washing machine off solar?

[Sunking]

That's what I was told by people that have been exclusively selling and servicing Surrette batteries for 29 years. And that's why I would suggest checking with Surrette yourself because they sell VERY few 5000-series batteries for RE. Most people buy the floor scrubber ones in the L-16 size, like S-530's, for RE.

Then you are simply being sold a bill of goods by sales and marketing folks.

The reason they do not sale a lot of 5000 series for solar is pricing. However Rolls makes a total of 14 batteries in the 5000 series family. Every one of them is listed in the RE line up. In Rolls Flooded RE family are the 4000, 5000, and now a new line up 4500. The difference between each series is plate thickness with the 5000 series having the heaviest thickest plates. It also affects the warranty as the 4000 and 4500 series are a 7 year warranty, and 5000 is a 10 year warranty. Also note when you look at the CCA specs the 5000 has the lowest rating. Here is the full list of Rolls RE series on a printable page.

As for CCA and MCA, yes Rolls does publish those numbers for all batteries. That does not mean all of them are intended to be used as starting and cranking. If you look at all series CCA and MCA side by side in terms of Amp Hours the 5000 series has the lowest CCA and MCA of all of them. The reason is simple is because the 5000 series have the thickest heaviest plates. Other manufactures like Trojan do not publish CCA or MCA in their Flooded Deep Cycle batteries, only AGM lines. They certainly could publish and market them for starting but they do not because they are poor choices for starting and cranking because internal resistances are too high. The most important factor for starting batteries is CCA and MCA. You want as high of a CCa and MCA money can buy. It is Cranking Amps that start motors, not amp hours.

Can you press a Deep Cycle battery into cranking service? Yes you can but at a cost, lower cranking amps. That is why as you stated Chris you have to put the 12CS11PS in parallel to get the cranking amps up high enough to be effective. A much more effective design is to use a starting battery, battery isolator, and an auxiliary Deep Cycle battery for house house power to run the lights, navigation, fridge etc... You get the best of both worlds and no need for a switch if you over discharge the house batteries. You are correct when you say I do not know a lot about ships. However I do know a lot about ships, especially USN submarines and freighters. Nuke subs obviously do not use starting batteries, they use traction batteries. The largest of them is a dedicated set for the propulsion motor. smaller in size is dedicated sets for life support, communications, and Missile/Torpedo fire control tubes. Freighters do use starting batteries for diesel engines a dedicated set for the main engines and another for the auxiliary engines to generate ship house power. Like subs they also have dedicated batteries for nav/com and emergency lighting in the event the main and aux engine fails.

So if you and others want to use deep cycle batteries for cranking have at it. Rolls appears to be the only manufacture touting Deep Cycle batteries for starting.cranking which I do not blame them because it generates cash, but there are better solutions out there for that purpose.

[ChrisOlson]

And Rolls adds to the mess with FS- floor sweeper, and CS something non-intuitive.

Yeah, sorry Mike. It's easy to get tunnel vision, but it's also frustrating when somebody tells me you can't do something that I see being done every day.

We got our Surrettes from Diesel Supply in Hudson, WI because they're only 50 miles from us and they've been a Surrette dealer for 29 years. They told me the 4000-series are floor scrubber type and that's what FS plate code stands for. The 5000-series are are primarily traction and heavy duty cranking/starting and that's what the CS plate code stands for. They sell those 12-CS-11P's for just about every yacht with diesels in it on the Mississippi and Lake Superior for starting batteries and house power. They use them in Warren locomotives, order picker forklifts, those electric construction scafolding trucks, and on and on. They are used in just about everything else imaginable where a heavy duty battery that will experience deep discharges - and THEN have to start an engine or drive a traction or lift motor - is required.

That's what I was told by people that have been exclusively selling and servicing Surrette batteries for 29 years. And that's why I would suggest checking with Surrette yourself because they sell VERY few 5000-series batteries for RE. Most people buy the floor scrubber ones in the L-16 size, like S-530's, for RE.
--
Chris

[Mike90250]

Confucius Say: Man with 2 watches, never knows what time it really is.

And so it goes on the forums. 2 learned individuals, and each sees things differently.

And Rolls adds to the mess with FS- floor sweeper, and CS something non-intuitive.

BE nice gentlemen.

[ChrisOlson]

Chris you know just enough to be dangerous when it comes to batteries. You should be asking questions, not answering questions or giving advice about batteries. You simply do not know what you are talking about, and make things up when you do not know what you are talking about.

Oh. And who made you the "expert"? I got news for ya'. The Surrette 12-CS-11P is the single most popular battery on the water for yachts with 24V systems - used for for starting the propulsion engines. Normally arranged in two banks. With the selector switch you can switch banks for starting either propulsion engine, or if they've been run down on house power you parallel the banks with the selector for starting.

There's a reason they supply a MCA rating on them.

I don't really give a flyin' crap what you think they're good for. I know what they're good for. And before you spout off any more about things you don't know about, I would suggest you check with Jamie Surrette or your rep on that.
--
Chris

[Sunking]

Sunking - you are very confusing. Where do you get your information from?

Try to follow along. I get my information from James Surrette the executive officer of Rolls/Surrette Battrery, and my Sales Rep Patrick Friesen whom I have worked with for over 10 years at Rolls/Surrette in Canada.

Have you ever worked with or on a 12-CS-11P battery? They are all deep cycle batteries. The 12-CS-11P has Rolls' world-famous CS plates. CS = Cranking/Starting.

Yes I have and you are right, they are Deep Cycle batteries which is exactly why they are not Cranking/Starting batteries.

CS DOES NOT = Cranking/Starting. You are making that up and showing your ignorance. CS = Plate Size Code and treatment. Treated with Resistox. Width = 5.625, Height = 10.75. Thickness = .26. CS is one of the heaviest thickest plates Rolls uses which means it is NOT A CRANKING, STARTING, TRACTION. STATION, or any form of a hybrid or cranking battery. It means it is a DEEP CYCLE ONLY application. So if you have a boat or generator using it as a Starting battery you really screwed up by your own ignorance. It may work, but poorly especially in cold weather and a really POOR choice. If you needed that kind of size you should have at least got a hybrid or AGM. In the same size and weight would deliver 300% more CCA.

Here is the proof. Scroll down to the bottom of the document and see what CS really means. You just got BUSTED. It is the Flooded Railroad battery section. Scroll down to the bottom for PLATE CODES and SEE what CS is and quit making things up. Note there is no 12CS11PS in RR batteries. RR's do not use 12 volt batteries. For Starting RR use plate codes HHG, EHG, NS and CH which are some of the thinnest plates Rolls makes. Care to guess why. So they can deliver very high CCA and MCA current, exactly what you want in a starting and cranking battery.

Their FS plates, also used in marine deep cycle, are smaller motive power batteries. FS = Floor Scrubber. They are thinner, .170" positive grid, designed for less intensive cycling and shorter life. All of Surrette's lower price point marine deep cycle batteries have FS plates.

This is the only thing you got right, and only half right. FS does equal Floor Sweeper. That means it is a hybrid battery, a cross between Cranking Battery and Deep Cycle Battery. It has thinner plates than a Deep Cycle so they can deliver higher discharge currents than Deep Cycle batteries without excessive voltage sag, but cannot deliver as much current or CCA as a true starting battery. It is a trade off. You cannot have both high CCA and DEEP CYCLE in the same battery. Thin plates = high current short cycle life. Thick plates = lower discharge/charge current, deep cycle with long cycle life.

Chris you know just enough to be dangerous when it comes to batteries. You should be asking questions, not answering questions or giving advice about batteries. You simply do not know what you are talking about, and make things up when you do not know what you are talking about.

[FloridaSun]

There are a few different options that affect the wash time.

The main challenge I had in researching this was to know what the Wp would be during a wash cycle. That info doesn't seem to exist anywhere - which makes correctly sizing the inverter difficult. As you know, the kick in Wp of a motor can be 7x the motor wattage for a split second and unfortunately none of the manufacturers seem to have that figure on hand. LG can tell you how many Wh used during the different cycles and also Wp for the spin cycle, but that number seems to be the more constant W consumed during the fast spin and not based on the initial Wp in overcoming inertia. I think most of you have massive 2KW+ inverters so this is less of a concern. Pure sinewave inverters here are pricey so getting the smallest inverter that can handle the job in the long term is important.

yessir... the settings do make a difference and I haven't tried but one using the kill a watt meter. This Maytag has auto water level setting, only fills per weight of load sensed and difficult to check just how full it is as it locks the lid once started. Seems like a great washer but takes some getting used to ...like when I first used it... pushed the start button... nothing happened. Thought I had a defective machine! hahaha, never had a computerized machine before and did not realize it was started but sensing the load and then learned to push the button and walk away from it, let it do it's thing.
There may be many low watt use machines sold today and would be interesting to hear from more here on appliance watt use. The industry doesn't seem to bother with info, only what amp breaker is needed (15A @ 120V for mine) stated in their specs. Have yet to pull the machine out and read specs on back label which might be more informative.
Smaller inverters are not only cheaper but can be more efficient too, saving watts in solar systems. I plan on having several eventually, add to my present 400W PSW. I'm a fan of redundancy anyway so if by chance one fails there is backup to run essentials. Next step for me is a 600 or 700W PSW. Not all of us go out and buy a 2000W inverter, thinking it will provide all the power needed without considering our battery bank voltage and Ah rating.
hehe, I'm happy to be using grid power for the wash, less than 2 cents per load.

[ChrisOlson]

Of course I will be lucky to get 3 years out of this battery, but at a cost of $100/battery that is acceptable. The forklift batteries don't really work in these small applications. Even the Trojan's are a problem as the cheap controllers max their absorb voltage at 14.4V which isn't enough to fully charge a Trojan which leads to one or more cells going "dormant".

I would agree that a cheap marine deep cycle being very intermittently cycled like that is a better option than industrial traction type. Like the Trojan IND-series for floor sweepers are a bear to charge with an RE system, even with a good controller. The cheap marine deep cycle will probably last longer due to its more moderate charging requirement compared to the industrial type, which would require grid or generator power, or overkill on solar capacity, to properly charge it.

If you are going to do several loads of clothes in a row, and use several times a week, then the thin plate marine deep cycle will probably not last very long, though. Most people get 3 - 4 years out of them on a trolling motor in a boat.
--
Chris

[jamjamdave]

hmmm... Two hours to do a load? Seems excessive.
I have a year old Maytag, 102L capacity compared to your 58L LG. Did a half load this morning and the maytag consumed 100Wh total, same as yours. Wp was much higher with it's 800rpm spin cycle but run time much less, closer to 45 minutes before ready to hang on the solar clothes dryer.

There are a few different options that affect the wash time. I go for Eco Cotton as it uses the least water/kg of clothes (probably washes for longer with less water) and you can load the machine with more clothes at one time. There are other options like "Intensive 60" which washes in 60min but then you should only put in 4kg of clothes. But it is definitely possible that your Maytag is better for this application (that brand doesn't seem to exist here).

The main challenge I had in researching this was to know what the Wp would be during a wash cycle. That info doesn't seem to exist anywhere - which makes correctly sizing the inverter difficult. As you know, the kick in Wp of a motor can be 7x the motor wattage for a split second and unfortunately none of the manufacturers seem to have that figure on hand. LG can tell you how many Wh used during the different cycles and also Wp for the spin cycle, but that number seems to be the more constant W consumed during the fast spin and not based on the initial Wp in overcoming inertia. I think most of you have massive 2KW+ inverters so this is less of a concern. Pure sinewave inverters here are pricey so getting the smallest inverter that can handle the job in the long term is important.

The trick now is teaching the mamas at the lodge who can't read or write how to get all the settings right without by mistake doing a hot wash!

[jamjamdave]

jamjamdave,
Your setup may be working right now, but I suspect it won't last too long. You are pulling that battery at least to 50% DOD and possibly further due to the short heavy draw so the battery is somewhat under rated and being stressed. Add to that you are marginal on charging the battery back up with only 80 Watts of pv. Now this could be even worse if you are not using a charge controller to stop any overcharging.

You may not want to go for one of the large expensive batteries for this as there are golf cart batteries that can be had reasonably cheap and you may want around 200 watts in pv to charge them up with a controller and it may last a few years for you.

We generally do just one wash a week. I start the wash at 11am on a full battery and we're done by 1pm. By 2pm the battery is full again - I do have a cheap controller. I have installed loads of PV systems in the last 10 years and a big consideration here in Africa is cost - to a much greater extent than in first world countries. Here (rural village Africa), salaries range from US$100 to a maximum of US$400 per month (with 60% unemployment rate) and thus installing 200W of PV to generate 100Wh per week would be overkill.

Of course I will be lucky to get 3 years out of this battery, but at a cost of $100/battery that is acceptable. The forklift batteries don't really work in these small applications. Even the Trojan's are a problem as the cheap controllers max their absorb voltage at 14.4V which isn't enough to fully charge a Trojan which leads to one or more cells going "dormant". The only solution to this undercharging by cheaper controllers seems to be the very expensive controllers (MX60 or Steca Tarom) but then those cost more than the rest of the system combined! Hence the cheaper "deep cycle" batteries (I know they aren't really deep cycle) are best for the budget solar consumer.

I supply rural village homesteads with small solar systems that run lights, TV, small appliances for $690 including installation. In that price range, the considerations for sizing of panels and type of equipment used are very different.

[ChrisOlson]

Can you use the 12CS11P as a Traction or Cranking Battery? Sure you can if you do not know what you are doing and willing to sacrifice performance from ignorance.

Sunking - you are very confusing. Where do you get your information from? Have you ever worked with or on a 12-CS-11P battery? They are all deep cycle batteries. The 12-CS-11P has Rolls' world-famous CS plates. CS = Cranking/Starting. They have sailed the Atlantic from Texas to Nova Scotia for 20 years in marine diesel starting/deep cycle applications, on railroads for locomotive/car power, and small electric "order picker" lift trucks. The CS plate code is their .265" positive 4% antimony grid.

Their FS plates, also used in marine deep cycle, are smaller motive power batteries. FS = Floor Scrubber. They are thinner, .170" positive grid, designed for less intensive cycling and shorter life. All of Surrette's lower price point marine deep cycle batteries have FS plates.

It does not matter that batteries of lesser ah capacity might have higher CCA or MCA rating. That just means the smaller battery has more and thinner plates, probably of lead-calcium grid. These types of batteries are not designed for dual cranking/starting and deep cycle application like on a yacht or trawler. The Rolls 12-CS-11P is. You size the number and size of batteries to the amp requirement for starting your propulsion engines. If the propulsion engine starters are 24V, 450 amp, then the 12-CS-11P is more than adequate (in series) to start those engines.

The 12-CS-11P is identical to any steel container forklift battery except it is dual prope container, so it is spill proof. You pop the cover off it and inside are six 2V forklift style "jars" all connected together with bolted interconnects. You get a bad "jar", you simply pop the cover off, unbolt the defective "jar", lift it out and drop in a new one.

Surrette has only started advertising these different batteries for "renewable energy" in the last 10 years since "renewable energy" has become all the rage. But they have not designed special batteries for it until just recently - and most of those AGM. The 12-CS-11P, as an example, has just been put in their "RE" line as being suitable for RE applications. But it is the identical battery that has been used in motive and marine power for 20 years.

Surrette's main business was NOT RE. It was marine and industrial motive power, and had been for over 60 years. John Surrette, widely considered to be the father of modern deep cycle batteries, designed the first ones in 1935 for fishing trawlers on the Atlantic - not for off-grid solar. When Jamie Surrette took over the company in 1996 less than 1% of their business was renewable energy or solar storage. Today it has grown to about 50%.
--
Chris

[Sunking]

we REALLY need the popcorn eating emoticon on here

Here you go.

[thastinger]

we REALLY need the popcorn eating emoticon on here

[Sunking]

Well, I don't know exactly what to tell you -

Simple look at the specs.

First they list them as DEEP CYCLE
CCA = 845 amps
MCA = 1056 amps.

Do you understand what those numbers mean? Cold cranking amperes (CCA) is the amount of current a battery can provide at 0 °F (−18 °C). The rating is defined as the current a lead-acid battery at that temperature can deliver for 30 seconds and maintain at least 1.2 volts per cell (7.2 volts for a 12-volt battery). From that you can determine internal resistance @ 0 degrees C = [12.6 - 7.2] / 845 amps = .0064 Ohms.

The 12CS11PS is a 12 volt 357 AH battery @ the 20 hour discharge rate which weighs in @ 272 pounds. Now take a look at a much smaller ROLL Marine battery 12 volt @ 260 AH S12-290AGM. It has a CCA = 1830 amps over 100% more cranking amps. With that you can determine it has a internal resistance of [12.6 - 7.2 volts] / 1830 amps = .0029 Ohms @ 0 degrees C. It even list the Internal Resistance at Room Temp of .0018 Ohms which means a Cranking Amps = [12.6 - 7.2] / .0018 Ohms = 3000 amps

Can you use the 12CS11P as a Traction or Cranking Battery? Sure you can if you do not know what you are doing and willing to sacrifice performance from ignorance. If your life depends on performance and you know what you are doing would use a real Traction Battery or Marine Battery which is designed to do what it is claimed to do.

Heck even a much smaller ODYSSEY PC2250 blows the ROLLS 12CS11PS out of the water and it is a 12 volt 125 AH battery @ C/20 (1/3 the capacity of the Rolls) with a CCA = 1225 and MCA = 1550 amps.

I agree the Rolls is a great DEEP CYCLE, but a very POOR Traction or Cranking battery. The Rolls 12CS11PS is designed as a DEEP CYCLE battery. Not a Hybrid (Marine, Traction, Stationary, Golf Cart, Floor Sweeper, Fork Lift, ect...) or a SLI (starting-lighting-ignition) application as you stated. The Rolls battery is designed to deliver at most a C/10 discharge current for a extended period of time. Hybrids are designed to deliver 1C or more for extended period of times. To do that means the internal resistance has to be low. To get low internal resistance the plates have to be thin and many plates. When you do that you give up cycle life. You cannot have both low resistance and long cycle life in a lead acid battery.

[ChrisOlson]

ROLLS are excellent batteries, but they are not Traction batteries, they are a True Deep Cycle battery. They cannot be used for hybrid applications like Starting or Fork Lifts.

Well, I don't know exactly what to tell you - the 24V electric forklifts running around at the local Menards have two Rolls 12-CS-11PS batteries in them.

We also have two of them in our yacht for starting batteries for the Cat 3406 diesels. In a marine application the 12-CS-11PS has MCA rating of 1,056 amps for 30 seconds @ 0°F. In the boat they double as standby power for lighting, navigation, radar, radios, and control systems when the onboard genset is shut down.

Diesel Supply, where we got our Surrettes from, uses the 8V version of it with four in series for 32V starting on EMD diesel-electric locomotives. And in the locomotive they double as standby power to keep the electrical systems in the locomotive powered up 24/7 when the V-16 EMD diesel engine is not running.

So "can't be used" must need some qualification because they work fine here, along with everybody else that I've seen use them in motive power and marine applications.
--
Chris

[FloridaSun]

New LG washing machine:

http://www.lg.com/za/washing-machines/lg-F10B8QDP5

Cost: about US$ 450
Energy Rating: A+++

We run this once a week and it works perfectly. We run it on the following settings:
*Main setting: Cotton Eco
*Temp: Cold Wash
*Spin: 400rpm
water usage: 40L for 7kg load
Total elec usage: about 100Wh
Running time: 2 hours
Peak energy usage (beginning of spin cycle): 250W (for a minute or so).

hmmm... Two hours to do a load? Seems excessive.
I have a year old Maytag, 102L capacity compared to your 58L LG. Did a half load this morning and the maytag consumed 100Wh total, same as yours. Wp was much higher with it's 800rpm spin cycle but run time much less, closer to 45 minutes before ready to hang on the solar clothes dryer.