I'd go with NiCd's, See if you can find some STM5-180 Safts. I bought some from a guy near Barstow that had a couple hundred of them out of a couple of electric busses that he picked up at auction. IIRC each bus had 108 of them.
That was in 2007. More recently two of those same type of busses were autioned off at Grand Canyon. I believe they went to Las Vegas.. (look for the guy that had a drop tank that he made into an electric vehicle.) >Paul, >Every time the cell is at the top of charge, it will expand. >Don't compress and you will likely burst it in short order. The same is true for NiCd's.. My SAFT STM5-180's have stainless steel strapping. Rick Suiter at Elite Power showed me how the Lithium batteries actually gain capacity when they are compressed! > Be careful buying nicads strange to you as many, most have very low >power, amp output. Check their model specs first as only high output >ones are useful for us. The STM5-180's are close to the size of a Golf Cart battery and Saft says to keep the current under something like 1000A for 15 seconds and I believe the same is true for the BB-600's. Remember, these are aircraft starting batteries. The Bad: They don't like heat. And the not so bad: And as Lee Hart would explain.. "They are a lot like us, if they don't get exercised for long periods they get lazy." Although they can be stored at any state of charge for any length of time they are lazy when put back into service after an extended period of rest. They lose up to 10% of their capacity in 24 hours and 10% a month after that. But.. just charge em up and exercize them. They thrive on the type of abuse that would kill a lead acid battery in short order. They need to be charged to 114% of capacity removed, (not really that efficient) Energy density is more than lead acid.. The STM5-180's are close in size to a Golf Cart battery and weigh 51lbs compared the the 61 lbs of the US Battery's they replaced. My E-10 uses the STM5-100MRE NiCd's, (evalbum.com/1703) and I water between 400-500 Ahrs of overcharge, or about twice a year. This time of the year it doesn't see a lot of use. After sitting for a couple of weeks, the range is reduced about 20%. If I use it almost daily I gain that 20% back after 2-3 days. My Golf cart sometimes sits for 2-3 months with no use, then my Grandkids come over and hot rod it until almost dead. Sometimes they don't plug it into the charger until the next time.. not the best for a pack but the batteries are from '95 and are still going strong. >IMO, Lee's > idea of switching to NiCd is best ...>bottom lineill > I agree,but then again I'm a NiCd lover. _______________________________________________ UNSUBSCRIBE: http://www.evdl.org/help/index.html#usub http://lists.evdl.org/listinfo.cgi/ev-evdl.org Read EVAngel's EV News at http://evdl.org/evln/ Please discuss EV drag racing at NEDRA (http://groups.yahoo.com/group/NEDRA)
