Carbon foam batteries?

[LywWyr]

There is a guy in town who swears by these carbon foam batteries.
I have a few questions...
Are they any better than lead acid?
Why do the marine guys like these batteries so much?
How well do they perform in the heat? We have 96-100 °f highs and around 86° f lows daily in August.
Can they handle high charge/ discharge rates?

My neighbor has a 10k array, and 32 of these batteries, installed by the "carbon foam battery guy" 3 mos ago and she can't make it through the night.
This is 1 person in a 1200sq ft home , with an array capable of of 50kwh a day in August according to pv watts calculator. Her 1 and 2 ton ac units are both inverters, she claims she can't use the ac at night , has to unplug the fridge at night etc...I will see this system myself today and get a read on her real usage.
Now "carbon foam guy" says a 2500w vawt will solve all her problems....I think this guy is shady AF .

 

[HRTKD]

The link below is sort of typical of the reviews I found. For your neighbor's issue, I would first look at the charge profile used. If it isn't an AGM charge profile then that could be part of the problem. The carbon foam batteries are not going to last long if discharged below 50% very often according to the link.

Firefly Carbon Foam Batteries Are Great, But Read The Fine Print

These days we are seeing some great new battery technologies for a live-aboard voyaging boat, but with that we are also seeing some wild claims. It's important not to let our enthusiasm for the former…

www.morganscloud.com

 

[midahar]

There is a guy in town who swears by these carbon foam batteries.
I have a few questions...
Are they any better than lead acid?
Why do the marine guys like these batteries so much?
How well do they perform in the heat? We have 96-100 °f highs and around 86° f lows daily in August.
Can they handle high charge/ discharge rates?

My neighbor has a 10k array, and 32 of these batteries, installed by the "carbon foam battery guy" 3 mos ago and she can't make it through the night.
This is 1 person in a 1200sq ft home , with an array capable of of 50kwh a day in August according to pv watts calculator. Her 1 and 2 ton ac units are both inverters, she claims she can't use the ac at night , has to unplug the fridge at night etc...I will see this system myself today and get a read on her real usage.
Now "carbon foam guy" says a 2500w vawt will solve all her problems....I think this guy is shady AF .

There I don't know about carbon foam but the carbon AGM batteries are bursting pretty impressive specs and they all seem to line up fairly closely there looks like they'll deliver the amp hours that a standard lead acid battery won't deliver and you can discharge them deeper plus they'll crank out the amps on demand so I mean we're looking for amp hours in a case like hers and I think I believe in them I'm surprised I had never heard of them before the day before yesterday cuz I've kept my nose stuck in this stuff for a bunch of months but yeah they'll handle the highs and the lows from what I've read which makes them in some ways better than the lithium

 

[LywWyr]

I won't be buying any.
Check Firefly's warranty...if it gets over 80 f they start cutting the warranty.
The lifepower4 batts IMHO , are better

 

[MoToad]

There I don't know about carbon foam but the carbon AGM batteries are bursting pretty impressive specs and they all seem to line up fairly closely there looks like they'll deliver the amp hours that a standard lead acid battery won't deliver and you can discharge them deeper plus they'll crank out the amps on demand so I mean we're looking for amp hours in a case like hers and I think I believe in them I'm surprised I had never heard of them before the day before yesterday cuz I've kept my nose stuck in this stuff for a bunch of months but yeah they'll handle the highs and the lows from what I've read which makes them in some ways better than the lithium

Ah. Thx for the clarification (I think). I just bought the Canbat lead carbons and was told by the dealer that they are AGM. They are selling them along side their AGMs at the same price stating the AGMs get 400 cycles and these get 2000 and work fine in cold weather. So I took the risk.

 

[Substrate]

Have you noticed that most typical agm's have a CV voltage of about 14.4 to 14.6v, whereas with the Canbat docs I saw, that voltage is lowered to 14.1v? (Similar to a true gel cv voltage).

I have emplored you to verify this lower CV voltage setting with Canbat because 14.1v is NOT an "treat 'em like agm" voltage.

This "treat 'em like agm" is what ruins true gel's, and may also be degrading yours. Almost the oldest wive's tale (and salesman lack of knowledge) since sealed batts began. What happens is that the batts do work - for a time - usually long enough to get past the warranty period when case bulging, blown tops and similar start to happen when the proper CV voltage is not followed. Made even worse if there is no on-batt temperature compensation probes.

Ah, looked at the Firefly manual. 14.4v CV tops. But needs maintenance / refresher charges which the average joe isn't going to be following - like having at least a 0.4C charge available. That means a charger / generator to do properly - not with say poor solar insolation and a small pv array.

Were they ever "commisioned" with the proper charge prior to installation, (as per the manual) or just slapped into place and the pv array put on it?

Does your Canbat need likewise? So there you go - the maintenance requirements are usually too much for the average solar user who wants to just install and let pv do all the rest, which aren't sufficient in the long run.