Batteries on the way

[Guest]

How chemicals come with NiFe cells

[QUOTE=Mike90250;32678][moderator voice ON]
1) folks - please when quoting, just snip it to the relevant part. it makes for much cleaner discussion. [Mod mode off]

I would hope that the chemicals come in suitable bags, properly sealed, for a good 10 year shelf life.


The chemicals that come with the cells are packaged to be used within a short time frame, a few weeks or months and NOT years! The dry chemicals come in heavy duty plastic bags (not like zip lock bags) - the standard way in the alkaline battery world it seems.

Many of our customers order one extra set of dry chemicals and if they do they they are responsible for long term storage. All one needs to do is store the original plastic bags in air tight containers. 55 gallon drums or smaller sizes make excellent long term storage containers. Just make sure the lids are sealed well. If the lids are not sealed properly then you have just defeated the whole purpose of storing the chemicals for the long term

JD
BeUtilityFree, Inc

[Mike90250]

Mike you need to kill this thread. BE UTILTY FREE IS A SCAM.

Well, I've given them so much of my life, it can wait till I open the crates in October mid month. At the very least, a forum can serve as a learning tool for the rest of the RE community. This Friday, my wife goes up, and maybe she can inspect the crate contents, and let me know if it's batteries or what.

[Guest]

Mike you need to kill this thread. BE UTILTY FREE IS A SCAM.

Dictionary definition of Scam:

"a dishonest scheme; a fraud "

BeUtilityFree and its processor UtilityFree has been Importing these cells from China SINCE 1995 is NO scam. Thousands of cells have been purchased and put in use. The Chinese government buys the cells at 38,000 or so AT A TIME!

Please read some of the testimonials on our web site. WE DO NOT MAKE them up. They are real. The China company has been making the NiFE cell for about 25 years now. Edison made the cells for over 84 years. Hardly what ANYONE in their right mind (which you don't seem to be) would call a "scam". You are so wrong who ever you are.

This is not by any stretch of the imagination some "dishonest scheme".

It seems when a product comes along and upsets the "status quo" i.e the lead acid world, you get called all sorts of things. The train has left gate and there is no stopping it now and for years to come.

It seems to me after reading so many of your posts you seem to ALWAYS bash and put down the NiFe battery.
People like YOU who say such things you only show how IGNORANT and foolish you really are. The historic facts speak louder than all the BS you bring to this forum.

I am also quite sure that you may work for a lead acid battery company or have some other vested interested we do not know about. Why don't you tell us who you really are? Of course you won't! People like you HIDE in the internet web.

J D
BeUtilityFree, Inc

[Sunking]

It seems when a product comes along and upsets the "status quo" i.e the lead acid world, you get called all sorts of things. The train has left gate and there is no stopping it now and for years to come.

BeUtilityFree, Inc

You are not talking to Joe Ignorant Public. I have been working with Batteries likely more years than you have been alive. There is nothing new about Edison's NiFe battery developed in 1901 for the Electric Vehicle industry. They were antiquated by an earlier design by a Sweed Waldemar Jungner who invented the NiCd battery in 1899. The last US manufacture quit making NiFe in 1975.

[john p]

Its a pity this thread had taken a few bad turns.
I hope Mike does not stop giving us information on his new battery set up. Im sure im not the only one that is interested to read an honest report from him.. I want to learn how it goes and what setting up problems he encounters.
I dont care about how antiquated the battery types are or why they dont still make them in USA..What we want to know is how the ones that are made are going to perform..
Please Mike continue this thread for a loooong time.

[Mike90250]

Yes, I will be visiting my batterys mid week, and getting them commissioned ! I'll be offline for a week, till I get back to the internet. (It looks like the requirements to install phone line or cable runs, will be MORE than for electric !!) So for the short term, I'll have to go with a 3g wifi hotspot next year. 4g may never arrive there, fut friends with 'droid phones report 3g on site.
Updates will arrive as avaiable .

[Mike90250]

short update

Well, just got back, and I've decided that if I'm to continue with everything, I need either more vacation days, or start a petition to increase days from 24 hours, to 36 hours. There is just not enough time to do everything !

Batteries are placed and filled. Connecting and charging will have to happen "later". I discovered that it takes 8 hours for the electrolyte to cool down from nearly boiling, to 90F before pumping into the cells. I went and bought 6 more buckets, so I could make larger batches, and thought I could increase the process to 11 batteries at a time. Last batch, I bought bags of ice, and packed around the buckets to cool them in 4 hours instead of 8.

Photos and write up in a day or two. Still catching up at work, and with 900 emails at home first. My vacation was filled with "working" 7am - 9pm every day. I'm beat!
Mike

[Mike90250]

7 Month update.

This last week, was refill time. Becasue of the need to exclude Co2 from the cells, the vent & fill hole, has a little check valve in it, and it was a real pain to bypass it and refill. Cells were not quite yet down to the FILL---- indicator line, but each took about 1/2 gallon of distilled, to top them off. Bank seemed fine, but not under any heavy load yet. I've set the absorb time back again, to reduce gassing, we'll see how it goes.

Their size is roughly a bit larger than L-16's

House permit is imminent, and in 6 months, I hope to be living off the batteries at night.

battery_bank_install.jpg

solar: http://tinyurl.com/LMR-Solar
Setting up batteries http://tinyurl.com/LMR-NiFe

gear :
Powerfab top of pole PV mount | Listeroid 6/1 w/st5 gen head | XW6048 inverter/chgr | Iota 48V/15A charger | Morningstar 60A MPPT | 48V, 800A NiFe Battery (in series)| 15, Evergreen 205w "12V" PV array on pole | Midnight ePanel | Grundfos 10 SO5-9 with 3 wire Franklin Electric motor (1/2hp 240V 1ph ) on a timer for 3 hr noontime run - Runs off PV || || VEC1093 12V Charger | Maha C401 aa/aaa Charger | SureSine | Sunsaver MPPT 15A

[Sundetective]

We may have to 'LeRoy' the problem.

7 Month update.

This last week, was refill time. Becasue of the need to exclude Co2 from the cells, the vent & fill hole, has a little check valve in it, and it was a real pain to bypass it and refill. Cells were not quite yet down to the FILL---- indicator line, but each took about 1/2 gallon of distilled, to top them off. Bank seemed fine, but not under any heavy load yet. I've set the absorb time back again, to reduce gassing, we'll see how it goes.

Their size is roughly a bit larger than L-16's

House permit is imminent, and in 6 months, I hope to be living off the batteries at night.

[ATTACH=CONFIG]2011[/ATTACH]

solar: http://tinyurl.com/LMR-Solar
Setting up batteries http://tinyurl.com/LMR-NiFe

gear :
Powerfab top of pole PV mount | Listeroid 6/1 w/st5 gen head | XW6048 inverter/chgr | Iota 48V/15A charger | Morningstar 60A MPPT | 48V, 800A NiFe Battery (in series)| 15, Evergreen 205w "12V" PV array on pole | Midnight ePanel | Grundfos 10 SO5-9 with 3 wire Franklin Electric motor (1/2hp 240V 1ph ) on a timer for 3 hr noontime run - Runs off PV || || VEC1093 12V Charger | Maha C401 aa/aaa Charger | SureSine | Sunsaver MPPT 15A

Mike, can you tell us a little about what charging Voltages that you are using. Have you taken any
internal electrolyte temperatures at various times including different stages of charging?

There are some things that we may be able to try but it takes working with the numbers that only you
would know.

As you may suspect sometimes answers can be cheap and sometimes not. You may need to figure
what this watering problem will run in time and money as you move in and pump up the volume.

If it gets too tough you might be the perfect guy to unleash brand new thinking to an old tired game.

10 / 21 / 12

Bill Blake

[Sundetective]

Mike, can you tell us a little about what charging Voltages that you are using. Have you taken any
internal electrolyte temperatures at various times including different stages of charging?

There are some things that we may be able to try but it takes working with the numbers that only you
would know.

As you may suspect sometimes answers can be cheap and sometimes not. You may need to figure
what this watering problem will run in time and money as you move in and pump up the volume.

If it gets too tough you might be the perfect guy to unleash brand new thinking to an old tired game.

10 / 21 / 12

Bill Blake

Mike, what about one of those inexpensive stainless steel meat thermometers to get some internal electrolyte temperature readings.
Going by what Changhong Battery Co. has documented recently and also in the past - eliminating most of your watering nightmare is
never going to happen. Especially with YOUR Changhong NF700-S Cells ... IN PARTICULAR.

However I feel that we can cut the amount of distilled water and the number of sweet dollars flying out of your hands back a bit.

I'm positive that we can cut your time and the 'Nightmare Factor' back a whole Lot. As in 100% sure.

Whether it's now or $ hundreds of dollars and many additional hours of intense, sweaty aggravation from now .....
Lord willing old Bill will just be waiting on you.

Then we can 'Roll up our sleeves' (so to say) on the badboy problem - and make something happen right then and right there.


Bill Blake

[SteveC]

Mike, can you tell us a little about what charging Voltages that you are using. Have you taken any
internal electrolyte temperatures at various times including different stages of charging?



Bill Blake

I checked the electrolyte temp. in my 700 a/h cells during a charge to 16.5 v. This is a 12 v. bank. I used the glass thermometer provided by ChangHong, and the readings were very close to room temp. during that charge. I have done this several times with the same results. I also placed the palm of my hand on the sides of the cells and could tell they were room temperature. Or, so close that my skin contact could not discern any difference.

[Sundetective]

I checked the electrolyte temp. in my 700 a/h cells during a charge to 16.5 v. This is a 12 v. bank. I used the glass thermometer provided by ChangHong, and the readings were very close to room temp. during that charge. I have done this several times with the same results. I also placed the palm of my hand on the sides of the cells and could tell they were room temperature. Or, so close that my skin contact could not discern any difference.

Thanks Steve and also thanks for the 3 threads that you started in Eric's forum back in 2011.
A friend of mine has all the wisdom archived and categorized as usual.
It's a lot different than the Ni-Fe batteries that I bought 40 years ago but you know what they say
in Russia. The little cells that I had were made in Russia and heated up just fine.

It was disappointing (in Eric's forum) that powerfarmer got everybody excited about his Zapp Works
(rebuilt Edison) Ni-Fe Cells only to break his word on finishing up on a little of the story.

The Changhong Cells were unfortunately not designed for such refresh tricks so until someone
with a little common sense comes along old Bill still loves the technology but has to say
forget the Chinese Ni-Fe versions. They can do much better.
Edison did much better for the US Navy during WWI by adding the air powered Fill AND Drain feature.

The US Navy didn't play. Their giant Lead Acid batteries were also capable of the REFRESH Treatment
the same as their Nickel Iron Cells were.
They had drills to use the Ni-Fe cells as CO2 Scrubbers to keep the men alive under the sea for up to
100 days in an emergency. Then technicians would 'Refresh" the Ni-Fe cells when the Captain said to.

You see we have all been subjected to a terrible 'veneer of knowledge campaign'
with the Ni-Fe game as I have said many times.

It's mostly all been about Lies, omissions and that sales buck. They know is why they fear so bad.
The actual truth is NOT BAD but MUST be faced up to for a most successful technology.

I wrote a bit about the US Navy history and gave references in another forum under the handle of BillBlake.
This was my first Solar forum (here) and the Sundetective bit was a bit of a Lark.

The Thread Title is: 'Nickel Iron (Ni-Fe) Battery Life Cycle Chart .. from the Manufacturer'.

https://www.google.com/#hl=en&output=search&sclient=psy-ab&q=Nickel+Iron+(Ni-Fe)+Battery+Life+Cycle+Chart+..+from+the+Manufacturer&oq=Nickel+Iron+(Ni-Fe)+Battery+Life+Cycle+Chart+..+from+the+Manufacturer&gs_l=hp.12...5140.5140.0.12906.1.1.0.0.0.0.108.108.0j1.1.0.les%3B..0.0...1c.bBM2HV8SxxM&pbx=1&bav=on.2,or.r_gc.r_pw.r_cp.r_qf.&fp=8e97703fe6d1cdc8&bpcl=35466521&biw=1024&bih=533

All that Hank and Stephen at Zapp Works ever did was read Mr. Edison's
extremely detailed instructions on exactly how to refresh the Nickel Iron Battery Elements.

It's a testament to the trends in our society that the wisdom from Mr. Edison (and his gang)
seems to have become Lost to 99.99% of the population for over 100 years.

With the mouth that a few of them out there have it's no wonder that some guys that do know
a little something can hate like hell telling many times.
Sometimes they get drawn out for a dab or two which is real nice and appreciated.


Bill Blake

[Mike90250]

Mike, what about one of those inexpensive stainless steel meat thermometers to get some internal electrolyte temperature readings.
Going by what Changhong Battery Co. has documented recently and also in the past - eliminating most of your watering nightmare is
never going to happen. Especially with YOUR Changhong NF700-S Cells ... IN PARTICULAR.

However I feel that we can cut the amount of distilled water and the number of sweet dollars flying out of your hands back a bit.

I'm positive that we can cut your time and the 'Nightmare Factor' back a whole Lot. As in 100% sure.......

the batteries are not getting warm at all, my normal solar charge current is about 30A, into a 800ah battery. they do bubble like mad above 55V or so.

If you want, contact me off list, about cutting my nightmare factor back.

[Sunking]

So Mike I ask again.

How is the NiFe thing working out for you?

[Mike90250]

How is the NiFe thing working out for you?

They are low in the mornings . I don't think they are "under charged", many amps are being put into them, and not many being taken out. I finally got the "carbonate test kit" and will have to try it out next weekend. Ran into too many chores this weekend.

If it's just some fine tuning still needed, I'll be OK, if it's a lieing sack of sales pitch, with no basis in reality, then not so rosy.