Do you care to make a video showing the entire process?
The positive electrode is unfortunately not magnetic.
For some reason it is not constant success and results. I am testing also nickel laminated carbon steel cap 15 mm cap, it has some success but being close to sealing gasket it is damaged from heat.
Great news!!!
I'm not aware of any pulse timing adjustment on the Glitter welder. Yeah, I noticed the crappy pic after I already destroyed the cell by prying on it to test its weld strength. The round seal was still intact though. In fact, I dont think any of the cells failed at the seal, despite destroying so many aluminum caps. After successfully spot welding a circle cut peice of the AL-NI strip to the positive end, I was able to weld a "pure nickel" (aliexpress) button cap onto that. I used it upside down to get a better surface contact area, given the concave shape of the cell's positive electrode, while also trying to stay away from that outer seal. Not ideal... but just to give proof of concept and get it right later. The weld seemed pretty rock solid. Certainly better than anything I can imagine necessary. Later on... unfortunately, upon trying a couple more cells, I immediately blew holes through them as before, so either this welder is not consistent, or I need to redress my neglected electrode tips and try to keep consistent on the operating end. Still doesn't feel like a complete dud anymore, now that I've seen that it does work. I'll work on more and try for better pics when I can find time again this week.
looks you are on the track. i also feel i need to sharpen electrodes constantly,,yet have to give more tests. i have recieved button caps made of nickel aluminum, they are small diameter enough to be far from the gasket and also have high "hat" for welding nickel strips on..so far it didnot work as the stainless steel cap which stuck really hard to the cell but am still at beginning here. one thing noticed though is that welding nickel strips to the cap after already welded cap to the battery gives another heat boost to the aluminum positive pole and weaken the cap-pole weld, in case that is consistent i will have to weld strip to cap and later cap to cell pole..
I am sorry
No problem. I would bet someone (China) could custom make the caps if enough were ordered.
Seems that copper is another interesting intermediate material. I should try that. In case copper is used to weld to positive side then maybe get all connections from pure copper?
Mine were also from Lucy's store. That's a good idea about the raised cap, but yeah... cell, copper, cap, nickel. I wish it was more ideal, but if I can find a good metal hole punch for the copper with around a 14mm diameter die, I don't think it is too much work to do. I don't mind spot welding anyway. Sometimes therapeutic, at least when there's consistency. Not so much when it blows holes in cells. I've got 9 model 3/Y modules, so close to 10,000 cells. I can harvest the cells pretty well and fairly quick without damaging them, but I'm still working on a process to clean them up without ruining the plating and causing rust. I can wool wheel them to a new looking shine, but its tough to know when im past the plating. I'm considering making a jig to hold several at once and writing a CNC program to remove all the material around them possible, leaving only maybe .020-.030", then soaking them in some sort of solution to get rid of the remaining layer. Sounds good in my head anyway. I can at least use them in some of my projects in the meantime now, as is. Hopefully someone can chime in on all this with us. I'll continue to post any results I can as I find time to fool with it all.
The way unpredicted things come up without any signs!!! Good luck with your new item.Upon tinkering some more, my 811H started throwing a E01 code, indicating bad oxidation or touched pins causing damage to the unit. Neither was the case, so I'm unsure of what is going on. I didnt want to take it apart and void the "warranty". The Aliexpress seller offered a full refund if returned or 2/3 refund without returning it. On the chance that I can fix this one, I took the 2/3 bait and put another new one on order. I've heard usually good things about the Glitter welders, so I don't feel too dumb about giving one another shot, versus gambling on something else. If I can't fix this one, at least I have spare parts for the new one and extra consumables that it came with. Took like 3 weeks to get my first one delivered, so I guess I won't have any updates for awhile.
Seen people fully dipping batteries in solvent. I didnot like that. I wasnot aware of rust issues but thinking about steel plating it makes sense it can rust.
I've also seen them dipped in what I beleive was just acetone. Although it's not conductive, I would still probably just dip the necessary amount, since the "JB weld" part isn't near the positive end anyway.. As far as needing to wrap them, it's probably a good idea regardless, but I don't think it will eliminate potential rust. If you've had your cells for weeks already, they're probably not going to rust if they haven't already, unless you try to clean them up and brush past the plating. I've had some cells that I took to a bench grinder and wire wheeled the bulk material off of, then wool wheeled 100% shiny and must have not went through the plating, because some haven't corroded at all. Most did, especially as I got less patient. It's tough to carefully stay within that threshold, without it being so tedious that the time outweighs the reward. Repeatability/relatively low time consuming is the goal for me if I can be so picky. As I've mentioned, I have about 10k of them and can get more very cheap, so finding the right process will be valueable to me, but my time is valueable, even if I mostly enjoy fooling with this stuff.
I might try it sometime down the road when I get a beefier iron, but I don't feel like it will show good results. I think it would still heat the cap for too long (maybe depending on the iron) or just take too long in general for a high quantity of cells... or it wouldn't hold up great to any application with heavy vibration. I can't recall when, but ive been wrong before, so I won't rule soldering out. I'm also not aware of current limits through solder connections versus spot welding. I'm looking to pull at least 15A in somewhat short bursts, which may not even work so well with the copper nickel sandwich idea. Just high hopes here...
The Glitter 811H comes with free Aluminium/Nickel Nickel & Copper Samples ... might be an idea to have a play around with them singularly and/or with combo sandwiches first to see how you get on.
I think you could skip the button, but I would just like to have the positive end raised up for what im using them for, since it falls concave into the cell as is. Maybe just uniformity as well.. it also sort of poses as a hazard of shorting to the negative side, even with a wrap around the cell. Just depends on your end application, I suppose.
