tomcarm's Lithium Project

[Dot]

There should be a check list for the dumb bums like me. Thanks Nini / Wayne

[Mrcoolabah1au]

Good night mate see you on the road some time ok

[T1 Terry]

You need to know how many Ah you use per day. If you are living off the batteries now, do you have a battery monitor? This will tell you how many Ah you use per day, you need 2 1/2 days battery capacity, the reason for this is to cover for rainy days and heavy over cast days. Then you need the capacity to recharge the batteries. Each battery type is different, 1 1/2 times the daily usage is required if you use lithium batteries and 2 times the daily usage if you are using lead acid batteries. The reason for the difference, lithium batteries don't need to be recharged to 100% to stop sulphation, lead acid batteries do, so you need to recharge the lead acid batteries faster. Also the recharging efficiency is different between the 2 types, lithium batteries suffer very little loss between discharging and recharging, lead acid loose more than 20%, so at least 20% more needs to go into lead acid batteries than what you took out. So you need lots of solar or some other form of recharging as well as the solar.
As an example, if you used 100Ah per 24 hrs, you would need 250Ah of lithium or 500Ah of lead acid batteries. To recharge with solar only you would need 850w for lithium and 1200w for lead acid. Basically, it's practical for lithium but not for lead acid, you would need lots of solar and a secondary charging system if you suffered 2 days of rain, the batteries would need recharging by the morning of the 3rd day and quickly to prevent sulphation, the lithium battery would only require enough to get through the next 24 hrs, or in this case 100Ah to get through to the next morning and hopefully the sun will reappear by then.

Now you know why David's head was spinning

[dapope]

Dot, I showed George our little battery monitor, will give you all the info you need, from thereyou can work out how much battery you will need. You have 400 ah of lead at the moment, and you have a 3 way fridge that I guess runs off the gas mostly, so 200 ah lithiumis probably sufficient. You will need to decide if you are going to run 12 or 24volt, if you have the space to add a 12v alternator that may be an easy workaround, and then you can do a 12v house setup.
The reality is, for heaters etc, if you are going to do a decnt runtime, just run the genny,then when you want to be quiet, or run while driving, you can do it off the inverter then.. It wont be cheapsetting up, but you will never have to do it again.

[T1 Terry]

There should be a check list for the dumb bums like me. Thanks Nini / Wayne

Maybe start another thread, list out what you have now, what you want to be able to run that you can't run now from the batteries and we can try to guide you from there.

[Dot]

Thank you boys xx

[Boblebago]

Ok so if one was to consider this way to go how do you know what is what and what is needed eg, solar panels, how many, how many batteries, how to look after them, Have tried to google Lithium but the most I know of Lithium is it is a drug Reading all these posts means nothing to the likes of me?? Alright to say ask Terry but time is time and I doubt he would have any to spare just to answer q's like mine.

Hi Dot

I offered to show you my setup at 40 Mile and you never took up the offer, have had 400 amps of lifePo4 batteries in the bus for 2 years next month no problems no other gadgets except a cell logger, runs 230L fridge, microwave (LG Soladom 1600w) kettle, toaster, coffee machine and a 1300w vacumm cleaner.
Best investment I made, I average about 160 amps usage a day.

Regards Geoff

[Dot]

Oh Geoff, was it your batteries you wanted to show me Remember we had a peep at them at Kingston SE but sshhhh I won't tell if you don't

[dapope]

I like showing mine too.



Batteries I am talking about

[Dot]

I like showing mine too.




Batteries I am talking about

Yes and they were very pretty as well