don't need them)... its a sickness an addiction if you will.
old calb cells after capacity test along with beginning of the new and improved box, and heater system
![IMG_1700[1].JPG](https://diysolarforum.com/data/attachments/180/180090-9eeff7b9a65390c4169d1ae33fb1ce2b.jpg "IMG_1700[1].JPG")
some of you might recall the issues I was having with the heater system. the components are all most always 12 volt in nature which required power sources, step down converters and all kinds of other trash courtesy of china and amazon that always burns up.
about 3/4 of the way through last winter I blew up another 12/48 relay and gave up on the whole control scheme i was using. instead I rewired all of the pads in series, 16 of them which with each additional pad lowered their heat output by half. so for 1/4 of last winter i ran with no control system just relying upon the fact that wiring them in series cut the power down each time. it also allowed me to spread the pads over the entire aluminum plate so the heat is totally dispersed
the four pads you see here a 12 volt 25 watt pads, but with 16 of them wired in a series/parallel arrangement My temps held steady last year at 22-25 °c for the last two months and i simply unplugged them at the end of the winter season.
my cells are protected from cold temps by three systems.
i will update as I reinstall the solar controllers, the inverters et all. for now its genset 24/7 while at the cabin until this iteration is completed.
then on to 2.0 of the lithium journey... brand new winston cells (yes my bank account is already wincing at this)
reasons:
more space to tinker with them: being bent over and twisting myself into knots to get into the battery shed that was built originally for AGM batteries is getting as old as my back...
I plan on buying 32 new winston 400 a/h cells in the future and need room to grow (I don't need them)... its a sickness an addiction if you will.
old calb cells after capacity test along with beginning of the new and improved box, and heater system
some of you might recall the issues I was having with the heater system. the components are all most always 12 volt in nature which required power sources, step down converters and all kinds of other trash courtesy of china and amazon that always burns up.
about 3/4 of the way through last winter I blew up another 12/48 relay and gave up on the whole control scheme i was using. instead I rewired all of the pads in series, 16 of them which with each additional pad lowered their heat output by half. so for 1/4 of last winter i ran with no control system just relying upon the fact that wiring them in series cut the power down each time. it also allowed me to spread the pads over the entire aluminum plate so the heat is totally dispersed
the four pads you see here a 12 volt 25 watt pads, but with 16 of them wired in a series/parallel arrangement My temps held steady last year at 22-25 °c for the last two months and i simply unplugged them at the end of the winter season.
- note 4 pads per side in series
- 8 pads on the bottom, 4 each in series with those two packs wired in parallel
- total number 16 pads wired directly to the battery with a blade switch to disconnect
my cells are protected from cold temps by three systems.
- the BMS which shuts off at the commanded temp.
- solar controllers, i use morning star, and they can shut off via their temp sensor. by disconnecting it, the solar controller goes into error mode and will not charge, but once the fault clears, they start charging again, so I rigged one of the 12 volt thermo controllers that we all use to simply interrupt the temp sensor for the charge controller. batteries get to cold, no solar charging.
- Lastly by the heating pads with no controller but last years experiments proved to me at least that it was not a concern if wired correctly in series/ parallel this year I will wire all in series which will drop the out put again to see what they sit at temperature wise when wired all in series.
i will update as I reinstall the solar controllers, the inverters et all. for now its genset 24/7 while at the cabin until this iteration is completed.
then on to 2.0 of the lithium journey... brand new winston cells (yes my bank account is already wincing at this)
![IMG_1701[1].JPG](https://diysolarforum.com/data/attachments/180/180228-356ba0cc66b191732642bb50eac24473.jpg "IMG_1701[1].JPG")
![IMG_1864[1].JPG](https://diysolarforum.com/data/attachments/193/193974-4e6ad0738101ff7fe8ad406af544c005.jpg "IMG_1864[1].JPG")
![IMG_1875[1].JPG](https://diysolarforum.com/data/attachments/193/193975-727ece9d77272bb8421a80466782ae10.jpg "IMG_1875[1].JPG")
![IMG_1877[1].JPG](https://diysolarforum.com/data/attachments/193/193976-42e1f73bfa2890337eea88b417a49f6e.jpg "IMG_1877[1].JPG")
