Another newbie

A

Angry Andy

New member
Joined
Jul 3, 2021
Messages
7
Hello everyone!

Not sure how i found this place....I have been searching on DIY battery backup for a little bit and now got an itch....So here I am.

Lets start with my background. I am a Union electrician by trade.

Voltage and current are my workday...so I am comfortable working around "hot" lines, I have respect for current; and have learned it the hard way.

I finally went solar on my house last year, and love the benefits of it so far....and I recently found out that I might be able to source used battery packs from handheld radios....

I hope to be able to open up the battery pack and hopefully find some battery gold.

Any chance there are people selling their test/rebuild stations or maybe renting them out for a few months?

Next week I will know exactly what battery pack are E-WASTE, and hopefully can give more info at that time....but I would love to know if there are people around that can point me in the direction of the battery recovery process. I assume someone in NorCal has the equipment I need and it might be sitting stable in their garage....I would be happy to share some of my battery cells once I get into finding out whats exactly inside the cells being thrown away.

Im not sure if I want to buy a crapload of testing/charging equipment if there are others nearby who already have it and are not using it......
 
I would get at least one 4 slot tester if you know the cells you will be getting from radio battery packs hold 18650's Plus a 4 wire Internal resistance meter. Read the threads by Wolf for comparisons of the various 4 slot testers and IR meters. Use the cell database located under battery tools at top of the page to gauge the soh(state of Heath) of the cells. The best source of 18650's has been battery hookup and battery clearing house. Both on the east coast. If you have a source of battery packs for free it is even better.I never had any luck getting cells for free, the ones I did get were terrible. have you worked around Dc much? 12v little spark 24v bigger spark 36 volt even bigger spark 48v so on and so on. Where in Northern California are you, Sacramento here.Read the FAQ's https://secondlifestorage.com/index.php?forums/frequently-asked-questions.42/
Many people are moving away from 18650's, NMC cells and to either LiFePo4 or LTO cells.
Later floyd
 
Welcome to the rabbit hole! Folks will need to know where you are located to know if they are close enough. This hobby has an endless list of tools and gadgets that you "need" ;) Being an electrician you probably have lots of the needed tools already. I will second floydR about getting a 4 wire IR tester especially salvaging your own cells it will really help filter out bad cells early rather than after you spent lots of time charging/testing them. As for other tools if you are okay going slow a 4 slot tester which with some added wires can do non standard sizes. A lot of the stuff you will want/need will come up when you start building packs. Like a soldering station and spot welder(I recommend avoiding the cheap spot welders as I have tried several and they all suck) Kweld is good I hear and what I plan to try next. Have Fun!
 
Welcome Andy :giggle:

Well, how @cak says I suppose you have most of the tools needed for welding/testing current and voltage; a good start for IR tester could be the YR1030, I find it's lovely. To build packs you'll have to choose battery holders, I went for 5x4 modular ones (here on AliExpress), you can find so many types.

A good procedure for selecting cells is this post in the forum: 18650 Harvesting Flow Charts.

Keep us updated with your progress!
 
Hi, I've been following your forum for a long time, now I decided to join, I'm very happy to be here with you!!! My name is Caroline)) 🥰🥰
 
Thanks for the replies.... I live in the east bay area, Concord / Walnut creek area.

So the batteries I Thought I could get are not around.....**BUT**. I found these used 12v 16ah cells in the E-waste.

Not exactly sure how I could go forward with them. The battery is two separate cells but were connected in parallel before I removed the busbar.

I assume these battery "packs" have a BMS in the pack or no? I see on the label that there are charge and discharge voltages.
 

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They might have a bms hard to say they are LiFePo4 batteries each one being 4s 16Ah I see you have 4 of them.
LiFePo4 sometimes doesn't have a bms (the cheaper ones dont have the BMS) as theses look to be out of a UPS or medical devices I think they have BMS's. only way to be sure is find a datasheet on the battery, or take one apart.
Later floyd
edit: could they be parking meter batteries/ parking pedestals batteries?
 
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floyd, yes they are from parking pedestals....

I assume the city is changing out the battery packs even if they are still good. I found one with a build date of 2220; which I assume is week 22 of the year 2020.

Might just cut into one of them and see what is inside.
 
how many have you found so far ? find enough You could make a nice powerwall with them.
Wish I was still in a position to dig though the ewaste at work.
Later floyd
 
Remember, Introductions are for introductions. Hiding content inside of an introduction thread keeps others from finding pertinent information they may be looking for as well.
 
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