Carbon fibre AGM batteries!

[duxuk]

A couple of UK based battery suppliers including Tayna are announcing a new technology from Elecsol. The carbon fibre AGM batteries will be available in 220 and 270Ah capacities and come with an unmatched year warranty. No sizes or weights are given but availability appears to have been pushed back from February to April. Hopefully they will also produce smaller capacities in time. Sounds interesting? For the uninitiated Carbon fibrebatteries claim "no sulphation" since the electrons pass through the fibre which acts like a protecting layer. (This is a poor explanation, hopefully someone could describe it better)

Andrew.

[retepsnikrep]

I had some elecsol carbon fibre batteries ten years ago and they were a pile of steaming!

Warranty not worth paper it was written on as does not cover EV use. lasted about 3000 miles if i remember correctly.

IMO not recommended, get some Tojan bats if you want lead acid.

[ChrisB]

Friad I've got similar to report, they are great for leisure work, just dont expect miracles in EV use ..............unless they have changed drastically.

As for an explanation to the "no suphation" bit, why not give them a call and ask it from the horses mouth
http://www.elecsolbatteries.com/contacts.php

ChrisB

[duxuk]

The AGM batteries are totally new and will hopefully combine the perceived advantages of AGM with a long life expectancy suggested by the longest guarantee in the field. The current flooded Elecsol batteries are a redesign, so will hopefully match the bold claims. The website specifically mentions EV use for the 110Ah model, but not for the 100Ah liesure battery. If I held a grudge against a company for ten years I might feel it was time to move on. Surely in this lengthy time frame a lot will have changed. I spoke to someone at Elecsol who was called "Steve". He offered to make me a custom pack of 110Ah batteries with different plates to give me 62Ah C1 instead of the standard 47Ah. He said that over charging was the main reason that people fry the batteries in short order. Because the charge passes through the carbon fibre as an intermediate layer there is not the same mechanism for sulphation to occur, so there is no need to charge above 14.6V for equalisation. It's interesting that when I charge with a Ctek charger the charge voltage reaches 14.4V at which time the charger switches immediatly to a 13.5V float charge. With other flooded batteries the charge stays at 14.4V for a period of time before dropping to the float voltage.

I will honestly report my experience when I have some to relate.

Andrew.

[ChrisB]

It will be interesting to see how you get on, I think the trouble was the company made some very wild claims in the past.

Looking on their website now, still there are no real specs for the batteries, the closest you get are a few graphs but they show the 20ah rating for a 110ah battery and as I said fine for leisure work (caravans etc) but we need C5 or C1 really.
If you look at Trojans or other sites that offer traction batteries they will give you all kinds of specs over the whole range.

I'd just make sure you get all your specs in writing for the special pack and that they know exactly what YOUR going to put the batteries through regarding discharge currents and durations and then make sure they are willing to give them a Cycle life: 1000 cycles to 80%dod and the guarantee of a full 5 years.

I'm not knocking the batteries for leisure use, just I'd personally like a bit more proof of them being suitable for EV use before I'll be using them again.

ChrisB

[duxuk]

I started this thread not to discuss the performance of Elecsol flooded batteries, but to draw attention to the forthcoming AGM carbon fibre batteries-a totally new technology.

[Peter Eggleston]

Like Peter and Chris, I too had a set of Elecsol batteries about 10 years ago. I had the big 220 items. At the time they were new technology, but they turned out to be a load of what Peter said. Why risk the same thing happening again until they have been proven, when you know there are better alternatives.
Peter