Trying to charge/balance EPOCH battery

[schiesserm]

I recently bought an Epoch 50Ah Lithium battery. I use it to power a hydraulic lift gate on an old box truck that I use for storage. It arrived with 19%charge and I connnected to a cheap 12v solar charager and got it up to 100%. However the voltage is only like 10-11V, at times not enough for my lift gate, and I have to connect accessory battery to get it to work. I contacted EPOCH and they said to use a battery charger to get it up to around 14 V. I can get the volts up to 14-14 but it quickly dies again. They said to call back to guide me in balancing the cells in parallel. Seems like my DIY resources tell me that requires having a charger where I can dial in the voltage with a DC power supply, so I bought one of those.(Jesverty) However I don't really know what to set the power supply to as far as AMPS, or even volts. Seems like the epoch should work better out of the box.

 

[sunshine_eggo]

Without the leads connected set the voltage to read 14.4V and turn the amps dial all the way clockwise (presumably 10A)

Connect leads, and you should see the the voltage report the battery voltage (a little higher than actual due to wire resistance) and then the amps will report whatever is flowing.

If you see a sudden jump to 14.4 with a drop to 0A, then the battery has protected itself due to a cell being over voltage.

 

[mikefitz]

Epoch 50Ah Lithium battery. I use it to power a hydraulic lift gate

It's possible that the battery cannot provide enough current and going into overcurrent protection, do you know the lift motor amps or power rating.
If the battery is the Epoch essentials with Bluetooth it should be good for 50A continious and 170 A for 3 seconds, according to battery data.

 

[Omkar]

I recently bought an Epoch 50Ah Lithium battery. I use it to power a hydraulic lift gate on an old box truck that I use for storage. It arrived with 19%charge and I connnected to a cheap 12v solar charager and got it up to 100%. However the voltage is only like 10-11V, at times not enough for my lift gate, and I have to connect accessory battery to get it to work. I contacted EPOCH and they said to use a battery charger to get it up to around 14 V. I can get the volts up to 14-14 but it quickly dies again. They said to call back to guide me in balancing the cells in parallel. Seems like my DIY resources tell me that requires having a charger where I can dial in the voltage with a DC power supply, so I bought one of those.(Jesverty) However I don't really know what to set the power supply to as far as AMPS, or even volts. Seems like the epoch should work better out of the box.

Do not use a PWM charge controller on LiFePO4 batteries. You risk permanent damage.
Scroll down to:

Overcharging, Power Quality and Cell Destruction from Charging​

https://nordkyndesign.com/charging-marine-lithium-battery-banks/

 

[sunshine_eggo]

Do not use a PWM charge controller on LiFePO4 batteries. You risk permanent damage.
Scroll down to:

Overcharging, Power Quality and Cell Destruction from Charging​

https://nordkyndesign.com/charging-marine-lithium-battery-banks/

That article is complete bullshit.

A quality properly functioning PWM charge controller programmed to the appropriate charge and float voltages will NOT harm a LFP battery.

The PWM controller likely failed and shorted PV to battery. This has also happened with MPPT controllers.