Hybrid battery conditioning?

[redilast]

So I randomly stumbled upon an article talking about hybrid battery conditioning services. All it really says in the article I read is "Conditioning means that the pack is cycled (top charge taken down to zero then back to 100%). This is good for the battery pack and the cells but can also help diagnose any pack issues."

And then I found on a local hybrid shops website that they charge like $1200+ for this service. So they are literally charging you that kind of money just to cycle the battery a few times? Or are they actually going to also replace 1-2 dead/weak cells for that kind of money.

I don't own a hybrid and have no plans to, but I'm just curious if any of you guys know what actually goes into a hybrid battery "conditioning" service, as it seems like a total rip off. I'm well aware that nickel based batteries can benefit from occasionally being fully cycled completely a few times, but that can't be all they are doing, can it?

http://www.carspoon.com/article/does-hybrid-battery-conditioning-really-work/

http://www.thehybridshop.com/battery-conditioning/

 

[dogman dan]

Hogwash. Sounds like a great business though,, serious profit margin.

A better top balance charge of a battery, including nimh, and nicad is a good idea.

Zero to be gained from the discharge in any chemistry, other than identifying a weak cell. But then what? can't easily replace just that cell, so if the pack is toast, you surely can tell on your own.

 

[redilast]

Zero to be gained from the discharge in any chemistry, other than identifying a weak cell. But then what? can't easily replace just that cell, so if the pack is toast, you surely can tell on your own.

Cycling Nickel based cells is in some cases has been well known to increase the capacity. I own chargers with "conditioning" features which basically cycle the cells then test the capacity and will continue to cycle until there is no improvement in capacity. But I've only really seen this be effective for cells that have been left idle for a while. I've experienced this many times with various AA Ni-Mh cells. And yes they can and do regularly replace weak or dead cells in hybrid packs with other used cells. But IMO that would fall under refurbishing rather than "conditioning." So I'm still not sure if this whole conditioning just involves cycling a bit and "testing" for weak/dead cells. Seems like a lot of money for $1200+.

 

[dogman dan]

My own experience with nicads using power tools professionally,, what I found works is stopping sooner, but then charge, cool, charge, cool, charge again. This finally balances the thing, and gets you capacity back. The old packs just stop charging too soon because they get hot.

This is with small power tool packs, NOT a car.

I still think the key is just getting them actually full and top balanced. That deep discharge just unbalances IMO. Ok,, so maybe I'm wrong as hell. But I still wouldn't pay no $1200 for it. Price should be closer to $200.

 

[redilast]

I actually went to the Hybrid Shop today, as it is close to my house and offers smog services and I just got a smog/renewal notice for my SUV. While I was there I looked through a nice little booklet that they had talking about their conditioning service.

From what I gathered it is basically a fairly advanced individual cell diagnostic as well as cycling the pack 2 full times. They had many pictures of their setup but didn't show the discharging equipment they are using. But they showed various graphs of the before and after from some vehicles. In some cases they supposedly increased capacity by 4-5x. They hook up each individual cell to heavy duty leads which I assume is used for the battery discharging machine. They do a couple cycles then compare the before and after. And if there is a couple weak cells at that time they will recommend replacement and can do that with the pack already out of the car.

So that is quite a bit of money right there for sure, and I'm not sure how automated their system is. But they need to remove the pack, then hook up leads to each individual cell then discharge each cell one at a time for 2 cycles.

 

[dogman dan]

Then that sounds more worth the price they charge. I had this mental picture of your car goes for a drive around the block with the gas engine function disabled, twice. Then a balance charge,, "that will be $1200 please".

I'm sure replacing a bad cell is highly effective in increasing capacity, but likely they charge some more for that.

Still seems like for that kind of money, if you feel already your battery has a problem, it might be better spent towards a replacement. On a 10 year old car I mean, not a fairly new one.

Two times in my life, I went to a mechanic without getting shafted. All the rest, always something. When something goes not as expected, the lying starts.

I paid $1000 for a spark plug once. Ok, to be fair, the 4th mechanic figured out that mechanic one had dropped a plug, then installed it. Before that, other mechanics replaced everything else in the ignition system, some of it twice. So I get a bit mis trusting of those guys.

 

[redilast]

Yea, I'm not real fond of most mechanic shops and do as much of the work on my car's, motorcycles etc myself. Only thing I've paid for in the past few years was CV axle replacement and an AC conversion from R12 to R134a, because no place around here refills R12.

I would never personally pay $1200 for this "conditioning" service, because I could do it myself. But, I guess for someone that is experiencing some hybrid battery problems it might solve the problem, or if 1-2 cells are not recoverable maybe they will swap in some good used cells of similar performance once they have the pack taken apart for not much more money. Their shop rate was $114/hr which is a new high for me for an auto shop. So that's $14 an hour for their employees and $100 for the owner. :lol:

I do imagine that it would take several hours of manual labor to test each individual cell or bank of cells in a hybrid pack, as you'd have to swap lead around to the electronic load unless they have some kind of automated machine that can go from 1 cell to another automatically. But $1200+ would be about 11 hours work at their shop rate.