55rebel said:
It's basically jehugarcia explaining why he doesn't balance the battery pack in his converted 1962 VW panel bus and hasn't needed to in over 2 yrs. Also, explains the different lipo chemistries and why the need to balance, or not, with demonstrations. Very edifying.
FWIW, it isn't really the chemistry itself, it's the quality of the cells, and how hard they are pushed.
RC LiPo, for instance, is generally a low-quality manufacturing and probably little or no QC product. So many of them require cell-level balancing on every cycle, when deeply discharged or used at high rates.
The EIG NMC cells I use are high-quality with good QC, and so far I haven't had to do balancing on any of them, though I have had one traction-pack cell begin to have lowered capacity and higher Ri after several years, and relegated it to lower-usage lighting-pack duty.
Some A123 pouch cells I have seem to stay balanced, though I haven't checked it manually in a long time (it has a BMS, but when first acquired used I did a fair bit of such testing to be sure it was ok, and also just to contribute to the ES knowledgebase).
Some cheap 18650 LiFePO4 cells I had (Vpower/CammyCC) had to be balanced every time, regardless of discharge level.
Some better 18650 Lithium cells I have in a pack that's underspec'd for what it's rated to do stay balanced ok as long as it's not used up to it's ratings, or discharged too deeply, though because it can't handle much load I don't really use it too often, as my uses are hard on batteries.
You'll probably see similar findings in various battery/cell test/troubleshooting/repair threads around ES.
BTW, are you originally from Phoenix? I was born and pretty much raised here in Phoenix. So, I'm a bonafide "Desert Rat". 8)
Been here more than 30 years, and lived here a few years as a kid, too, with a few years stay in Texas farm country between those, but born on the Texas coast and then a few years on the California coast before my first stint here.
But it's my home now, and not going anywhere if I have a choice about it.
BTW, if you put your location in your profile, then whenever you post questions about vendors, repairs, etc., people can better respond with relevant info.