LiFePO4 Recommendation?

olemetry

10 W
Joined
Dec 28, 2011
Messages
76
I am looking for a new battery for my 6T. After doing some homework, it seems that LiFePO4 are generally the safest, most reliable. I am done charging LiPo hobby batteries, balancing, etc.

However, there are so many different places selling batteries, I do not know who to pick. I see there is a lot of Sun Batteries available in the US for good prices. I am looking for a 48V and around 12- 15 Ah.

Any help is greatly appreciated.
 
The old standby is Ping. There have been reports here of his batteries having an amazingly long service life;
http://stores.ebay.com/PingBattery
Having said that, I believe the tend here is moving towards Li-Ion batteries, especially those using Panasonic cells. It's mostly a matter of weight, the LiFePO4 packs being boat anchors. BMS Battery is one popular vendor for "plug and play" batteries.
 
Most of the LiFePO4 types people have used are low-C-rate, and some of questionable quality, so if you use them very hard at all they may become unbalanced each time and require either manual rebalancing on each charge or a good BMS that does this for you. The prebuilt packs probably all have a BMS, though how good it is can be as questionalbe as the cells inside.

The only well-known high-C-rate LiFePO4 cells. A123, are very expensive and often counterfeited (or unknown-quality scrapped cells resold as new), with guaranteed-genuine ones only available from the manufacturer's sale site (Stortronics, IIRC). They're also difficult to assemble into a reliable pack. Lots of threads and posts about this can of worms.


I dont' know if it's the same brand you're talking about, but SunThing batteries (and other stuff) have been complained about here on ES a number of times.
 
Thank yall so much for the help. It sounds like I should be looking for towards the Li-Ion route. That said, what do you think about this:

https://bmsbattery.com/ebike-battery/680-48v116ah-bottle-09-panasonic-battery-pack-battery.html

They sell this in 3 ways:
1. Just the battery.
2. Battery with controller.
3. Battery with controller and torque sensor.

I have my old controller that I used with LiPo hobby batteries, but there are so many wires, I dont know what is what. It has no name on it, so I think I may as well get a new controller. Is this a recommended one?

Also, what are yalls opinion on torque sensors?

Thanks again!!!
 
Where are you located ? What motor and controller are you going to use ? A battery needs to match the needs of your controller Motor and your range
 
New Orleans. All flat. No hills. 29er with 8T motor. No set range. Just a few miles around town.

Who makes 8T motor? I bought years ago and forgot.

If the battery needs to match controller, maybe I just get the battery/controller combo? Reading about the torque sensor. I didn't know these existed, but sounds interesting.

Thanks again for all the help. Is there any type of e-bike Discord? That would be cool.
 
It's hard to make a battery recommendation when you are so vague on what you have. 6T or 8T is generally considered to be a "motor speed" and we might assume that it's a MAC geared motor, there is no way to be sure.
Can you show us some pic.s of the motor and the controller you have? Are there any spec.s on the old controller?
You asked a general question about battery packs, but w/ the intergrated sine wave controller, you are now asking a question where the motor type and brand could be very important.
 
yes sorry. it has been a while with young kids but ready to get back into it. i remember it is definitely geared due to smaller size. no specs on old controller but it worked good with old hobby 6s. any help is appreciated thanks again. i learn so much from getting back into community and batteries seem to be the most difficult thing. thx
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olemetry: to refresh your memory, go into your user profile and look through your old posts.
 
Mark5 refreshing. I guess a 30amp or less controller. Guessing. But you have a C.A. so you can adjust the amp draw. If Ping get a 15ah or more. You can turn the amp draw to 25amps or ? Make a box the size of the battery before buying.
 
Alright, I glanced bak thru your posts and you have a MAC 7T kit you got from Cellman. That would be a quality Infineon controller, so you don't want to toss it.
At one point you were interested in a frame bag w/ the pack inside, so I would suggest you contact Em3ev about a 48 V or 52 Volt triangle set-up.
Do you still have the Cycle Analyst?
 
Yes this stuff is a lot of shit. As I don't read Chinese or understand BUT. You are the only thing we got.
I just had to replace a hall sensor in a almost new motor. Have to rewire Halls from jst to fat white thing. So it's always something. Just go back to Paul for a lighter battery stille should last 4_5 years and he knows your shit (not lifepo4 ). If you got from Paul em3ev. ? One time shipping so fill your cart.

Did you buy this kit from Paul ?
 
Thanks yall for the help. It sounds like I have a good controller, I just need to find a wiring diagram. If the CA is the display screen - about 5 inches wide and 1.5" tall that displays the info, Yes I still have it. I have emailed CellMan to see what he recommends. The Panasonic battery packs (11.6 Ah) with the keyed on-off still looks appealing. Would the Sine Wave controller still be compatible with geared MAC 7T if I decided to go that route as well? Can the Infineon controller be used with a tourque sensor? That seems like it could be useful. THANKS AGAIN !! Getting closer to pulling the trigger on a battery. Can't wait to show you all.
 
LiFePo recommendation?
good news - you do not have to deal with China if you are willing to spend $$
A123 pouches 20Ah
I have used them on 2 of my ebikes.
A123 dealer Stortronics is desperate to sell those cells to you.
How desperate?
they send me 40 pictures of 20 cells I wanted to buy so could check them one by one and approve for shipping.
A123 had quality problems and have quality problems with falling apart robots decalibrated .
A123 shows perfect looking cells flat with no wrinkles on their web site
what I got /20 cells/ was something much worse looking.
Fiskar gave up on them
but they are one ONLY choice if you want 20Ah and high C-rate for DIY and simply they are desperate to sell.
you cannot buy SAFT superfosphate cells , I tried - they are cilindrical and they are THE BEST LiFePo.
 
Doenst headway sell any cells anymore?
 
I have A123 20ah cells big heavy great cell. 1,158 cycles 5yrs. A lot of weight in size to be lugging around at 24s. 16s is as big a bike can handle. Also these cells can be ripped out of packs made for cars and they will try to spot weld new tabs on old cells and resell them this is a very bad idea . These are a great cell just big and heavy .18650 cell may be my next battery pack. But must get a good cell. Use the controller that you have Mac Motors need a controller to match there high-speed motor so use the controller you have
 
12s is fine as you can use A123 20ah at 80 amps or 40v X. 80amps 3,200 watts out of a home made pack. More money for controller. At 80amps they will last a long time. I charge at 16amps so fast charging. But these cells are of the highest quality if real. The recall happened 10 -12 or more years ago for cheap resold cells. It was still a gamble with many losers.
 
flippy said:
Doenst headway sell any cells anymore?
If you like heavy saggy unmatched cells, sure. :/

Their single advantage might be that you can just bolt them together (assuming you get the screw terminal varieties).
 
FISKAR recall happened because faulty new cells build into new Fiskar modules A123 built.
Not electrically faulty but misaligned folded cells .
 
A123 are not the best choice for Lithium Iron Phosphate, there are ONLY choice of high C -rate LiFePo cells for DIY , because simply you can buy it.
The best in my view are Superphosphate technology from SAFT.
They are cylindrycal but the best because:
SAFT quality, consistent quality /not like hit and miss A123/ and very high C-rate /they make energy and power Superphosphate/
 
Olemetry PM'ed me this:
For what it's worth: Joseph at EM3ev replied with a bunch of info, but also said this:

"We do have the 13S (46.8V nominal) Preditor battery pack. If you can wait until the end of this month/early May we are hoping to release a 14S (50.4V) 4P and larger 14S 5P battery packs that will be similar to the Preditor battery with a lockable slider that connects to the water bottle mounts."

Not sure how that would work with my 30A controller and MAC 7T, or if it's just overkill.
Ok, to review what he has;
Motor Mac 7T- A fairly fast wind hub motor able to take quite a bit of power.
Controller-Appears to be an Infineon 10(?) FET in the 30 to 35 Amp range.
In a 26" wheel @ 48 Volts, given enough Amps, it should top out in the high 20's MPH. I say "enough Amps" because the Ebike CA sim. appears to show the system, due to the fast speed motor, becomes Current limited w/ a 20 to 25 A controller over 25 MPH.
So the question as to "which battery" becomes one of "how fast do you want to go"?
If a "standard" battery of say, 22 Amps continous discharge rate is installed, the Current will have to be limited via his Cycle Analyst, so the battery will not be over-taxed.
If one of Em3ev's "custom" batteries is installed, it likely will be able to supply the System requirements w/out any limitation.
As we all know, more speed = more money, so we are back at "How fast do you want to go"?
We are not familular w/ his bike at all, but I suspect, 25 MPH would be plenty fast.
Also, Olemetry has expressed some trepidation over all the wires and connectors he is facing. I would say, "not to worry". Enough folks here have used this combo, whether the CA is "direct plugin" or not, to be able to help. I would suggest he start his study at the Grin site, where there is plenty of info. on using Infineons w/ the various versions of the Cycle Analyst.
 
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