KBWaldron: thanks for the update. Due to a snafu at batteryhookup my delivery date for 4 modules has been delayed from today Mon. Nov. 18 until Wednesday/Thursday this week. Many apologies from Ryan. Ryan also confirmed that these batteries came from a large solar farm in Arizona where the company lost funding and went bankrupt and had to dismantle their battery storage setup ASAP to make room for a new tenant. Ryan said that the circuit board within the battery case is a proprietary BMU meant to communicate battery status to an external overall supervisory computer system. Ryan and Tom are in touch with one of their clients that claims to be able figure out how to communicate with this BMU directly without removing it. Ryan guesses if this information is going to be available it will happen in the next two weeks or so. If it does materialize, Ryan will send out an informational email to everyone that purchased these batteries from them. If that does not happen, then the only option is to do what David Poz did in his video and bypass the BMU to get at the cell sensors directly. Too bad we cant figure out a way to use the temperature sensors as well. I have finally had contact from a person that works for the BYD Battery Box group by emailing to: batteryboxgrp@byd.com . His name is Sean Li. He said originally that he was not aware that BYD ever had a battery like the one we are buying. I sent him the battery information and the model number ABSSM. I am hoping he will research it on his end and be able to provide us more information on this battery and possibly how to operate the BMU. More later as it comes in.
Cheap 4kwh LiFePO4 batteries from Battery Hookup
- Thread starter Will Prowse
- Start date
Although I'm just learning about solar power, I'm taking a chance and buying 3 or 4 of these.
I intend to use them in a villa I have in the mountains of the Dominican Republic. My intention is to bring everything that's needed and hand it over to a professional installer, which means I would appreciate it if anyone on this forum can tell me the items that would be needed (other than solar panels) to have a working installation.
Will Prowse suggests using this BMS (200 amp Common Port 8S Daly BMS)
If I want to have two (or three) of these online, what inverter should I buy?
Temperature control won't be needed because it's a cool, tropical zone.
What else should I get that I'm not mentioning?
Another question: would it be reasonable to assume that a professional solar installer would be able to do what David Poz did? (he figured out how to bypass the non-working BMS and put in his own). I wouldn't want to run into a situation where I bring these battery modules to another country and then can't find anyone who can put everything together for me.
I intend to use them in a villa I have in the mountains of the Dominican Republic. My intention is to bring everything that's needed and hand it over to a professional installer, which means I would appreciate it if anyone on this forum can tell me the items that would be needed (other than solar panels) to have a working installation.
Will Prowse suggests using this BMS (200 amp Common Port 8S Daly BMS)
If I want to have two (or three) of these online, what inverter should I buy?
Temperature control won't be needed because it's a cool, tropical zone.
What else should I get that I'm not mentioning?
Another question: would it be reasonable to assume that a professional solar installer would be able to do what David Poz did? (he figured out how to bypass the non-working BMS and put in his own). I wouldn't want to run into a situation where I bring these battery modules to another country and then can't find anyone who can put everything together for me.
Gnomad
New Member
Thank you Will for the 10% discount code, I picked up 8.
Anyone by chance in KS or the midwest and want to do a group buy to save on the shipping cost? $350 is a bit stiff unless int can be spread over several batteries. I would add that I can accommodate a semi and have a forklift so I can uncrate for private pickup.
Newbie question: Will Prowse suggested to get a 8S BMS for one of these battery modules. Does that mean that I have to keep adding increments of 8 for each module in a system? i.e. If I want to build a system with 3 modules, do I need to get a 24S BMS?
danphillips
New Member
- Joined
- Oct 29, 2019
- Messages
- 108
Anyone in North Carolina interested in a group purchase to share in shipping costs?
LithiumSolar
Solar Enthusiast
- Joined
- Nov 19, 2019
- Messages
- 177
Wtf. I was just looking at them about 15 minutes ago and they had some in stock...
RogerD
New Member
- Joined
- Sep 26, 2019
- Messages
- 106
They are no longer listed on the site.
I had the order page open and when I tried to place an order it said sold out
KBWaldron
Solar Enthusiast
Yeah, when I was there yesterday to pick up my two they mentioned that they were going very quickly. A few youtube videos and messages here are all it takes I guess. The delay in shipping was due to having to respond to a fire inspector's suggestions on arranging their goods in the warehouse. They were very busy testing and cleaning up the batteries for shipping when I arrived. I was fortunate to be close enough (8hrs) to be able to drive down and back yesterday.
And, I got across the border without any duty. Late night crossings are the best as they really don't want to bother with the paperwork.
KBWaldron
Solar Enthusiast
Just call and confirm they have set them aside. I called to purchase mine and asked them to do so as I would be arriving in a few days.
For those interested here are the as-picked-up, cell voltages on the two that I picked up. Last column is average cell voltage. I will be bottom balancing these and then charging them to see how the cells vary, and to determine actual capacity. Then repeat with BMS to see the difference.
For those interested here are the as-picked-up, cell voltages on the two that I picked up. Last column is average cell voltage. I will be bottom balancing these and then charging them to see how the cells vary, and to determine actual capacity. Then repeat with BMS to see the difference.
Refinished
Shocked and Amused
What kind of time are people seeing between purchase and shipping? I bought mine almost a week ago and have seen no updates.
KBWaldron
Solar Enthusiast
In my time there talking with them it sounded like they might ship once a week.
KBWaldron
Solar Enthusiast
I was planning on taking a copper pipe, splitting, cutting to length and wrapping around them until I got a thickness I could put a standard auto battery clamp on.
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Is your middle name McGiver?
KBWaldron
Solar Enthusiast
I purchased two of these batteries, and thought I would do the following as part of my balancing.
The diagram below shows the two batteries as they would be wired (black) in parallel. The inter-cell lines (thin black) are already there as some pretty significant bus bars. I would bottom balance with this arrangement, not yet having added the green connections.
Then I plan on adding the wires in green, which effectively put corresponding cells from each battery in parallel. This will cause each cell pair to become and remain balanced to each other. I would have fuses in each of these lines to protect against one of the cells in a pair shorting internally; this would not be good for the other cell, to say the least. I would then bottom balance again, now establishing an absolute bottom (i.e. the low end of charge based upon the chemistry of all cells.
At this point we do not have a fully depleted battery, which would also be a truly dead battery. Instead, it should be thought of as a battery with no available power, since the system would be configured to stop any further draw on the battery once this charge level has been reached.
Finally, I would add an active BMS, connected as usual, to keep the entire packed balanced. This arrangement has the benefit of only requiring one BMS, rather than two. Then I would charge the battery to determine the true capacity of the battery.
Now, my only concern. Have I somehow mistaken this wiring to be a safe arrangement? It can be confusing since there is a mix of parallel and serial wiring going on. Note though that the green lines go between equal voltages, and in fact, force these voltages to remain equal by bleeding current one way or another to maintain that voltage. Meanwhile the BMS will do the same thing between cell pairs to maintain a common voltage in all cell pairs.
The current through the green lines should normally be very small and so relatively light gauge wires can be used, as is the case with the BMS wires. In fact, these light gauge wires could act as the fuse I suggested, but I will still use fuses.
I invite any comments.
Edited to make green lines in diagram clearer.
The diagram below shows the two batteries as they would be wired (black) in parallel. The inter-cell lines (thin black) are already there as some pretty significant bus bars. I would bottom balance with this arrangement, not yet having added the green connections.
Then I plan on adding the wires in green, which effectively put corresponding cells from each battery in parallel. This will cause each cell pair to become and remain balanced to each other. I would have fuses in each of these lines to protect against one of the cells in a pair shorting internally; this would not be good for the other cell, to say the least. I would then bottom balance again, now establishing an absolute bottom (i.e. the low end of charge based upon the chemistry of all cells.
At this point we do not have a fully depleted battery, which would also be a truly dead battery. Instead, it should be thought of as a battery with no available power, since the system would be configured to stop any further draw on the battery once this charge level has been reached.
Finally, I would add an active BMS, connected as usual, to keep the entire packed balanced. This arrangement has the benefit of only requiring one BMS, rather than two. Then I would charge the battery to determine the true capacity of the battery.
Now, my only concern. Have I somehow mistaken this wiring to be a safe arrangement? It can be confusing since there is a mix of parallel and serial wiring going on. Note though that the green lines go between equal voltages, and in fact, force these voltages to remain equal by bleeding current one way or another to maintain that voltage. Meanwhile the BMS will do the same thing between cell pairs to maintain a common voltage in all cell pairs.
The current through the green lines should normally be very small and so relatively light gauge wires can be used, as is the case with the BMS wires. In fact, these light gauge wires could act as the fuse I suggested, but I will still use fuses.
I invite any comments.
Edited to make green lines in diagram clearer.
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Thanks KBWaldron. I took a lenth of 1/2 inch inside diameter copper pipe, put it into a vise, used a hacksaw to split the topside, cut to length to fit inside a regular battery terminal and slid both onto the BYD battery terminals. Tightened completely and voila, I got power. I put a 250 amp breaker on the positive side and a 200 amp shunt meter on the negative one, connected up to a 3000 watt inverter (after using a resistor on the negative side to charge capacitors) with not sparks. Then I ran a 1500 watt heater and all was good. Next step is to deal with the individual cell monitoring. I am going on vacation for Thanksgiving so if there is no new information when I return about using the onboard BMU, then I am following David Poz and just cut the thing out and get access to the cell voltages directly. I would love to hear progress from others that have gotten their BYD batteries.
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