Future of DIY LiFePO4 looks bleak…

[Nobodybusiness]

Would appreciate to understand what ‘bar’ you are referring to.

Are you saying you believe that you can build a DIY LiFePO4 battery with better performance and/or quality than listed batteries such as those offered by outfits like SimpliPhi or Signature Solar (or BYD) or that your DIY battery is going to deliver close to that same level of quality / performance for a much more economical cost?

Easily. Doing it now.

 

[BlackWaterPark]

Easily. Doing it now.

How about some minutia, here. The ones you build, the details and layout, and exactly which commercially built units you've tested your builds against, how you've tested them, and how you can assess longitudinal performance between yours and "X" brand?

 

[Bvillebob]

So which battery company are you with?

 

[MrM1]

So which battery company are you with?

To whom are you asking?

 

[BlackWaterPark]

So which battery company are you with?

Assuming your talking to me, I have my own company, and it's cannabis cultivation. But sure, let's play along with unidimensional and assumptive thought processes and say that I'm a rep for "fill in the blank" battery manufacturing... Does this somehow invalidate the legitimacy of the questions I posed? We have someone stating they build better batteries in every way, from function performance to price than any commercially built battery, and I think it's a fair question to ask for some measure of proof to back that statement up. Don't you?

 

[toms]

How about some minutia, here. The ones you build, the details and layout, and exactly which commercially built units you've tested your builds against, how you've tested them, and how you can assess longitudinal performance between yours and "X" brand?

Sure.

A decade ago my lifetech LiFePO4 cells were manufactured. I have been averaging 15kwh/day throughput since then.

Meanwhile i have seen the early BYD B-Box units fail early in hot environments, the LGChem (LiNMC) been recalled because they occasionally catch fire, the Simpliphi get themselves in a muddle in parallel configuration to the point they are useless. The early Pylontechs are starting to fail.

Anyone asking your question obviously has limited long term experience with LiFePO4. The commercial offerings all have issues - it doesn’t take much effort to build a better LiFePO4 battery.

 

[Ampster]

- it doesn’t take much effort to build a better LiFePO4 battery.

The big issue for me is NEC 2020 which requires UL certification on battery systems. Depending on when it it implemented at the local level will influence how many DIY batteries are built. DIY may be relegated to RV, hobby, off grid and unpermitted installations.
In California, if the Successor Tariff is approved, the incentives for batteries may drive demand for more expensive UL certified systems. The Tesla Powerwall and others come to mind.

 

[upnorthandpersonal]

Never mind that:

- Several commercial systems can't be properly opened for maintenance, of have cells with welded terminals meaning individual cells can't be serviced.
- I need a BMS with proper low temp disconnect. Plenty of off the shelf systems don't have that.
- I don't want to be stuck with a predetermined form factor such as 19" rack systems since I have to add insulation and heating elements.
- Even if there were off the shelf systems that I could use, I'd still have to build a box for insulation and heating.
- If today my BMS is fine for a 100A application, but tomorrow I need 200A, I just need to replace the BMS in my DIY system.
- Two years after warranty ends, the BMS breaks down in the off the shelf one. How do I fix it? Can I still get a replacement BMS for it? Is the company still in business? Will they ship me the parts? Can I service it to begin with?
- Today I have a 12V application, tomorrow I need 24V. With DIY, I just have to rearrange the cells.

Oh, and I want my braided copper bus bars dammit

 

[Ampster]

Never mind that:

Yes, on a global perspective it is an entirely different set of assumptions driving demand. From that perspective I do not agree with the hypothesis in the title of this thread. I think DIY will continue just based on human nature. No doubt, manufactured packs will grow but I do not see them cannibalizing DIY. The entire market for hybrid systems will grow.

 

[BlackWaterPark]

Meanwhile i have seen the early BYD B-Box units fail early in hot environments, the LGChem (LiNMC) been recalled because they occasionally catch fire, the Simpliphi get themselves in a muddle in parallel configuration to the point they are useless. The early Pylontechs are starting to fail.

Ok,and so are you purporting here that what you build is superior to all commercially built units and you've done the exhaustive testing to verify this, or is it just that you've seen a couple things here and there and are basing a rather large blanket statement over the entire industry? Have you seen DIY builds fail too? Perhaps more importantly, have you seen commercially made units actually perform to spec and stand the test of time? I mean, what's that percentage here, based on your direct experiences? You keep saying "early" versions of things, so is this to say that no commercial products improve over time? It's easy to cherry pick, even from ones own experiences, in order to bolster ones own arguments. Social media is all about that, quite honestly. Maybe your doing that, maybe your not, but I would find it hard to believe that every company out there cannot build at least equitable batteries to what the best DIYers are producing, considering they generally have far superior resources available to them and they realize they are in a highly competitive market space now.
And your right, I have not been empirically vested in lifepo4 for very long, I've been keeping tabs on it for 4 or 5 years now across various forums and following the tech in general. I do have a lot of experience with lead acid though, and all manner of related off grid gear, and I've seen many examples of failed equipment, for a variety of reasons, and largely due to user error and flat out bad system design. I don't go assuming that Trojan can't make a good battery because some dink didn't understand how to properly assess soc with them though, or never bothered with maintenance, etc that they were designing their batteries to fail early because some dude only managed to scrape 2 years out of them and went off proclaiming that lead acid doesn't last more than 2 years.

Don't consider this some kind of attack (if you were inferring as such), but rather an honest and open dialogue.

 

[Bluedog225]

For a mad max scenario, we gotta have solar and diy batteries…..

 

[iamrich]

I would find it hard to believe that every company out there cannot build at least equitable batteries to what the best DIYers are producing, considering they generally have far superior resources available to them and they realize they are in a highly competitive market space now.

It's not a competitive market, that's the problem. The ready to use units I have seen are all parked at $.33/watt. I am positive all of these companies can drive this price down to $.15/watt or less and still turn a small profit, but why do that when you are selling these like hot cakes at the current prices? The 5kwh rack mount batteries are gone the second they hit the dock in the USA, so why would I lower the price? Meanwhile you can get commodity cells and build your own for less money, they just don't look as pretty, and you have to do the work.

 

[BlackWaterPark]

For a mad max scenario, we gotta have solar and diy batteries

Definitely agree in general on that statement. Later in the spring, I'm certainly going to build some batteries, as has been the plan. I'm still in data absorption phase currently however. My entire property is based around total collapse scenarios, along with how to get along with zero power (2 years of my life actually).

 

[BlackWaterPark]

It's not a competitive market, that's the problem.

Look at what California is doing with mandates in regards to new residential and commercial structures as pertaining to battery storage and pv support. It absolutely will not stop there either. We are on the cusp of an explosion in the market, and all these companies understand that. Many are being Incorporated into much larger parent companies. Briggs and Stratton just swallowed up Simplphi recently, if I recall that correctly.

 

[Bluedog225]

It will be interesting when shipping settles down. I have this idea that there will be a flood of stuff. Car chips, therefore cars, electronics, etc. Time will tell.

 

[Rednecktek]

It will be interesting when shipping settles down. I have this idea that there will be a flood of stuff. Car chips, therefore cars, electronics, etc. Time will tell.

Can we add video cards to that list while we're at it?

On a more serious note though, I think some of the biggest factors that OTC batteries have over DIY's (especially for people like me) is availability and time. If you can afford to wait 3-6 months for parts to show up then a DIY battery will be much like computers were in the late 2000's where you can get exactly what you want the way you want it with the features you decide on. Similarly doing a DIY battery will give you the same size battery with the features you want at a slightly lower price than an OTC offers for a SIMILAR price.

Now if a 100ah battery cost $1000 for an OTC and $500 for a DIY then it's very much worth it, but I think (some of) the argument right now is that a 100Ah OTC is down to about $350 and a DIY is only $275. Well, that's not a lot of difference anymore and the OTC's are available NOW, or at least much faster than a DIY can be done most of the time.

Similarly, I can buy a HP Omen Gaming PC off the shelf at Best Buy, or I can build one from parts ordered online for a little bit less if I'm willing to wait a couple weeks for parts to arrive. I see a lot of similarities there.

Will DIY batteries ever stop being a thing? No. Will they be less and less popular compared to OTC batteries as prices drop? Yes. Will you be able to drive to a store and pick up a battery for a small price premium? Hopefully. Right now I can go down to Pacific Power and pick up a 70Ah LiFeP04 battery for $379 and that's the ONLY place I have ever seen that has LiFe's in stock.

Either way, it looks to me like DIY batteries will never die out completely, but will become more of a niche market like PC parts are currently. In a few years I'd love to see a store I can walk into and get a BMS and some cells and that cool battery box right off the shelf, but that's the whole Online VS Brick issue that I think has already mostly lost the battle.

 

[Bluedog225]

My gut says 48 volt; 100 ah; rack batteries at $1,200 by midsummer. Without the fancy stuff.

 

[MrM1]

Similarly doing a DIY battery will give you the same size battery with the features you want at a slightly lower price than an OTC offers for a SIMILAR price.

Slightly Lower??

I'm all in DIY 230ah 24v x2 for under $2200. That's 460ah total. It would cost over $3k for 400Ah's of serve rack batteries and I would not have Bluetooth control and monitoring.

 

[MrM1]

OH... And my 16 230ah cells arrived in 4 days from Huston TX

 

[Zwy]

My gut says 48 volt; 100 ah; at $1,200 by midsummer. Without the fancy stuff.

I contacted Amy the other day, 16S 280Ah pack would cost $2381 shipped to my door. I could add another 48V 280Ah to my bank with another K9 from Batrium for under $200. Granted, the initial investment with the Watchmon CORE with 1 K9, no fuse holders or extended comm cable would be around $600 plus some shipping. For 2 48V assembled packs the cost would be $400 per pack for BMS. That's $2800 per 280Ah battery with some miscellaneous for 2 battery packs, it get cheaper adding more packs and K9's.

But what is the quality of the BMS in that 48V 100Ah $1200 battery? Do you compare the BMS in it with the Batrium?

We all can buy what those assembled batteries are using, usually a BMS in the under $200 range, 120Ah cells for $50 each from Amy. That's $900 to $1000 per assembled pack. What I'm seeing is the smaller Ah sizes are getting competitive to DIY to an extent ( although a $900 pack is 33% cheaper than the $1200 pack you think is coming). It is when you start getting to much larger systems that you see the discount DIY has over pre assembled.

I can add parallel cells to my existing DIY packs with those K9's but at $200 I think one is better off with individual cell monitoring. Let's say I add 2 more packs for a total of 4 packs of 280Ah, total 1120 Ah. $2381 x 4= $9524, Watchmon CORE with 4 K9's would be about $1200 with some shipping. With $150 shipping that puts the total pack at $10,874, let's just go with $11,000 as you have some supplies.

To equal that with 100Ah packs takes 11.2 of the pre assembled batteries. $13,440

DIY is still a 22% discount. If you parallel cells and run 2 packs, you save about $380 additional, that comes to just over a 25% discount.

Many of the pre assembled batteries are welded terminal, if you have a bad cell, you have your work cut out for you, if you can even replace it. With the DIY, you change out the bad cell and move on. Which pack will most likely live the longest and end up the cheapest per watt hour over 10 years for example?