Aptera's PI Battery Pack

[@Fairburne69]

I can't get enough Aptera content. Thanks Steve!

[@johnwdowell]

My Aptera KZbin playlist kzbin.info/aero/PLfzAjyeEEFU9NWZyych7r_9x360Lu5lq2&si=8j2NiiW0cB13BmcJ

[@BSingh-on4qr]

I used to but for the past few weeks my interest has died down until a PI is actually built. I’ve invested but still

[@Fairburne69]

@@BSingh-on4qr I understand. It's now time for Aptera to "put up or shut up". If they can't get a PI model at least 1 finished before the end of the year all my interest will wane. I do think we will see at least one either in August or September. Time will tell.

[@BSingh-on4qr]

@@Fairburne69 I’m really disappointed that no billionaire has invested. Or like why hasn’t cpc just fully funded áptera? Surely they see the value in it

[@Fairburne69]

@@BSingh-on4qr If I were to guess anyone interested in investing that much money wants controlling interest and they are not willing to give that up. Just a guess. Or maybe there are too many problems and they don't believe it's a viable option.

[@GNiessen]

Loving the detailed reviews of the Aptera news.

[@TheDapperham]

Nasty math class flashbacks aside, very nice informative cast, Steve. Thanks.

[@adimchionyenadum2962]

Thanks, Steve, for breaking this down for non-specialists like us.

[@deanmcmanis9398]

It is great to see the battery pack being tested, and the PI builds moving forward. Tim really seems to know a lot about batteries. And I'm glad that Chris got him to assist in bringing the Aptera's battery into production.

[@DemaGeek]

Good breakdown and look into the battery module details Steve, thank you!

[@robcotter5474]

Great job expanding on the information provided. Very well detailed and explained.

[@johnvoules7447]

Thank you, thank you, thank you! What a nice educational breakdown for us laymen to have a better understanding of this video.

[@Mikey_Likes_It_Too]

Steve, love your analysis, keep up the great work!

[@unclegeorge7845]

Thanks Steve, Neat to know aspects of the Aptera adventure. Barbie was right. "Math class is tough!"

[@RayGannon]

Thanks for another great video. None of the numbers add up but are in the ball park. That's kinda par for the course with lithium battery packs. A couple quick Google searches suggest the complete battery pack will be in the $10K to $12K range which is good news. The engineer seemed a bit too cheerful about the 'better that 400 miles per hour' charge rate. That's 2/3's of the 60KW DC fast charge Chris Anthony mentioned they might get to in previous videos.

[@jamesengland7461]

The 400 may be a consistent rate while the 60 may be a peak rate, which is typical of ev charge rates.

[@likethesky]

Came here to say this. 400 mi/hr is what I get on my Model 3, which is slated to have ~1/4th the range per kWh than the Aptera. So the Aptera battery pack will be charging at 1/4th the rate of a Tesla…?

[@Landonsoul]

Thanks for keeping us informed!

[@jhallpk]

The battery tray will likely be constructed from extruded aluminum cross members joined at their ends either by direct welding or some other custom cast or extruded members. I beleive that is what Chris said was happening in your interview with him previously, I may be mistaken though cause he could have been referring to the frame at that point.

[@SomeGuyNamedPaul49]

I can't see the battery tray being cast fiber or glass as those materials are poor thermal conductors. Also, casting seems like it'd be out due to the tooling costs whereas that tray looks pretty simple to assemble from dimensional stock.

[@gr8dvd]

Guessing it doesn’t matter how the battery tray is constructed for PI vehicles so long as it has very similar weight & strength of final build…. and gets us to PI asap (w/o inferior construction). Someone considerably more experienced & knowledgeable than myself persuasively argued more of PI should be hand-built.

[@jhallpk]

@@SomeGuyNamedPaul49 what I was saying is just where the extruded members would meet would be a cast aluminum junction piece, just a thought, not saying its going to be like that

[@adimchionyenadum2962]

Are you perhaps confusing the battery's frame with the vehicle's frame? I suppose they are two separate things.

[@stevendunn264]

I am so ready for my Aptera. I have a bottle chilling and will pop the cork as soon as I hear about the first customer deliveries.

[@bluetoad2668]

On the bright side you'll be able to hand that unopened bottle on to your kids.

[@randyland1000]

Thanks

[@DaBinChe]

The 0 at the end means the shape of the cell which is round.

[@doctoraardvark190]

I remain skeptical that lithium ion is the best way to go as far as battery technology. But it seems Aptera is committed to it. Perhaps when better battery technology is available they will be able to quickly change their battery packs?

[@lsh3rd]

These modules are a very nice size and shape for DIY EV projects.

[@universeisundernoobligatio3283]

Intresting design information, but by now you would think the design would be frozen and ready for production. They should be working on future designs but the upcoming production design should be well established. Still looking forward to my Aptera but its now time to get production rolling.

[@SchwuppSchwupp]

At 1:35 is a QRcode visible on the battery. I am very sure it is some identifier number and I know there exists a online tool to insert this number to get more information, but I forgot the name. Is here somebody watching who is into DIY Battery building? Do you know this homepage?

[@ematejowsky]

Hopefully LiFePO4 also will come in that cell format and reprogramming the battery management is easy. Keep the weight the same and let the energy density drop to whatever it come out at (%10 less??). The voltage might be a bit less and the 4 sec sprint time might increase a tad. I'm currently looking at buying an Ora to drive till Aptera comes to Australia. I'm opting for LiFePO4 version with 110K less range than the NMC version. Ora range is quite marginal for me but Aptera will go twice as far per KWH.

[@a5-30-31cts]

Sorry for the late comment, but my private cell provider put out a new price list for cells. I don't know if EVE's "INR21700-50E(3C)" (a 5000mAH capacity 21700 cell) that you looked up and the one listed in my price list is the same as their "811" cell, but this cell is currently listed for retail purchase (non-wholesale) for $1.95 usd /cell. With the LE's requirement for 2,304 cells (384 x 6), if I were to buy them, it would cost me $4,492.80 usd to purchase the cells for the 400 mile LE

[@namenotshown9277]

Apart from the cost of cobalt, earlier cobalt based lithium cells, were a bit dangerous, with a lower temperature for thermal runaway ( you accidentally flashed your youtube dashboard, showing your income for last 30 days.....not bad!)

[@tims8603]

Battery sizes, I can't say for sure but the zero on the end is actually the letter O. It signifies that the cell is round. I kinda wish they would drop that because it's not necessary and confusing.

[@ronfarnsworth7074]

Good observation, makes sense.

[@SomeGuyNamedPaul49]

They generally have dropped the 0 and these days people usually refer to it as a 1270, though 18650s are still almost exclusively retain that 5th character.

[@StanTrnik]

They should use prismatic batteries with better energy density per battery pack per liter and also jus single motor in rear wheel .

[@richardryley3660]

The battery pack does seem like a great design. I wonder if they could have left a little space for internal cooling though. I like the idea of replacing the batteries with longer ones for the 600 and 1000 mile options, but I do wonder if the longer batteries will conduct heat to the baee as well. And if they go with 100 kW charging the excess heat during charging will be much greater. I think Aptera is assuming that end cooling will work just fine, and testing will prove that it's overengineered enough that they can handle even more heat with just a bigger cooling system. But if they have to redesign the battery pack it will take time, and the while point was to reuse the battery pack. Of course, rhe new battery pack can be used in the original 400 mile version. So they could save some money that way.

[@robertkirchner7981]

Do you remember what the dimensions for the longer batteries were meant to be?

[@richardryley3660]

@@robertkirchner7981 21120 for the 1000 mile, 2190 for the 600.

[@e-economy-]

The length were 90mm for 60kWh and 120mm for 100kWh. Which means different height in battery pack why I would be surprised if an upgrade from 40kWh will be possible. 25 to 40 kWh should be possible though.

[@richardryley3660]

@@e-economy- I could have sworn I posted the battery sizes needed. Oh well. Anyway, I suspect the battery packs are going to hang lower in the frame, meaning the belly pan will have to be redesigned to reduce the ground clearance and leave room. The tub and interior would be the same, but the suspension would have to be beefed up to handle the greater weight. Alternatively, they could raise the battery higher in the frame, but this would require a loss of 20 mm or 50 mm of headroom. The tub could still be the same, but they'd have to take the space out of the roof. Although I suppose they could just make the whole vehicle taller. They will probably make the frame thicker, to match the height of the battery pack. So modifications to the frame, suspension, and belly pan. Changes to the body will probably be minimal.

[@bluetoad2668]

They don't care about battery health or longevity, these just have to last for test drives and videos to encourage investment, that's how this thing works - pay attention and you might just save some money

[@61Voltwagon]

The 700 in a 21700 cell is the length in tenths of a millimeter. "Large" cells like this don't really need tenths so they're rounded and just called 2170. Tenths matter more for coin cells.

[@adimchionyenadum2962]

I learnt in school that 10 mm = 1 cm, therefore, 700 mm = 70 cm. The battery cell dimension is 21700. The only way to make sense out of this number is that 21, the diameter, is given in centimeters, whereas the length, 700, is given in millimeters. Thus 21/700. So, no mistake. Is that what you are saying?

[@Ingo.Mclean]

Good recap.. but wondering why Aptera doesn't use [Corrected: I incorrectly siad LiPo when I meant litium Iron... my bad on the acronym] LiFePo instead of nickel/cobalt chemistries? the aluminum battery pack holder looks CNC machined, not very cost effective. Wonder what their end game production line method will be to manufacture.

[@madmotorcyclist]

Probably expense?

[@robinpettit7827]

Prototype builds are usually done with specialized tools while the production switches to mass produced methods.

[@sra71121]

Lithium polymer batteries are great because they are lighter than standard lithium batteries, but NCM based lithium batteries tend to have a higher cycle life and have a lower failure rate when compared to lithium polymer. I work with lithium polymer cells and have seen this first hand! I've seen some last a decade or more, but the majority last 2-4years before they fail.

[@christopherbrand5360]

Do you mean Lithium Iron Phosphate (LiFePO4) chemistry? LiPo refers to Lithium Polymer batteries which primarily relates to the polymer electrolyte and the anode chemistry could be any of a range (including NMC and FePO4). My opinion on why they would use NMC instead of FePO4 is to start with the highest energy density at reasonable cost and accpetable cycle life and safety characteristics. LiFePO4 chemistry generally has about 70% of the storage for the same weight of batteries. Lithium Polymer batteries are less robust from a packaging perspective and would be really hard to keep safe in a crash. They work great in your phone, but not something I want in a large pack in a vehicle.

[@Ingo.Mclean]

@@nickorbeck8693 LIPo are Lithium Iron Phosphate Still round... like Tesla 4780s

[@GNiessen]

The tabs are not perfectly positioned. Hopefully still within tolerance.

[@jaytee66]

Good catch overhang is waisted current flow

[@suunraze]

Nickel has higher energy density than cobalt but is more volatile. Recent chemistry engineering toward higher (and aspirationally all-) nickel content has been on stabilizing the cathode to allow maximum nickel percentage without sacrificing safety and longevity.

[@NorCalSkeptics]

As per normal, i'm confused. ¿Why is a single 'bus bar' connecting to both anodes and cathodes?

[@glennzajic7318]

Some cells are in series, while others are in parallel.

[@NorCalSkeptics]

@@glennzajic7318 Thank you. Question: ¿How is that better than having each group of cells in parallel?

[@glennzajic7318]

@@NorCalSkeptics Cells are combined in series to accumulate the voltage needed, and in parallel to provide the current required. If they were all in parallel you would only have about 4 volts but current up the wazoo. Current is what dictates the gauge of wire needed. The higher the voltage the smaller the wire can be to still provide power. I over simplified it but I am sure somebody more knowledgable can explain it better.

[@louisjov]

I love that they've done the vibration testing, but I would be curious to see how the battery pack holds up after simulated 200, 300, or 400k miles. I'm sure that if a failure due to design was going to happen, it would have happened in the first 100k miles, but think about the theoretical lifespan of these vehicles and batteries. 1000 charge cycles of the 400 miles pack is 400k miles, and the battery might last even over 1000 charge cycles Even if the warranty was only up to 100k miles on the battery, I think it would still be very informative to vibration test 1-2 packs up to 300k miles, just to see how they preform. Heck, you could even take one, and just vibration test it until it fails, just to see how long it will go

[@matthewhuszarik4173]

NMC chemistry seems to be an outgoing technology. LiFeP seems to be on the rise and Na-Ion is as well.

[@suunraze]

The zero at the end denotes a cylindrical format and is generally omitted in modern parlance

[@madmotorcyclist]

I wonder if thermal compound is the same as the thermal paste they use on CPUs.

[@_sticks_]

Similar. Loosely related and similar job duties. Actual chemical compounds differ between thermal pastes and thermal adhesives etc.

[@sra71121]

My guess is that it isn't thermal paste, but solder paste. The bus bar is soldered to the nickel plate when the laser heats each spot to get the best possible surface contact..... I could be wrong 😅

[@ronfarnsworth7074]

​@@sra71121If you're thinking flux I don't think so. For end cooling they'd use thermal compound.

[@namenotshown9277]

There are some issues with the battery metal plates that join to the cells. 1. you can see the round positive end pieces are not spot welded into the middle of the metal cap 2. the negative straight pieces spot welded to the edge of the top of the cells is even more uneven. That will definitely be an area of weakness in the design. If that spot weld is not good there wont be a proper circuit to that cell 3. they are using the length of the outer case of the cells as a current path, shortest path is the best path, that will effectively increase the internal resistance a little bit 4. their is only one spot weld used, if somewhere around 5amps is going through those spot welds there is chance it will heat up and basically be a high resistance path and loose energy via heat 5. the single spot welds on the negative ( edge of the top of the cell) I suspect will be problematic, its probably the worst place you can join to the cell.......a nice idea but not what the cells are designed for Aptera really doesn't want to have recalls, as is I think the those metal plates as is are not going to be a long term solution and potentially problematic.

[@GullWingInnMoclips]

So their battery building experts are wrong and you are right? Got it.

[@PandaKnight52]

They did mention they aren't spot welding they are laser welding, so that would have different connection, only slightly but still different.

[@namenotshown9277]

@@PandaKnight52 I do have a little expertise in batteries, if you can see obvious issues just by watching the video, then thats a concern, its just not good engineering what they have shown of the welding of the plate to the cells (the negative connection in particular), its a great idea so that all cells can face the same way to make production a bit easier, but what is more important is good connection between the cells and the top plate....very important. Since they are saying its time to start production ( note that Steve Fambro has been saying that since 2007!) then you wouldn't want to be redesigning the battery connections at this late stage.

[@namenotshown9277]

Cooling is also fairly rudimentary and untested I would think, its going to take some time to get all that heat from the top of the cells to the bottom being a tall cell . Its rather important area of design to test what heat the cells generate under stress conditions and if the heat transfer is enough to keep them cool. Also fast charging requires cooling of the cells, also needs to be tested if their system is capable of doing it. Teslas system is really excellent in temperature controlling the cells. You certainly dont want any overheating of cells and thermal runaway under any conditions.

[@GullWingInnMoclips]

@@namenotshown9277 They did the battery shake test that simulates 100,000 miles and it passed with flying colors. Do try to keep up.

[@garykunz5305]

400 mi per hour charge rate doesn't seem that great. That is a 1C charge rate and 1 hour to fast charge from empty to full when on the road for the launch edition vehicles. I would have thought they would have been able to charge at 2-3C for a 30-40 min charge. Hopefully that will improve when the PI vehicles come out.

[@Fairburne69]

This won't matter much for me. Most of my power will come from the solar panels and when I do need to charge I'll just plug it in from home. It will only matter to me if I go on a road trip longer then 400 miles. Which is something I have done in about in 10 years.

[@richardryley3660]

They have mentioned looking at a 100 kW charge rate. However, they will need improved cooling to handle it. If they want to charge that 1000 mile battery in anything close to an hour, though, they will need it.

[@ronfarnsworth7074]

0% to 100% while legit for comparison is more a math thing than real life. Most people I know that roadtrip start at 10 -20% and quit charging at 80 - 90% depending on battery type and charging curve and temp.

[@robertkirchner7981]

We were never told to expect 2C charging, but their original target was 500 miles/hour charge rate or better, so 1.25C I guess? 400 miles/ hour is a bit disappointing, at about an hour and a half of driving on a 15 minute charge. Hopefully the larger, or later, packs will charge faster.

[@chrisrudzinski6241]

This is the improvement, don't forget they tried to reduce charging rates a little while ago as a cost saving measure.

[@TogetherinParis]

You input 384.

[@thomascorbett2936]

All those hundreds of cells and connections what could possibly go wring . I dont know much but i always wondered why they couldnd make just one giant battery sort of llike a conventional car batery but much larger . Then it wouldnt take all those tiny cells and connections .

[@jamesengland7461]

A couple reasons: each lithium cell can only generate about 3.7 volts, so for a typical 400 volt system, you'll need over 100 cells to achieve that efficient voltage. You could make bigger individual cells, to make higher energy capacity, but bigger individual cells would retain more heat and be harder to hear and cool. The industry does use a variety of solutions, from that 2170s and Teslas 4680 cells, to "pouch " cells which are flat rectangles of various sizes.

[@jamesengland7461]

At any rate, this is a typical way of building millions of battery packs which have proven to be extremely reliable for hundreds of thousands of miles. It is crazy though.

[@jamesengland7461]

Oh yeah, I forgot to mention- regular car batteries actually have 6 lead-acid cells , each with 2.1 volts. They're not terribly tough either, and could easily crack open or the internals break under rough conditions. They also only last, for most people, 2-5 years at most.

[@SchwuppSchwupp]

BYD Blade Battery is what you are suggesting. I do not know the reason why they prefer these 21700, but I think these are more of a commodity (more manufacturer choices, more testing results available, easier to repair a decade out into the future) and these blade cells were not available at the time of battery pack design choices.

[@thomascorbett2936]

​@@jamesengland7461difficulty getting rid of heat I can understand .

[@theproffessional9]

If this car charges at 400 Mi/h that means the peak charging speed must be only 50 kilowatts

[@richardryley3660]

They were aiming for 40-60 kW, so it's right on target. In terms of mileage, however, that is impressive. It will just generate a lot less heat, and more importantly, cost a lot less than 400 miles per hour for a Tesla.

[@GullWingInnMoclips]

My current EV charges at that rate and it is something like 1/4th as efficient a design. So this will give about 4 times as many miles per hour as that which I am currently completely satisfied with. This is very fast charging and being a relatively small battery, it does not require as much in the way of materials to build. A great choice. Higher charge speeds are not required for this very efficient vehicle with a small battery providing so much range.

[@danielthompson3928]

I think you mean “average” not peak, right?

[@nihongobenkyoshimasu3190]

I don't really have a good idea of what 400 miles per hour is compare to other EVs because this depends of the consumption of any EV , which is between 3 and 5 miles per kWh. Honestly 60 kW DC is quite low, like the Nissan Leaf, while the most advanced Superchagers can provide now 350kW and even more.

[@johnshenton9066]

100k life time test should be 200k at a minimum. 300k would be better as the real world can be quite brutal.

[@adimchionyenadum2962]

Maybe just for starters.

[@chriseidam7319]

Good video.

[@Kukaboora]

Showing the progress of battery packs to public is commendable for Aptera. But why did Aptera very recently reveal the HVAC part to only a single woman is a mystery to me. Why not showing it publicly?

[@PandaKnight52]

Probs waiting for confirmation or waiting on the rest of the HVAC system. Could also be waiting for a concrete supplier agreement, they don't like to talk about things that still could change.

[@e-economy-]

The reason might have been to get people talking/ focusing on something new and unknown so far in order to stop the uprising discussion about the missing mention of Elaphe during the investor webinar. Communication tactics.

[@namenotshown9277]

Nothing shown of the cooling plate, pretty hard to test if you haven't built one, seems they have an aluminium box and nothing else........c'mon guys you have to do better than this! How will they even know if the cooling plate is sufficient ( it was mentioned somewhere else it will be on the bottom of the cells). Pretty disappointing nothing shown of thermal management at all.

[@Kukaboora]

Recently Aptera announced a 20 M cryptocurrency reg D crowdfunding for accredited investors. This seems to contradict the reason for closing the current crowdfunding on June 30. What really going on?

[@adimchionyenadum2962]

What do you mean?🤔

[@namenotshown9277]

this company designed a battery assembly system, that requires no welding and also can be taken apart and quick to assemble. As is aptera packs are not easily repairable, most likely you would need to get a new pack if failure occurs. anyhow its quite a nice idea kzbin.info/www/bejne/h2nZfp-Cf8ynfLM heres an interview with the guy who designed it kzbin.info/www/bejne/o6uzamlvjKyiebc

[@artboymoy]

Thought we were going to watch it and THEN talk about it...

[@adimchionyenadum2962]

If that was what you were expecting, then you can go watch the whole interview like the rest of us did and then come back and watch this again.

[@artboymoy]

@@adimchionyenadum2962 Just going by what Steve said. So yeah, I went and just watched the video. Forgot to come back to this.

[@SteveBueche1027]

Little late in the game for battery validation don’t you think? How is that cooled with no channels or coolant contact areas?

[@Ingo.Mclean]

don't think you heard the whole video, Steve and Aptera both explain that

[@jaybusby8299]

End cooling is explained very well in this video.

[@dangr3957]

It’s a scam.

[@sra71121]

Not really... my guess is Aptera is waiting to carefully select and test cells as the market is currently flooded with garbage cells that several manufacturers make exaggerated claims and find that the claims fall short of your expectations after testing. Finding a reliable manufacturer that can live up to their battery claims and balance that with affordability... its not easy.

[@richardryley3660]

They are validating the production intent batteries, which will go in the vehicle. Testing their prototypes might provide some valuable data, and I guessing they did test them, just as they are testing this one. But until they test the actual batteries that will go in the actual vehicle sold to customers they can't be sure of their results.

[@bluetoad2668]

So he's putting that pack together by hand?😂 It's that how Flux power does it? Have you looked at the financials of Flux power? 😂

[@RomanChaar]

We are still very far from possible production sadly.

[@fourteenfour1]

Getting silly with how many one off parts are going into the first Production Intent build, from the pack, its caddy, to the frame of the vehicle.

[@RomanChaar]

Aptera Needs Unbelievable Support $100,000,000 #ProductionAtBest2026