HELTEC Active Balancer for LiFePO4 batteries. How to install and avoid problems.

Рет қаралды 34,394

2 жыл бұрын

Today, we balance a 16s battery by using an Active Balancer from Heltec. We have seen and used these devices before but I wanted to highlight again how to use them correctly to have the most success. It is not a set and forget process.
Two out of the 16 battery cells are out of balance and I let the Heltec balancer work over night to get this all right again. I explain how to install the balance cables and check them before connecting the actual device. Also, don't get fooled by all the cells having the same voltage. It does not mean you also have the same state of charge (SOC).
The balancer should not stay connected all the time with LiFePO4 battery chemistry. Due to the very flat charge curve, the balancer can create an unbalance at lower voltages, so does the exact opposite of what is expected.
Why the active balancer only works at higher voltage of your battery.
• Why the active balance...
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Пікірлер: 229

@chrisloving6647 2 жыл бұрын

Have had one of those for about a year. Still works great

@dillihag 2 жыл бұрын

Hi Andy. I'm from sunny hot Australia but reside overseas now. Your videos are awesome for the technical content, as well as the little bit of home I see every time! This video was great for me because it explained the balancer and how it should be configured. I am finally getting what I think is full capacity from my pack with 280ah cells after turning off balancing below 3.45V. Thank you!!

@OffGridGarageAustralia 2 жыл бұрын

Awesome, thank you for sharing!

@gumpster6 2 жыл бұрын

With how little insulation was initially stripped I'm surprised you only had one not making connection. Very generous of you to give them away. I won't be entering as I don't own any of this stuff. Good luck to those who enter.

@kirovoleg 2 жыл бұрын

I have one for 4 cells. I removed the solder and connected it to a relay which is controlled by an esp8266 that monitors mqtt messages fom the bms over wifi and only activates balancing if max cell voltage is over 3.38 and diff is over 0.02 and then disconects ince max cell voltage is below 3.379 or cell diff is below 0.01. This ensures that balancing is onoy active while charging and on the higher part of the curve. It may be a bit overcomplicated but since I had the components laying around and I was already monitoring the bms with a raspberry pi it was just a matter of connecting it all. So far it works great

@OffGridGarageAustralia 2 жыл бұрын

Thanks a lot for sharing, that is the perfect solution!

@ciaranmaughan5935 2 жыл бұрын

Hi Andy, you need to remove more cable sheath before installing the cables into the push fit connectors for a good connection because any contact resistance at 3v will reduce current flow. Love the videos

@kuhrd 2 жыл бұрын

I have had one of those active balancers connected to my main house battery bank for over well over a year at this point. Adding a voltage controlled relay to turn it on and off was one of the very first things I did after checking to ensure it was working. It makes a big difference when you have several hundred amphours of capacity and you are comming out of winter where you may have weeks in a row where the batteries never reach full charge.

@GTrainRx7 2 жыл бұрын

Thanks! I will do this on my car battery (LTO). No idea how to do it yet, google will tell me! I put a simple switch on mine, just turn it on when required and turn it off again. I think it draws 10milliamps, so on a 35Ah battery, it is actually a decent draw.

@sjdtmv 2 жыл бұрын

I was thinking the same thing, you beat me to the idea, easy to setup too

@CollinBaillie 2 жыл бұрын

@@GTrainRx7 Just a voltage controlled relay or switch. Should be easy to find online. Set it to measure the voltage of the pack, which you calculate using the desired cell voltage multiplied by the number of cells in the "S" part, and set the switch on voltage level accordingly. Set a switch off voltage at some other pre-determined and similarly calculated level so that when the pack is discharging, the balancer turns off. Have it enabled only when the pack is about 85% SoC or higher, and the balancer will never be able to burn out with excess current. Somebody else will probably have a better suggestion for that SoC voltage suggestion. I think Andy turns balancing on after the cells hit 3.4(5)v and turns off after they drop to 3.3 or 3.2v

@chuxxsss 2 жыл бұрын

Morning Andy, gold show on here this weekend. Have a great long weekend.

@SY-Yggdrasil 2 жыл бұрын

Dear Andy, your videos were so helpful for learning how these 280 Ah cells work and how to control them. After these active balancers came to market, I thought I made a mistake in ordering 123 smart bms. But now I am convinced that I was right and 123 bms will work fine together with the bistable relay. A fully configurable victron bluesmart charger works fine for not to exceed the 80% SOC when Batteries ar "not in use". I was very excitedto see if my installation would work on my sailing-yacht. Since now I am very happy!

@OffGridGarageAustralia 2 жыл бұрын

Thanks a lot for sharing and your feedback. There is actually no need to keep the batteries at 80% you can go to ~97% without causing any further degradation. But yeah, the active balancers work with any BMS and do a great job...

@evil17 2 жыл бұрын

So I think I saw this one @ 15:40, you were testing some new cells, EVE maybe? So this is your testing setup and you are doing a capacity test here. I have become a bad Off Grid Garage Addict of late, good stuff Andy, keep em coming!

@mohammadshoykot7188 Жыл бұрын

Thanks from Bangladesh

@bobbinbob 2 жыл бұрын

Thank you for this Andy just what I needed 👌👍

@OffGridGarageAustralia 2 жыл бұрын

No problem 👍

@peterking1134 2 жыл бұрын

Hi… are both balancers working at the same time?

@LostID_r2d2 Жыл бұрын

Very very helpful!! Thank you!!

@user-lq6ms5eq6j 2 жыл бұрын

Thank you andy for this nice videos you make me love solar energy even though the utility power is very cheap in my country 10kw for only half us dollar , but becuase of your videos i have spent a lot of mony to by off-grid system

@OffGridGarageAustralia 2 жыл бұрын

It's a great hobby and you're getting energy fro free! Keep doing it. Where is the energy coming from in your country?

@defjamsgreen 2 жыл бұрын

Be careful of scammers from previous videos everyone . Stay safe .

@brucebugbee6604 Жыл бұрын

I use a simple over/under voltage relay and use it to turn my active balancer on when the bank voltage goes above 27.2 volts and then turn off when it drops below 27.1 volts (for my 24V battery). The relay I use can also turn on at the low end of the voltage range if I want it to bottom balance, but I have not enabled the undervoltage setting on the relay. Seems to work pretty well and its cheap and simple.

@wayne8113 2 жыл бұрын

Thanks Andy

@JStarke240 2 жыл бұрын

I've got my 12s battery pack in progress (ordered from Amy). This would be a great addition.

@JStarke240 2 жыл бұрын

Way to go on getting rid of the spam/phishing attempt :). Andy's Off-Grid Security for the win.

@hummmingbear 2 жыл бұрын

I have the negative wire run through the relay on my victron charge controller. It's only set to close the circut (and enable balancing) when it goes into float state. A really easy way to balance only when at a set voltage

@solventtrapdotcom6676 2 жыл бұрын

This is clever. I like it.

@willtaylor8904 2 жыл бұрын

Nice,👍👌

@SpeakerKevin 2 жыл бұрын

I assume you had to take the controller apart to do this?

@kirovoleg 2 жыл бұрын

That is a neat idea. I will have to check if my Epever has the ports for that.

@hummmingbear 2 жыл бұрын

@@SpeakerKevin nope! Victron supports the relay out of the box. They have ports on the front for it. You can select different settings/options for when you want it to open/close the relay.

@monimi1 Жыл бұрын

Thank you for your interesting videos. I saw an app called Xiaoxiang in this video on your smartphone. Can you tell me which hardware works with this app

@excillisbank2611 Жыл бұрын

C'est un bon élément ce balanceur actif de batterie, HELTEK devrais penser à fabriquer un modèle SMART ce serais une belle expérience pour OFF GRID GARAGE ! . Merci ANDY (très stimulant la question pour obtenir le balanceur gratuitement ! je regrette de ne pas avoir suivi la vidéo plus tôt...) je continue la suite des épisodes OFF GRID GARAGE 😏🤗

@stevegorkowski3246 2 жыл бұрын

I also had problems with the balancer but with LTO cells. The board works great but like you said it should be turned on at the top end of the state of charge. I now have the electronics to do tests. My hope is to do the testing with the cells on the Ebike this fall. LTO cells should work well in the cold weather of Wisconsin. If it works well I want to use it in a NEV with a bigger pack of LTO cells. Your testing helped.

@sjdtmv 2 жыл бұрын

Use a voltage sensitive relay that turns it off and on at a set voltage

@OffGridGarageAustralia 2 жыл бұрын

Thanks Steve. I still have to test LTOs myself and probably want to use them in a mobile project I will start this year. As Ross said, a relay may help or even some solar charge controller have a programmable relay which can be used for this purpose.

@stevegorkowski3246 2 жыл бұрын

@@OffGridGarageAustralia A friend gave me the device that triggers a contact closure at a voltage set point. I have the pouch LTO cells and the tabs are aluminium and that was a bit of an issue but I am past that. The balancer issue is hopefully the last issue to fix. You probably know this but the charge discharge curve is much different than the common cells most people use. The larger voltage swing caused me to make the string voltage a bit higher so I don't hit the low voltage cutoff on my device too early. Thanks for all the great input!

@workshopideas1834 10 ай бұрын

If I buy 10-14s, can under 10S also use this battery balancer?

@IL_Praticone Жыл бұрын

Hi, I have a curiosity, could you tell me the printed code of the 8-pin component? (soic-8) Thanks!

@AjeethCheppudira 2 жыл бұрын

Hello Andy, Your videos are very interesting to learn all the solar configurations. Installing an active balancer in addition to a good BMS increases the cost of building our own LiFePO4 battery packs.After balancing and charging 8 EVE 3.2v/105 Ah cells into a 12 volt pack, there was a voltage difference of 0.16 v between the cells. I connected a 25W 30ohm resistor for the cells with higher voltage for 15 to 30 minutes and brought down the voltage of all the cells within 0.03 volt difference. After recharging the cells in full cycles with a Victron 15 amp charger for three days, the cells have remained at the same voltage difference of 0.03 volts. So I do not see the requirement of an active balancer, with additional wiring. Connecting a cell meter helped a lot in observing the cell voltage.

@OffGridGarageAustralia 2 жыл бұрын

Yeah, you can use a resistor to bleed of energy from single cells. It's just a manual process while an active balancer does it all for you. I have to consider one as I rarely fully charge my battery.

@ssoffshore5111 2 жыл бұрын

You say not to leave the active balance on all the time. I hadn't thought about that, but it makes sense. On the JK, which seems to have a lot more settings based on your videos, does it have the ability to only kick the active balancing on above a certain voltage? If not, it seems like this logic would be fairly simple for them to implement within the software. This way it wouldn't interfere in the flat part of the curve, but kicking the AB on at say 3.44V, and leaving the upper V limit at say 3.46V or so, would allow some frequent and regular balancing between 3.44V and 3.46V... Or is this not a good idea as you just don't want to go up that far on a regular basis for cell health reasons?

@neudan7788 3 ай бұрын

Can I connect the active balancer while charging the battery pack?

@petryrety 11 ай бұрын

I have a 18650 13s10p LG MH1 battery pack, and when the battery is on standby, I have a deviation of 2-3mV, and if I charge it (15A charger), this deviation rises to 45mV. It is normal? The current BMS is a passive one, JBD 13s 60A. I always have row no. 6 of cells with a higher voltage than the rest of the groups.

@razvanduta3563 2 жыл бұрын

Hi Andy. Just occurred to me that despite voltage being most of the time irrelevant in LiFePO4 batteries, the BMS manufacturers are still displaying the cell voltages or the cells voltage difference instead the current amperage while balancing. That would be a great feature and would show how effective the balancer is. 0A flowing in between cells = perfect balance. Raz

@OffGridGarageAustralia 2 жыл бұрын

That's a great suggestion! I'll pass this on to my contacts in China. They are always asking for improvements.

@randypeterson4055 2 жыл бұрын

That would require one resistance shunt for each cell. Massive and costly. I think cell voltage is a good enough indicator for top balancing LiFePO4 cells in a battery pack.

@markseamans4682 2 жыл бұрын

Andy, does the Venus OS have the ability to trigger the balancer based on voltage?

@OffGridGarageAustralia 2 жыл бұрын

Yes, you can use relays triggered by Venus OS or the MPPT controller relays.. a lot of possibilities to turn it on...

@TubolMotoadventures 3 ай бұрын

possible to damage the balancer if you connect the top socket(cell #9 to #16) first? I did it and caps exploded. nothing wrong with the wiring

@aljoschazentler8053 2 жыл бұрын

hi i am trying to find this beautiful terminal block push in connector online but having a hard time pinning it down maybe if possible give me a hint or link that be amazing thanks you guys

@luc_libv_verhaegen 2 жыл бұрын

Andy, with the big battery now "done" (let's call it "in production", as we all know that it will never be truly done), are you slowly getting it fully charged with the autumn sunshine and your current solar installation? Will you be able to get all three banks over 3.45V to actually warrant top balancing before winter hits?

@luc_libv_verhaegen 2 жыл бұрын

Also, when i am asking questions anyway... You have me convinced on compression, but you have not secured your cells at all. Even though here in germany (where i live) and belgium (where i would really love to stick a huge battery so that that house can almost go off-grid) I do not _really_ have to worry about earthquakes, but smallish ones still occur ever few decades (like the roermond one in 1992). How well do the busbars and cabling hold the batteries in place today? Would it make sense to glue a scrap strip of plexiglas, flat, on top of the other plexiglas, as a low fence around the batteries to keep them from moving around on the shelves. Would that, and the busbars and cabling hold them in place semi-securely in case godzilla does attack?

@GTrainRx7 2 жыл бұрын

Being in Queensland... yes. We have stupid amounts of sun. Except for today :D

@OffGridGarageAustralia 2 жыл бұрын

I picked up more solar last weekend. The 4kWp plus the temporary pool fence setup is not enough to get me the energy I need. Lots of shading on the garage now...

@abdulhamidismael7801 Жыл бұрын

Can I use balancer without bms

@cidadefmphb 2 жыл бұрын

Muito interessante. Parabéns

@catesolarcatamaran252 Жыл бұрын

At the board it says "run" de solder that one and connect to a relay that gets power when charging, that work really well for my pack.

@drewsuf77 2 жыл бұрын

Hi Andy, great content as always. Would I switch the negative wire of the active balancer. Could you do a video showing set-up using a voltage trigger switch. Please mate. I have a 12v set-up using a Daly.

@CollinBaillie 2 жыл бұрын

You have a switch to make/break contact of those "run" jumper pads. Everything else is wired as standard. The balancer handles enable/disable of balancing according to the "run" jumper pads.

@drewsuf77 2 жыл бұрын

@@CollinBaillie yes, but is it the negative wire I would pass through the switch.

@CollinBaillie 2 жыл бұрын

@@drewsuf77 No. In the video, you see Andy essentially shorting the 2 pads with a screwdriver. You literally wire the 2 jumper poles to a switch. If the switch is on, the pads are shorted. If the switch is off, the pads are open circuit. And by shorted, I mean they are connected, forming a complete circuit.

@drewsuf77 2 жыл бұрын

@@CollinBaillie oh ok thanks mate.

@OffGridGarageAustralia 2 жыл бұрын

Thanks Collin!

@Jsak666 2 жыл бұрын

Can you do a video on the voltage trigger module? I want to use it on my solar powered rasppi to trigger a relay to turn the AC charger on if there has been too many days of no sun and my battery voltage is low. A lot of questions on that module, when does it come on is the relay NC/NO and when does the relay trigger back off/on?

@OffGridGarageAustralia 2 жыл бұрын

Sure, I'll get one...

@55sunturbine30 2 жыл бұрын

Could a current sensor be used to turn on the balancer when current is in charge direction and off when discharging allowing continuous active balancing (install and forget)?

@OffGridGarageAustralia 2 жыл бұрын

A current sensor is hard to do. This is basically a shunt where the voltage is measured. So why not measure the voltage directly?🤷‍♂️ You want the balancer to be on all the time if over a certain voltage, regardless if charging or discharging.

@nateb3105 2 жыл бұрын

CAREFUL on the grey mylar packaging - its anti static & conductive!!! you can short something. They balance 24/7 - BUT they work on voltage difference, at the middle part of the curve, the voltage diff is minimal & the balance is minimal. They wont move enough current in a 300Ah pack during the time it takes to charge to a higher voltage, so wont affect a top blance. I used them 24/7 on A- grade cells, they worked incredibly well & the pack was always much better balanced

@nainabla 2 жыл бұрын

I think that on grade a cells the bms passive balancer is enough. So you could not tell if the active balancer was keeping the cells in balance or the passive balancer built in the bms was doing it..

@OffGridGarageAustralia 2 жыл бұрын

Didn't know it's conductive. I'll test it.

@nateb3105 2 жыл бұрын

@@OffGridGarageAustralia yeah *might be* - typically they're used for anti-static, so may be slightly conductive at higher voltages. But i once fried a hard drive by doing what you did :)

@ianendangan7462 2 жыл бұрын

My active balancer is named flying capacitor for 16S looked same as this one in the video. It turned off at 44.5V and turns on at 44V. It did a good job balancing than the passive balancer with the Daly BMS.

@OffGridGarageAustralia 2 жыл бұрын

The Daly has no great balancing capabilities with these large capacity cells. The active balancer is the perfect combination for your setup.

@gepettoautomobile 2 жыл бұрын

I think i don't miss any of your video, but I don't remember that test. I have active balancer so i will not participate 😁. Wish you the best

@BobHannent 2 жыл бұрын

Would be interesting for your rig to have 16x5A shunts so you could verify the movement of energy between cells when doing this kind of test. Not sure such a thing exists, but could be fun to make.

@OffGridGarageAustralia 2 жыл бұрын

I think we have tested all this in previous videos here on the channel and gained a lot of info from these tests.

@ralfb.5373 2 жыл бұрын

Hi Andy, Grüße, aus Bayern ! I have an argument for using the active balancer below 3.45V, and that is during discharge. I have the situation that in my 4S Winston 300Ah LiFePo Pack in the mobile home one of the cells is discharging more rapidly, probably because of a deep discharge earlier in its life (bought them second hand). Eg., while 3 cells are still above 3V, one is going down to 2.8 already (note Winston states 2.5V is the discharge limit. Also the Winston cells have different voltages and curves than your cells). So during discharge the balancer helps this weak cell and prevents the whole battery pack from shutting down when actually there is at least 10% more usable capacity in it. Hope I could explain clear enough.. Keep up the work ! Wo bist du eigentlich ursprünglich her ?

@OffGridGarageAustralia 2 жыл бұрын

Thanks Ralf. That is true and a balancer can help in this case if you need to discharge your battery that low. MOst users stop discharging at 3.0-3.1V anyway as there is not much capacity left (5-7%) below that voltage. Guck mal auf meinem deutschem Kanal, Link in der Video Beschreibung 😉

@t.d.5804 2 жыл бұрын

Got 1200Ah battery (Nissan Leaf cells) with the Heltec balancer, due to the battery size it takes time, but it works.

@OffGridGarageAustralia 2 жыл бұрын

I guess the LEAF cells are better matched altogether so will have less deviation once fully top balanced. 1200Ah is impressive. Is this at 48V as well?

@t.d.5804 2 жыл бұрын

48V 72kWh, 3 Nissan Leaf battery packs. Had them for about a year only with the Batrium BMS balancer and it could not match the cells (only 50W balancing), had 30-40mV at mid SOC and >100mV at low/high SOC. The Heltec works. Greetings from Germany.

@waynescheepers145 2 жыл бұрын

Andy, would it be worth the extra 100 usd difference for the new jk bms VS the one that you have, I'm thinking that the price difference of 100 USD is not worth it just to get the screen

@OffGridGarageAustralia 2 жыл бұрын

No, absolutely not worth it. The BMS will be always turned one anyway in a solar set up. So the +5V procedure is only necessary if you disconnect the BMS.

@waynescheepers145 2 жыл бұрын

@@OffGridGarageAustralia Thank you, glad it's not just me then

@captainobvious9188 2 жыл бұрын

It’s more expensive, but I like the JK balancer a lot more. I’ve been using it for years. It uses the same app as the BMS too.

@OffGridGarageAustralia 2 жыл бұрын

Ah, OK, it's the smart balancer with app. Yeah, that one is awesome.

@Fisco46 2 жыл бұрын

You can activate the balancer with the relay of the victron MPPT too

@OffGridGarageAustralia 2 жыл бұрын

Yeah, but this would only measure the overall voltage of the whole pack. Some cells may go over the 3.45V or whatever you want the balancer to turn on, without getting balanced. I much prefer the manual switch and turning it on every 2-3 months...

@magicmanspaz 2 жыл бұрын

When you came back over night all cells where over 3.3v but you started with all at 3.0-3.26-3.29 how have they all gone up? did you have charge connected? These balancers can be left on at all times I have been running them for about 2 years and they work perfectly the ells are always balanced and I always get full capacity from my pack. I understand where your theory kind of comes from but in practice they work. Even some argumentative "experts" who laid claim for a long time they don't work well are now offering them in battery's they sell. While yes the charge curve in lithium is very flat there is still mv differences and if you match voltage the cells are balanced this is the point of a balancer to stop one or more cells reaching high or low cell cut off before the others and so long as that happens the balancer is doing its job and you get full capacity. What would be a good test is balance a set of 4 cells with the active balancer, Then capacity test each cell after its balanced. Even so I don't see an issue with the balancer keeping the cells matched in the middle and top end. When you think about it a lot of banks will be sitting in the middle section of soc a lot of the time so when you whack on a high load you don't want one or more cells that may be out dropping and hitting low cell disconnect. As you charge the balancer keeps cells matched right up to full soc again. If they are all closely matched in voltage while in mid soc even if capacity was slightly off its not off enough to create issues the battery works and means the cells are still close matched for when you begin to charge full and reach full they stay close to each other and remain balanced as you charge to full and re top balance. Does that make sense.

@SkypowerwithKarl 2 жыл бұрын

Your charge and discharge patterns have made you lucky. What ever you are doing seems to be working for you, but if you start to see a balance problem, remember this video. I’m also running eel batteries. No problems

@magicmanspaz 2 жыл бұрын

@@SkypowerwithKarl My charge and discharge patterns vary depending on solar and my usage so no real pattern.

@SkypowerwithKarl 2 жыл бұрын

@@magicmanspaz I’m not going to risk it on my big system. I saw what it did to have balance active on my son’s trolling battery. The delta went crazy and tripped high cell. It took several charge & let it equalize cycles attempts to get full charge. Now he charges the night before and sometimes turns on the active balancer after it’s finished charging and waiting for morning. It’s usually never more than .010 unless he runs it under 3vpc.

@magicmanspaz 2 жыл бұрын

@@SkypowerwithKarl Sounds more like dud balancer or bms. or cell issues. none of my handfull of banks or cranking battery have ever had any issues with active balancers on all the time. and they use varied types of cells and mixed charge and usage non patterns.

@SkypowerwithKarl 2 жыл бұрын

@@magicmanspaz Well the problems went away when it’s only balancing over 3.4 so I got to say cause and effect. Most of the time the the Overkill BMS’s .050 amp resistive balance is all it needs. Engaging the Heltec will bring it to .002 delta or better. Those are eve batteries. He can troll all day vs a few hours with the heavy lead batteries. When things aren’t broken I leave things alone. My house system runs my dryer and hvac at the same time and is flawless. Probably going to add another 62kwh for reserve/rotation. Those will be two sets of 16 on two 200 amp JK BMS. Those have a 2amp balance but it’s current isn’t differential dependent.

@yorks_atheist3069 2 жыл бұрын

have one on order, my battery is in a long row of 16 will need to extend the cables what guage are they ?

@OffGridGarageAustralia 2 жыл бұрын

These are thin wires, maybe 22AWG

@yorks_atheist3069 2 жыл бұрын

@@OffGridGarageAustralia thanks what I'm going to go is pinch your idea of having the connections on a din rail that I can use for attaching such as a balancer without disturbing the battery in future

@OffGridGarageAustralia 2 жыл бұрын

@@yorks_atheist3069 perfect, that sounds great. This was exactly my thinking as well when designing this and looking for options.

@cidadefmphb 2 жыл бұрын

Ganhou mais um inscrito

@GospelOfTimothy 2 жыл бұрын

I have a 36 volt life04 ebike battery. The battery is getting old and has half the life or it may need balanced. It has a PCB but they don't seem to control the voltage very well. When I plug in the charger, it charges to 44 volts and then charger shuts off. After it sits for a few minutes the voltage will drop down to 38.9 V and the charger will turn on again. Should I leave the charger plugged in overnight, to balance the battery or will it harm the battery? Also the ebike has a controller board, that cuts power at 33 V. This is set up to save lead acid batteries for draining too much. Life04 batteries can go down to 2 V each or 24 volts on a 36 volt pack. Would it be advisable to disable the low V shut off on the controller, because the battery pack itself, has a low V shutoff to protect it?

@OffGridGarageAustralia 2 жыл бұрын

So 44V is far too high to charge this pack to. If this is a 36V battery LiFePO4 it has 12 cells I assume? That would mean 3.66V at 44V. It may be the BMS which protects the battery and shuts off charging. The low cut-off at 33V seems fine (assuming 12cells at 33V = 2.75V). The usual lowest discharge voltage is 2.5V for LiFePO4, not 2V unless you have special cells and the manufacturer specified this explicitly. I would not disable the low voltage disconnect. It is there for a reason and the BMS low voltage shutdown is just there if the one of your controller fails.

@steveh9714 2 жыл бұрын

We would love to see you hook this up to the dry contacts in your victron and only turn it on when the voltage is 3.45/cell or above!

@OffGridGarageAustralia 2 жыл бұрын

We can certainly give this a go...

@Rangarid 2 жыл бұрын

@@OffGridGarageAustralia I also want to see it. Hope you can make a video of that :). Thanks for your amazing tests!

@nainabla 2 жыл бұрын

Do you even need the active balancer for grade A cells. I think that the BMS passive balance is enough to keep the in balance..

@OffGridGarageAustralia 2 жыл бұрын

I would say, yes, you need one. I rarely fully charge my battery and if I do, they have drifted a lot. Don't get fooled by the internal resistance and how suppliers match your cells. That is only a snapshot and the resistance will change over time and usage pattern.

@ronwest7930 2 жыл бұрын

I would like to see a longer test leaving the balancer on while charging. and see how it works or doesn't. Many of the videos show an unbalance between the cells. Maybe a monthly near max charge and balance would be an idea. My c-40 charge controller has an auto-balance higher charge that can be set to automatically do this or a button can be pushed to manually start this higher charge. I keep learning and maybe soon I will see for myself.

@1978jra 2 жыл бұрын

Andy has made a video where active balancer is left on all the time. It didn't go well.

@ronwest7930 2 жыл бұрын

@@1978jra I just remember a short test.

@OffGridGarageAustralia 2 жыл бұрын

Hi Ron, I have now two balancers connected all the time to two different battery banks to do this test. Once the battery is fully charged again. I'll make a follow up video.

@adewaledipo 2 жыл бұрын

Can you please give me a link to that terminal connector on the battery

@OffGridGarageAustralia 2 жыл бұрын

All material and tools are linked on my website here: off-grid-garage.com/cables-and-connectors/

@Christian76S 2 жыл бұрын

You can even parallel these. And if you anyway idle middle SoC it is totally ok having the balancer connected all the time. Btw: mine is, and yesterday I fully charged the battery from around 70% SoC to 100% and there was no issue at all, the BMS cell overcharge cut-off didn't kick in.

@OffGridGarageAustralia 2 жыл бұрын

I had very mixed results with the battery #1. Because I charged the vehicle from it (higher load) the voltage difference was increased across the pack and the balancer did its job and balanced the whole time. Once I fully charged again the battery was totally out of balance. It could be that the terminal connections on the old battery were causing the increased voltage difference though. I'll do some more testing...

@catalinoentero6992 2 жыл бұрын

@@OffGridGarageAustralia hi andy have you try to use the active balancer qucc 16s 10a induction type.

@Christian76S 2 жыл бұрын

@@OffGridGarageAustralia You should do Andy. My concern when putting two of these capacitive 5A balancers in parallel was, that if their high frequency cycles were antiphase they would have eliminated themselves. But they didnt, with about 0.4V deviation of one cell I could already see a current of 7-8A flowing. I reckon with the larger current the balancers manage to keep the cell voltages in an acceptable deviation range for the BMS to not cut-off even in the steep area at the 1/99% ends of the SoC curve.

@geraldkoth654 2 жыл бұрын

Because of the way I use all my lithium batteries, I do not need a BMS, it just make the battery hard for me to use. If the BMS were to shut down a battery, I might be a couple miles offshore, or deep in the woods. A balancer is perfect for me. I just put one to use on a 72volt (20s) eBike battery I built. Will see how it works compared to the QNBBM I use on LiFePO4.

@OffGridGarageAustralia 2 жыл бұрын

The BMS is there to protect the battery. The battery is usually the most expensive part of your system, so I cannot see how this hinders you in your activity. If you're on an ebike in the woods and the battery is empty, well, there is no way to use it any more anyway, even if you go below 2.5V.

@CaptainProton1 2 жыл бұрын

I had one of these balancers and it caught fire when I ran my battery to around 3% empty and it tried to active balance the cells that were now out of balance by so much that the capacitors don’t limit themselves capacitor wise amps. Half the caps had exploded and wires had burnt out. Went with NEE balancer that works so much better.

@solventtrapdotcom6676 2 жыл бұрын

This is designed to top balance. You shouldn't run it like that. I'm not surprised it blew itself up. This isn't a phone app that does all the thinking for you. You have to know what you're doing.

@repairman2be250 2 жыл бұрын

With gadget like this there is no information on how properly use them, unless someone like Andy comes along and explains and shows by example things.

@sjdtmv 2 жыл бұрын

I have always run a fuse back for BMS use.

@OffGridGarageAustralia 2 жыл бұрын

It is for top balancing only as pointed out above. I have used it at the low voltages as well with my battery a while back and it worked there too, had no problems. It definitely should not catch fire!

@CollinBaillie 2 жыл бұрын

Nice giveaway! For anyone that has a lithium battery already setup or close to finishing their pack, go for it guys! I'm still learning and scheming, I'm not entering.

@OffGridGarageAustralia 2 жыл бұрын

Thanks for all your help here on the channel, Collin. I appreciate you're helping with responding to others. That helps me out a lot.

@CollinBaillie 2 жыл бұрын

@@OffGridGarageAustralia It's a pleasure Andy. You've helped me learn so much.

@civicrocker 2 жыл бұрын

Not sure if you or anyone will reply to this but… I have a JK BMS in my ebike I just built. The factory settings are to start balancing above 3 volts. Should I bump that up to 3.45 like you said in this video?

@SkypowerwithKarl 2 жыл бұрын

Minimum start balance voltage is 3.4 for LiFePO4 chemistry.

@hommerdalor6301 2 жыл бұрын

Are the cells lifepo4 in your ebike battery, not liion? 3.2V or 3.6V, 3.7V

@civicrocker 2 жыл бұрын

@@hommerdalor6301 ya they are 6000mah lifepo4 cells. 3.2v nominal. It’s a 17s3p config, giving me 18ah

@civicrocker 2 жыл бұрын

@@SkypowerwithKarl ok thanks. I’ll change it then!

@hommerdalor6301 2 жыл бұрын

@@civicrocker Nice battery, with the JK BMS, you can raise the low voltage cutoff, so it makes a reserve. With electric bikes, and simple original batteries, I had discharged battery before destination, that’s a huge problem, as I couldn’t walk and have very little force to pedal, I live on top of a little mountain, so I get range anxiety. 😅

@hing983 11 ай бұрын

Hi I setup 6 Nissian leaf battery for 6s active balancer how to connect is it start positive first then battery 5 4 3 2 1 negative right I have try negative then battery 1 2 3 4 5 then positive it short out

@OffGridGarageAustralia 11 ай бұрын

Battery 1 is always the one with the most negative terminal, so counting starts from the negative side of the battery. Battery #6 is the one with the most positive terminal in your case.

@hing983 11 ай бұрын

Yes most lithium 12v battery start from negative then first battery positive etc 2 3 4 5 but Nissan leaf battery is from positive 5 4 3 2 1 negative I try it works no burn

@PhilippeCJR 2 жыл бұрын

balancing at (i.e.)60-80% soc, means creating more unbalance at 99% right?

@OffGridGarageAustralia 2 жыл бұрын

Yeah, that was my experience so far. Some said they leave it connected all the time. I'll do a long term test right now with these two balancers. At the moment I would not leave them connected all the time and only turn on when needed at higher voltage.

@Dutch_off_grid_homesteading 6 ай бұрын

Heya still not sure gone use those balancers

@jessicahaines7263 Жыл бұрын

The point of clarification... When you say only above 3.45 volts meaning at least one cell above that? Or all cells above that? If all my cells were above 3.45 volts I don't think I would need to balance lol

@SpeakerKevin 2 жыл бұрын

What should one do if you notice that the wires aren't stripped far enough?

@porter5976 2 жыл бұрын

Strip them more.

@SpeakerKevin 2 жыл бұрын

@@porter5976 Solve problems before they occur.

@gartenwanst8757 Жыл бұрын

TBH I do not really get it. If they work perfectly fine above 90% capacity, why I shouldn't let them stay connected from 0-90 ? They will do there work and they will become even better above 90 ... right ?

@michaelbouckley4455 2 жыл бұрын

The voltage trigger XH-M609 you suggest is unsuitable!! It’s designed as a small power battery charger controller. Turns on low, off high. It’s also a bit tricky to program. The turn on voltage ‘difference’ has a range of 9v. (Down button) Works ok on nominal 24v Lifepo4. The problem is it outputs the input voltage. Did you try it with a balancer? It could be used with a 0v trigger, like on some opto isolated relays; but that could be a problem, if bms, or load power turns off. I would suggest using XY-CD60L instead, as it can be programmed as in and OUT modes, also adding another relay in the output, to control the balancer.

@OffGridGarageAustralia 2 жыл бұрын

Ah, right, thanks for that info, Michael. I have never tried it myself. I'll have a look for a better device for that purpose. Maybe we even don't need a trigger any more and can leave the balancer connected all the time? I'm doing more testing at the moment...

@JOLLE720 2 жыл бұрын

Oh Andy....schickst mir den auch an die Ostsee? 😁

@SpeakerKevin 2 жыл бұрын

Moving both probes is easier to read because it should read 3.x volts every time.

@DanBurgaud 2 жыл бұрын

6:25 From my understanding, this Balancer transfers the charge from one cell to an adjacent cell. If the unbalanced cells are far apart, it will take a long time..

@DanBurgaud 2 жыл бұрын

Clarification: By *far apart*, I am referring to physical positioning of the cells, not voltage delta. ie, if Cell#1 is the highest and Cell 16 is lowest voltage in the pack, this BMS will transfer the charge from Cell1 to Cell2, then cell2 to cell3 .... until it reaches Cell16. THEN AGAIN, that was early design version of balancers. Maybe they already changed it. It should be easy to check with an ammeter.

@hommerdalor6301 2 жыл бұрын

@@DanBurgaud I understood the same, with the 2Amps version, when reading the description on Ali, but when Andy tested the curent in each wire, I wasn’t so sure anymore :-D Maybe the test couldn’t really show what is happening, if the capacitors pump small bits of charges at a frequency witch seems DC for the multimeter, maybe an oscilloscope could reveal something else?

@OffGridGarageAustralia 2 жыл бұрын

I could not verify that during my extensive testing I did with these balancers. It seems to bet the higher voltage cells are being discharged and the lower ones being charged. It does not seem to transfer the energy just to an adjacent cell.

@nainabla 2 жыл бұрын

You should do a more extensive experiment to back up your claims that the active balancer ruin the balance of the cells if it is always connected...

@SkypowerwithKarl 2 жыл бұрын

Andy has and I can also attest on LiFePO4 that if you have an balancer active below 3.4 vpc you stand a good chance to have wild delta numbers as you approach full charge and likely have the BMS shut down charge due to a rogue high cell. Small corrections on the “flat” of the curve can be disastrous to balance. Let the delta run where it wants after it’s charged and has adequate balance time above 3.4 (or 3.45 Andy). Watching the cell voltage on the flat of the curve during charge, discharge and rest is constantly changing, trading places and correcting, usually never more than .010 Volt. It’s like watching voltage “bop-a-mole”. It’s totally normal and shouldn’t be corrected on the flat of the curve.

@randypeterson4055 2 жыл бұрын

@@SkypowerwithKarl Andy did make a video showing the test you are asking for, in the past.

@SkypowerwithKarl 2 жыл бұрын

@@randypeterson4055 I think you meant the other guy= @Vzajemna. I agree with 98% of Andy’s conclusions. I’ve actually done a video on a Heltec myself.

@OffGridGarageAustralia 2 жыл бұрын

I have the two balancers permanently connected to these batteries at the moment. Once we charge them up again, we will see. I know some people have said that they can stay connected 24/7 but my experience was different.

@SkypowerwithKarl 2 жыл бұрын

@@OffGridGarageAustralia Yeah, I’d be sticking to what you know. You seemed to prove a point Andy.

@solexxx8588 2 жыл бұрын

You have to strip more insulation off the balancer wires and tin them.

@CollinBaillie 2 жыл бұрын

Tinning wires before putting them in a pinch type connector is risky. Basically you end up with the point which "protrudes" the most making contact and nothing else. This single point of contact therefore becomes the only point for current flow. This results in an effectively much higher resistance and heat will be generated with higher current flow. Raw copper strands are best as the pinch will flatten the strands so they are all in contact and thus many more current flow paths, utilising the entire wire core. Alternatively, a ferrule could be used to ensure all strands are compressed together becoming 1 "solid" copper wire, and the ferrule wall would be pressed agains the pinch connector "bus bar" along its (ferrule) entire length. Watch a couple videos back about ferrules.

@solexxx8588 Жыл бұрын

@@CollinBaillie You are drinking the kool-ade. The solder is softer than the copper and makes a good bond. . It's a waste of time to put ferrules on tiny wires. You could use low oxygen silver wire but that would also be stupid.

@CollinBaillie Жыл бұрын

@@solexxx8588 or... watch a few videos back. How hard is it?

@CollinBaillie Жыл бұрын

@@solexxx8588 Are you basing "solder is softer than copper" on the state before or after soldering? I've never seen post-tinning solder that's softer than copper. Especially eutectic blends. Andy specifically made a video covering how these connectors pinch the wires at the pressure point, reducing the contact area, and how tinning wires is bad (TM). Kool-ade seems to be an excuse for ignorance. Not to mention it's a regional thing. We call it cordial.

@solexxx8588 Жыл бұрын

@@CollinBaillie BS

@andufuse640 2 жыл бұрын

good

@OffGridGarageAustralia 2 жыл бұрын

Thanks

@MrElciupacabra 11 ай бұрын

Hi, I think it is better to balance until 3.4V even though at the end you'll have some greater voltage differences between cells. it might happen that some cells in the pack has a problem...a loose wire for example resulting in a not correctly charging and the capacitor balancer might be your problem fixing. indeed... over 3.4V you will have some imbalancing...but...it will balance them again ...why so impatient with balancing at 3.4? the battery will discharge anyway under some loads so the cells will reset again to the same capacity. we must not forget that the important thing is that is balancing all the time and it does it's job and protects some of the cells in case of faulty connection or cell faulty Also it would be nice to see in the video the difference between voltage cells at 3.4V with and without the same capacitor balancer because I think without balancing until 3.4V the differences would be higher

@darrenorange2982 2 жыл бұрын

Not sure what I was doing wrong I never got this to work.

@stephensparks9084 2 жыл бұрын

4:58 I was thinking that the leads were stripped a little short.

@derekbeckett7071 2 жыл бұрын

You should bring the battery up to HVD, then slap on the balancer when the cells are at very high SOC, and let it churn there for a **while**. It will take a day or three to make up that difference

@CollinBaillie 2 жыл бұрын

What's HVD?

@hommerdalor6301 2 жыл бұрын

@@CollinBaillie high voltage difference?

@henvern 2 жыл бұрын

@@CollinBaillie high voltage disconnect.

@hoosiersolarpower974 2 жыл бұрын

I want one

@garys-half-baked-offgrid-dream 2 жыл бұрын

EV charging boardom busting again thanks Andy. Free charging with a charge point Scotland £20 anual subscription. Free sparks but by Christ it is tedious. It would help if MG would super charge. God bless you tube lol

@hmarc417 2 жыл бұрын

You have a 12 volt battery connected to a step up transformer to power the inverter to power the power supply to charge the lipo.

@CollinBaillie 2 жыл бұрын

You have to send that to Andy via email.

@hommerdalor6301 2 жыл бұрын

Not sure to see a lipo.

@Steven_Root 2 жыл бұрын

or you can just use passive balancers with some huge resistors, and they will be active only on those cells, that are out of specific top voltage range

@OffGridGarageAustralia 2 жыл бұрын

But this will burn off the energy. Passive balancing is a bit outdated...

@Steven_Root 2 жыл бұрын

@@OffGridGarageAustralia yeah, but nothing is perfect anyway, they all have their downsides

@jacopo.scarpellini 11 ай бұрын

I have just bought the same balancer from Amazon, or at least it looks exactly the same; it doesn’t have the brand on the pcb or on the box The leads are very short, they are like 30-40cm…

@206deeznutz 2 жыл бұрын

Hmm so is it a fact that keeping this active balancer connected 24/7 to a Lifepo4 pack a bad thing? I just got this thing and it has been connected to my pack continuously for a couple of days. But if it is truly bad for my pack to be connected to this thing 24/7 unless charging then I will disconnect. Anyone else able to confirm this?

@OffGridGarageAustralia 2 жыл бұрын

You have to try and test. See how it performs over time and if you still experience a high imbalance when fully charged, I would not leave it running all the time as it can create an imbalance at lower SOC and voltage.

@Loopyengineeringco 2 жыл бұрын

I've had mine on full time for over a month now. 200ah 16S LFP pack. 98%-25% DOD. My cells go out of balance at around 25% as they're worn, but the balancer hasn't made any difference other than recovering the imbalance within about an hour. I measured the wires with a clamp-dc ammeter and saw 4a on one of the wires, presumably the cell that needed help. No problems so far.

@muppetcp2000 2 жыл бұрын

I want to do this so bad

@edc1569 2 жыл бұрын

Something to remember with balancers, these are budget devices they have errors measuring voltages, they’re not very well calibrated and they will drift. You shouldn’t chase the “perfect balance” as what appears perfect with your chosen BMS isn’t actually reality.

@nainabla 2 жыл бұрын

they do not measure the voltage. The higher voltage just forces the current to the lower voltage cells. It is similar to when you connect the cells in parallel. The voltage will equalize because the lower voltage cell will just absorb the current from the higher voltage cell.. That is why they are accurate

@aurobindo1231 2 жыл бұрын

How do you order small quantity cells from china ??? I am from India and the sellers are saying it is not economically wise to import small quantity of product....so basically if i want to build these things by getting knowledge from these videos are useless.....coz as diy er we can't buy bulk of these things...as you are an youtuber you are privileged to do this kind of things....

@OffGridGarageAustralia 2 жыл бұрын

Some seller don't supply goods to India for some reason. You need to get in contact with the supplier and ask them for a quote: off-grid-garage.com/batteries/

@GoatZilla 11 ай бұрын

They need to make a talking multimeter, or one with a built in stand or something. It's 2023 already.

@todamnbad 2 жыл бұрын

I lost your link to the app you use

@OffGridGarageAustralia 2 жыл бұрын

All on my website: off-grid-garage.com/batteries/

@todamnbad 2 жыл бұрын

@@OffGridGarageAustralia I have search everywhere on your site, I am not having any luck

@OffGridGarageAustralia 2 жыл бұрын

@@todamnbad what all are you after? The JK-BMS app?

@todamnbad 2 жыл бұрын

@@OffGridGarageAustralia the app you use that seems to week on multiple BMS's

@OffGridGarageAustralia 2 жыл бұрын

@@todamnbad ah, the XiauXiang app. Yeah that's under this link here: off-grid-garage.com/battery-management-systems-bms/ Where the QUCC BMS is...

@BajanAlan 2 жыл бұрын

I put negative probe on battery. Then I dont have to fight with it!

@OffGridGarageAustralia 2 жыл бұрын

That's advanced voodoo technology you're using.😉

@mbr8981 2 жыл бұрын

Soooo bin am Start aber mit Schäfleshimmel von Berg

@mbr8981 2 жыл бұрын

This is furchbar 🤣

@opless 2 жыл бұрын

133rd! :-)

@OffGridGarageAustralia 2 жыл бұрын

Oh, wow. Do you keep a database for all of this?

@millycarrington 2 жыл бұрын

First!

@PierredeVilliersLife 2 жыл бұрын

4th

@hommerdalor6301 2 жыл бұрын

seventyseventh

@dahuaba9558 2 жыл бұрын

1st 😂

@ralph9987 2 жыл бұрын

You tested these months ago and weren't impressed. Why again now? Are you just doing ads for all the free stuff companies send you? Asking for a friend

@OffGridGarageAustralia 2 жыл бұрын

Must have been a different channel. I was really impressed with these ones.

@ralph9987 2 жыл бұрын

@@OffGridGarageAustralia go back and check. Pretty sure you said these took way too long to balance. I remember buying the 4s version initially on your recommendation and then in a later video you said the opposite, which annoyed me because I followed your suggestion and was stuck with a piece a crap balancer.

@OffGridGarageAustralia 2 жыл бұрын

@@ralph9987 I'm not suggesting anything here on the channel. I'm sharing my experience. If go ahead and buy stuff I show in my videos it's totally up to you. Nothing to be upset or annoyed about. These active balancers work fine. If you watch back the videos, you will see that they are working great if connected correctly. Maybe you did something wrong who knows... Here is the video again, just for you: kzfaq.info/get/bejne/Z7mCiMuYp8rdj5s.html