I'm experiencing some odd battery behavior and I'm hoping perhaps
someone can provide some expert advice to interpret what I'm seeing. I
originally started with 28 batteries, however have only installed 24 due
to space limitations. The twenty-four batteries that were installed in
the car have been charged & discharged occasionally over the past year
but for the most part the car has just been sitting during that time and
so the batteries maybe got around a dozen cycles during that period. I
managed to toast one of the batteries due to some carelessness on my
part and replaced it with one of the "extra" batteries that had been
sitting completely unused for that entire time. For the past month or
so I have been driving the car on a daily basis without any trouble, but
that new battery seems to require a bit of extra attention when charging
and I'm trying to figure out if the problem is with the new battery or
with the other batteries. Now, today, I seem to have a second battery
that is behaving just like the new battery. When charging the full
pack, these two batteries never seem to charge more slowly. By the time
the rest of the batteries have reached a full charge and the regs are
merrily blinking away at their 14.8V limit, these two batteries are
still only at around 13.3-13.4 volts. I can connect them to my 12V
charger to charge them individually and the voltage seems to come up
just fine. It's only when charged in the full string that they seem to
be obstinate. The weird thing though is that if I disconnect the
charger and come back to check the resting voltage later, these two
batteries are still at around 12.87 volts or so, which is a hair lower
than the other batteries but still within 0.05V and apparently fully
charged.
So.... Which batteries are functioning properly? Is the entire rest of
my pack coming up to the 14.8V max voltage too quickly, and these two
are the only batteries working correctly? A sign of sulfation maybe??
Or is the majority of my pack fine and it's just these two individual
batteries that are acting up? Any explanations for exactly what might
be going on here and what to do to get all of the batteries charging in
a uniform manner?
Thanks in advance for any help/advice.
-Bryan
_______________________________________________
For subscription options, see
http://lists.sjsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/ev
someone can provide some expert advice to interpret what I'm seeing. I
originally started with 28 batteries, however have only installed 24 due
to space limitations. The twenty-four batteries that were installed in
the car have been charged & discharged occasionally over the past year
but for the most part the car has just been sitting during that time and
so the batteries maybe got around a dozen cycles during that period. I
managed to toast one of the batteries due to some carelessness on my
part and replaced it with one of the "extra" batteries that had been
sitting completely unused for that entire time. For the past month or
so I have been driving the car on a daily basis without any trouble, but
that new battery seems to require a bit of extra attention when charging
and I'm trying to figure out if the problem is with the new battery or
with the other batteries. Now, today, I seem to have a second battery
that is behaving just like the new battery. When charging the full
pack, these two batteries never seem to charge more slowly. By the time
the rest of the batteries have reached a full charge and the regs are
merrily blinking away at their 14.8V limit, these two batteries are
still only at around 13.3-13.4 volts. I can connect them to my 12V
charger to charge them individually and the voltage seems to come up
just fine. It's only when charged in the full string that they seem to
be obstinate. The weird thing though is that if I disconnect the
charger and come back to check the resting voltage later, these two
batteries are still at around 12.87 volts or so, which is a hair lower
than the other batteries but still within 0.05V and apparently fully
charged.
So.... Which batteries are functioning properly? Is the entire rest of
my pack coming up to the 14.8V max voltage too quickly, and these two
are the only batteries working correctly? A sign of sulfation maybe??
Or is the majority of my pack fine and it's just these two individual
batteries that are acting up? Any explanations for exactly what might
be going on here and what to do to get all of the batteries charging in
a uniform manner?
Thanks in advance for any help/advice.
-Bryan
_______________________________________________
For subscription options, see
http://lists.sjsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/ev