Battery Recharge

[musicbooks]

This has probably gone round a few times but possibly worth a revisit ( shout at me if I'm wrong). I have conditioned my Lithium Agattu battery and now I recharge every day after my commute. When I plug in, one light is out and the recharge takes about 20 minutes to relight the top light and about an hour or so for all lights to go out, indicating a full charge. As my commute is only about 4 miles a day.. steep hills included, I am a little concerned about minimal discharge. Is this OK, or should I wait and recharge after a couple of days to allow a little more discharge. Slightly neurotic question but I am concerned about optimum cell life and topping up a minimum amount every day.

bw
musicbooks

 

[Jeremy]

As far as the battery chemistry itself is concerned, then it's actually very beneficial to only partially discharge lithium cells. They will give a much larger number of charge/discharge cycles if only used on shallow cycles, in fact with the usage you're giving the pack it will most probably die from old age before it runs out of cycle life.

Jeremy

 

[flecc]

As Jeremy says, that usage could hardly be better for a lithium battery's long life. Just what you want when they are £305 each.
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[stokepa31_mk2]

This has probably gone round a few times but possibly worth a revisit ( shout at me if I'm wrong). I have conditioned my Lithium Agattu battery and now I recharge every day after my commute. When I plug in, one light is out and the recharge takes about 20 minutes to relight the top light and about an hour or so for all lights to go out, indicating a full charge. As my commute is only about 4 miles a day.. steep hills included, I am a little concerned about minimal discharge. Is this OK, or should I wait and recharge after a couple of days to allow a little more discharge. Slightly neurotic question but I am concerned about optimum cell life and topping up a minimum amount every day.

bw
musicbooks

Hi Musicbooks

I do 7 miles a day on my torq and recharge every night. when called upon for leisure rides at the weekend it still gives me as many miles a the day I got it.

Regards
Paul

 

[Citrus]

This got me thinking

My Agattu has an 18T rear sprocket. On the journey into work (18.5 miles) I arrive with one LED left on (not flashing) averaging 14 mph. I charge the battery at work and the journey home is usually quicker (more downhill) and I arrive home with 2 or 3 LEDS left on averaging 16.3mph. I charge the battery again. I cycle to work at least twice a week - sometimes 3 - and use the bike for shorter journeys (5.5 miles to badminton on a Wednesday and 5.5 miles back again). Will the constant drain to 1 LED affect the battery greatly? I can't say I have noticed the battery deteriorate significantly in over 1200 miles since January.

 

[musicbooks]

Thanks everyone for reassuring me

bw
musicbooks

 

[flecc]

The Sanyo / Panasonic batteries haven't been showing life deterioration Citrus, probably for three reasons. First it's a low powered system which stresses the cells far less than some with almost double the motor power. Second, the battery management system is by far the best in the business. Third, Sanyo have had the longest experience of making these bike batteries for Panasonic, them first appearing years ago on the Panasonic folder in Japan.

Indications are that other makes latest batteries are also showing far less deterioration with deep drain use.

There will still be a difference in life between a deep cycled battery and a shallow cycled one, but it hasn't the severity it had until recently.
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[tony18m2001]

Hi folks

Related to this battery recharge thread. A question for the experts - I have an old NiMh battery for my eZee Cadence to use instead of the original Li-ion battery which was wearing out - I will eventually get one of the newer better Li-ion batteries. Meanwhile, I can charge the NiMH with the original Li-ion battery charger to a max of 41.5V or use a separate constant current power supply charging arrangment which is presently a bit of a nuisance to set up. The question is - if I only do 12 miles per charge, is it better to fully charge the NiMH battery, or is the lower endpoint from the Li-ion charger better to preserve its life?

Tony

 

[flecc]

The lower endpoint is actually beneficial Tony, especially if you don't use the full charge each time. Jeremy has described the way in which the Toyota Prius uses these NiMh batteries in this fashion, constantly cycling in the central area of charge, with I think 80% charge as the high point. They are guaranteed for eight years, a dream life to us!
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[Kal]

As Jeremy says, that usage could hardly be better for a lithium battery's long life. Just what you want when they are £305 each.
.

Someone on this forum said the Phylion 36V 10Ah Li-ion battery fitted to my Synergie Mistral costs £158 including VAT and delivery to replace. This is cheap.. so it will be interesting to see how long this battery lasts. I've been using the Mistral nearly everyday for two months now and covered over 600 miles. I recently rode for over 33 miles of hilly terrain in pedelec mode (my longest ride to date) on one charge. I recharge the battery immediately after every ride as recommended. The performance of this e-bike seems pretty good to me, but then I have no experience of other e-bikes.
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[oldosc]

old osc

My Agattu has an 18T rear sprocket. On the journey into work (18.5 miles) I arrive with one LED left on (not flashing) averaging 14 mph. I charge the battery at work and the journey home is usually quicker (more downhill) and I arrive home with 2 or 3 LEDS left on averaging 16.3mph. I charge the battery again. I cycle to work at least twice a week - sometimes 3 - and use the bike for shorter journeys (5.5 miles to badminton on a Wednesday and 5.5 miles back again). Will the constant drain to 1 LED affect the battery greatly? I can't say I have noticed the battery deteriorate significantly in over 1200 miles since January.

Oldosc,

What am I missing here I find this slightly disturbing as I am about to buy an agattu having read flec (what a marvellous review) on the range bit but this seems to imply a shorter range
thanks

 

[stokepa31_mk2]

its because the rear sprocket is smaller and this means the motor assists to a higher speed thus using more juice

Paul

 

[flecc]

As Paul says, and I warned of this in the extra section of the review.

However, the usage that Citrus is getting indicates quite high contribution from the motor, so the high power mode might be in use quite a lot and power might not be switched off at all during the run. The high average of 14 mph indicates all this, about 12 mph being more normal for these motor units.

For minimum range, higher gearing with a sprocket change, high power mode usage high, and never switching off.

For maximum range, gearing retained as supplied, high power mode avoided when a slight speed reduction enables the climb in standard mode, switching off whenever the going is easy enough to pedal without assistance.
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[flecc]

Someone on this forum said the Phylion 36V 10Ah Li-ion battery fitted to my Synergie Mistral costs £158 including VAT and delivery to replace. This is cheap.. so it will be interesting to see how long this battery lasts. I've been using the Mistral nearly everyday for two months now and covered over 600 miles. I recently rode for over 33 miles of hilly terrain in pedelec mode (my longest ride to date) on one charge. I recharge the battery immediately after every ride as recommended. The performance of this e-bike seems pretty good to me, but then I have no experience of other e-bikes.
.

The saving grace for the Mistral is that it's a quite low powered system, so it doesn't stress the battery unduly. Batteries using the same cells on the most powerful eZee models have been failing very quickly in the early versions, though the later ones have been a bit better. Only a change to a much more expensive type has really solved the problem of delivering enough current for the higher powered motors.

What ends their life on the most powerful bikes is cutting out, but with your motor that's not likely to happen until very much later. The territory makes a big difference too, more hill climbing meaning shorter life. It will be interesting to see how long yours goes before the first cutout occurs.
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[RobNYC]

Batteries using the same cells on the most powerful eZee models have been failing very quickly in the early versions, though the later ones have been a bit better.

What ends their life on the most powerful bikes is cutting out, but with your motor that's not likely to happen until very much later.

Do you include the Quando II in this group?

 

[flecc]

The Quando 2 is in the powerful group Rob, at 576 watts peak, one of the most powerful e-bikes.
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[Kal]

The saving grace for the Mistral is that it's a quite low powered system, so it doesn't stress the battery unduly. Batteries using the same cells on the most powerful eZee models have been failing very quickly in the early versions, though the later ones have been a bit better. Only a change to a much more expensive type has really solved the problem of delivering enough current for the higher powered motors.

What ends their life on the most powerful bikes is cutting out, but with your motor that's not likely to happen until very much later. The territory makes a big difference too, more hill climbing meaning shorter life. It will be interesting to see how long yours goes before the first cutout occurs.
.

Thanks for the information Flecc.
I too thought the modest powered hub motor fitted to my Mistral was not over stressing the battery by the long range I get. A good compromise I think, but as you say we shall have to wait and see how long the battery lasts. I know of others that are still okay after about six months.
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[oldosc]

Thanks for the speedy reply..it took me a little while (i day) to remember wher I asked this,
Is this on topic? I will be recharging my (hopefully new)bike abroad from the motorhome, I have a 600watt inverter
which does ok for the Vaio computer and a 6amp charger for my boat batterys (sealed gel) but as the sine wave is a bit square will it be ok for the sophicasted (sic) charge system of the Li ion batterys
Osc

 

[flecc]

That's unlikely to be a problem osc, since the average Li-ion charger's regulation should smooth the supply sufficiently. In addition, all e-bike li-ion batteries have internal charge regulating and monitoring circuits which will take care of any final tidying up of the supply.

You can have a look at a typical Li-ion's internal circuitry on this webpage of my Torq Talk site:

Li-ion content
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[RobNYC]

The Quando 2 is in the powerful group Rob, at 576 watts peak, one of the most powerful e-bikes.
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Uh oh.....