$0.01 shipping from HobbyCity USA! Cheap USA LiPo!

[liveforphysics]

Hobbycity is doing a promo for the USA warehouse right now for USA customers. If you spend over $150 on an order from the US warehouse, the shipping is just $0.01!

"1cent Shipping on USPS orders within USA 23/10/2010
We're now offering 1cent USPS shipping on all USA Warehouse products! All you need to do is order a minimum of $150 in USA Warehouse products to recieve 1cent shipping. Thats 1cent shipping on anything, planes included! Hurry, this is a limited offer!"

http://hobbycity.com/hobbyking/store/uh_newsPageExec.asp


They have some pretty damn cheap lipo too!

Here is a link to the USA warehouse items they stock. Notice of the 4pages of items they list, 2 and a half pages are just LiPo packs.

http://hobbycity.com/hobbyking/store/us.asp?currentPage=1



5s5Ah 20C packs, 92.5watt-hours, $41.39, Makes it $0.44 per watt-hour shipped to your door.

http://hobbycity.com/hobbyking/store/uh_viewItem.asp?idProduct=15008

They also offer all the way up to 40C packs for folks looking for best performance, though you end up paying roughly $0.68 per watt-hour.


Compare this with $17.95 shipping on the otherwise cheapest $/watt-hour hobbycity LiPo at $46.81 for a 6S5Ah pack, and it ends up being $0.58 per watt-hour shipped to your door.


So, to summarize, this is the cheapest Hobbycity LiPo price shipped to your door that I've ever seen, and shipping should be pretty quick since it's being shipped from the USA to the USA, so no slow-boats or customs inspectors to slow things down.

 

[snajczuk]

Wow. I have them in the cart. Do I buy 6 or 8?!?

 

[liveforphysics]

For a grand, you can build yourself a 2kw-hr pack, including wire and terminals and connectors etc.

2kw-hr's is a really nice pack size to run IMO. Good range, great power (40kw continuous, even with just 20C LiPo!), and 37lbs of battery weight. That means a well setup RC bike can be about 80lbs with a range of 60-80miles or so. Not too shabby.


To put it in perspective, to get 2kw-hrs from a ping-pack (2x48v20Ah), you're looking at spending $500 more.

 

[liveforphysics]

Wow. I have them in the cart. Do I buy 6 or 8?!?

Just as long as it's over $150, when you reach step #3 of the check-out process, you select your shipping option as $0.01 USPS delivery.

I just bought another 2kwhrs for myself.

 

[snajczuk]

Bought 8. Let the journey begin! Thanks for the tip.

 

[liveforphysics]

Bought 8. Let the journey begin! Thanks for the tip.

My pleasure.

I made sure to buy all I wanted for myself before posting this up. lol Wanted to make sure they weren't going to sell out from all you guys rushing the site before I got mine.

 

[John in CR]

It figures. Shortly after I shoot my wad on Konions and A123's this comes out. With nothing available down here I should be able to sell my stockpile at a tidy profit. Then I'll get a pallet full via sea shipping straight from the factory after the prices ratchet down another notch.

 

[neptronix]

FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFUUUUUUUUUUUUUU.......................................

I just ordered a bunch of LiPo, 2 hours ago, from HK... connectors etc!!!
And paid $29 for shipping!!

blaaaargg

 

[neptronix]

UPDATE: I called HK and they cancelled my order & gave me store credit.
+1 for HK!!!

And thanks LFP for the tipoff!! Time to order the motherload!

 

[itchynackers]

Awesome, this is the sale I've been waiting for. Just ordered a bunch for .46/wh (turnigy 5s 3000mah).

 

[liveforphysics]

UPDATE: I called HK and they cancelled my order & gave me store credit.
+1 for HK!!!

And thanks LFP for the tipoff!! Time to order the motherload!

Whoa! What a cool company to cancel your order like that! Now for that same money you will get some extra packs, and it's not like anyone ever can have too much LiPo.

 

[Lyen]

OMG, my mouth is watering for the lipo batteries.

Can you guys tell me which one(s) are the most wanted?

Thanks!
Lyen

 

[liveforphysics]

OMG, my mouth is watering for the lipo batteries.

Can you guys tell me which one(s) are the most wanted?

Thanks!
Lyen

If you're looking for the best performance battery available at any price (but doesn't take advantage of $0.01 shipping, because it's not stocked in the USA warehouse).

http://hobbycity.com/hobbyking/store/uh_viewItem.asp?idProduct=14616
$0.96 per watt-hour shipped.

If you're looking for the best performance battery that takes advantage of the $0.01 shipping:
http://hobbycity.com/hobbyking/store/uh_viewItem.asp?idProduct=14986
$0.68 per watt-hour shipped.

If you're looking for the best price on good batteries, and takes advantage of $0.01 shipping, but only 20C discharge performance:
http://hobbycity.com/hobbyking/store/uh_viewItem.asp?idProduct=15008
$0.45 per wat-hour shipped.




So, in this case, you pay over double the cost for the 45-90C rate LiPo, which means you could have twice the pack size with the lower C-rate LiPo, and get close to the same performance level, but with twice the energy storage (but also twice the pack weight). So if you're drag racing or something, the nano-tech's are the best choice, if you're commuting, looks like that $0.45/watt-hour is going to be a pretty damn tough deal to pass up.

 

[Lyen]

You are awesome Luke! You really did your homework buddy. My primarily goal is to carry the lightest possible batteries with the longest possible range for daily commute. So I think which ever one that is the most cost effective should be good enough for me.

Thanks!
Lyen

 

[neptronix]

You are awesome Luke! You really did your homework buddy. My primarily goal is to carry the lightest possible batteries with the longest possible range for daily commute. So I think which ever one that is the most cost effective should be good enough for me.

Thanks!
Lyen

My 20Ah 36v pack will end up being 11lbs. For comparison, a 20ah ping battery ends up being 11lbs.

Not bad!

 

[MN Driver]

Are there limits to the quantity of LiPo that I can choose for this shipping method? How about 45 of the 5s 5Ah packs at once?

 

[liveforphysics]

Are there limits to the quantity of LiPo that I can choose for this shipping method? How about 45 of the 5s 5Ah packs at once?

Seems to work fine.

 

[jonescg]

Those $1 per Wh Nano LiPo cells look pretty crazy, but how do they go when built into a 6-8 kWh pack for a motorbike, say? It seems like a lot of dicking around with BMSs etc. I mean, 5 of these packs in series will give you the desired voltage, and need 30 BMS units. If you don't plan on going very far... Any need for a BMS on these guys??

 

[amberwolf]

I am tempted to put up my 10 TS 60Ah LiFePO4 cells for sale, and use the funds generated by that for this, but I expect they wouldn't sell fast enough (if at all), and I also want to at least try them out on a couple of the bikes to see how they help out, compared to the NiMH and SLA I've used so far.

 

[liveforphysics]

Those $1 per Wh Nano LiPo cells look pretty crazy, but how do they go when built into a 6-8 kWh pack for a motorbike, say? It seems like a lot of dicking around with BMSs etc. I mean, 5 of these packs in series will give you the desired voltage, and need 30 BMS units. If you don't plan on going very far... Any need for a BMS on these guys??

When you make packs with LiPo in parallel, you just connect them in parallel at the balance taps. If you wish to run say something like a 30S 112v nominal pack (127v HVC), then it makes no BMS difference if you just connect 5 x 6s packs in series, or 50 x 6s packs in series. The pack made from 50 would just be 5 groups of cells paralleled 10p, so they charge/discharge/behave the same as if they were just 50Ah cells.

For a racing application, no need for a BMS. I've never used a BMS for LiPo, and see no reason for the additional complexity and failure points if you're a competent user. Yes this means you have to use judgement and not over-discharge the pack and wreck it, and keep an eye on cell voltages once in a while to make sure things aren't getting out of wack, but that's a task that takes about 1minute total to check with a battery medic, and I only bother to check once every 10-20 charge cycles or so.

For a race bike, you just buy the amount of packs that can be configured to suit your voltage and capacity demand, plug in all the balance taps to parallel them, connect all the discharge leads as needed, and go for it. Charge it all as 1 big pack with however many meanwell chargers you need to meet your charge time requirements.

That method would be TERRIBLE for an ebike for your grandma or some clueless newb, but it's the very lightest, most compact, and least things-to-go-wrong solution for a race bike by a wide margin.

 

[Tiberius]

I got an email saying they had LiPo in the German warehouse.

Yeah. Fuel dumps strategically placed all over the place. They are obviously gearing up to support worldwide e-bike racing.

Nick

 

[neptronix]

Yeah.. paralleling the balance leads..
But.. how do you tell when you have a bad cell once you've done that? it seems like you wouldn't be able to tell as you balance charge.. and i see how some cells could get overcharged or overdischarged that way. That means... lipo fire!

I'm gonna have 20aH @ 36V of this stuff ( 8 packs! ), but it's 5s and i'm using a 10s charger, so that helps..

but now i'm thinkin' i shoulda just got big ol' headways.

 

[liveforphysics]

Yeah.. paralleling the balance leads..
But.. how do you tell when you have a bad cell once you've done that? it seems like you wouldn't be able to tell as you balance charge.. and i see how some cells could get overcharged or overdischarged that way. That means... lipo fire!

I'm gonna have 20aH @ 36V of this stuff ( 8 packs! ), but it's 5s and i'm using a 10s charger, so that helps..

but now i'm thinkin' i shoulda just got big ol' headways.

Bro, it's not NiCd, NiMH or something. When you parallel cells with LiCo, they all have exactly the same state of charge.

This is how every LiCo based pack works that runs paralleled cells. It's been proven and proven and proven in everything from laptop battery packs to factory-built LiPo packs that run as many cells in parallel as they need.

 

[tostino]

Yeah.. paralleling the balance leads..
But.. how do you tell when you have a bad cell once you've done that? it seems like you wouldn't be able to tell as you balance charge.. and i see how some cells could get overcharged or overdischarged that way. That means... lipo fire!

I'm gonna have 20aH @ 36V of this stuff ( 8 packs! ), but it's 5s and i'm using a 10s charger, so that helps..

but now i'm thinkin' i shoulda just got big ol' headways.

Umm, even if you built a pack with headways, if you had any cells in parallel you would still build it the exact same way LFP is saying to (if you are doing it correctly that is).

Do some more reading, look at other people's pack builds... You will see it's extremely common to parallel as many cells as you need, and not have to have a bms on each parallel strand. That would be completely retarded to attempt, would waste a whole lot of money on extra BMS's that did nothing at all for you, and is just an all around bad idea if you ask me.

 

[Ultraman]

I was ready to move on this deal and order 12 6s 5000mah 25c packs. Turns out that free shipping to the US is only to the US and not to Canada though, and I was redirected back to the Hong Kong warehouse offerings. Would there be any US ebikers out there who wouldn't mind receiving a batch of Lipo for me and then send it up to Toronto for a fee? I'd pay for shipping of course, and whatever "handling" would be fair. Send me a PM if that could work.