Repair Attempt - 18650 DIY Powerwall Fail

[@Justablokeonaboat]

Good to see you posting again and great to see the power wall still working great.

[@AdamWelchUK]

Thanks 👍

[@fynens]

So glad to see you back. I missed your videos and was had to be satisfied with re-watching your old blogs.

[@AdamWelchUK]

That's kind of you. Bit rough this video - sorry.

[@jasonmonk7336]

Thinking the same last night! Hope alls good 👍🏻

[@Hzwo.0]

Love the reality of the video. Even the decision making included. Real calm to watch, no need to worry about constantly being loaded with advertising or pretending.

[@CollinBaillie]

Nice to see another video from you Adam. I miss your quality content.

[@paulkennett]

I felt nostalgia at seeing the old laptop cells still in pairs. I've had a few cells go bad like this in my system as well. The rest of it just keep chugging along. Amazing!

[@voneschenbachmusic]

Impressive longevity! Great to see an update on the DIY powerwall!

[@SATHISHKUMAR-ek5cg]

Glad to see you back Adam !!

[@marcrives279]

Nice update ! You shouldn't store your spare batteries fully charged, they'll wear out a lot faster.

[@kisadaniel]

Great seeing you again. I hope you don't get lost again😍😍😍😍

[@Tasirith1]

Great to see you posting content again Adam, great video too! Hi from Cairns, Australia!

[@Stoneman06660]

I am always impressed by your setup which is very professional given it's a DIY project. Very tidy! Keep up the great work :)

[@Darieee]

4:30 I love that moment when I inspect banks with a meter - a very suave feeling indeed

[@nwtech4674]

Welcome back, was worried where you went.

[@andrewgardner7104]

Glad to see you back, Happy new year.

[@konk407]

Good to see you back mate.

[@JackButlerVideos]

BMS did it's job well! imagine if you didn't find these cells! Also great you were able to push them out of the middle of the pack, good info to have! Building a new huge 3.3kw/h pack recently, I really need to get it together and start posting videos again! I'm sure you know how it is when sometimes it's too much of an effort haha.

[@fredrickwandeto5715]

Thank for sharing I'm happy to learn from you I'm going to build one for my household

[@audibosoundandlight]

Glad to see you’re back!

[@MJA5]

Nice work, What would be your formula for figuring the fuse wire gauge?

[@CollinBaillie]

I think something like max amp draw divided by number of cells in each pack times some safety factor (allows for surges but also doesn't let cells draw over current for too long). (IE 60 (A) ÷ 20 (cells) * 1.5 (safety factor)) You would have to be sure the C rate of the cells matched Charge Current and Discharge Current. Say you had a 20A charger, you'd want cells which can safely accept a 1A charge current (Charging at 1C, the cells would need to be a 1000mAh capacity. Charging at 0.5C, your cells should be 2000mAh. At 0.3C, 3000mAh cells. 0.3-0.5C is the recommended charge rate) These cells should then be able to discharge at 1C safely, so working with 3000mAh cells, you could pull 3A * 20 cells, so 60A. Surge discharge might be as good as 3C - 5C, 9A per cell (3C) or 180A for the pack up to 15A (5C) or 300A per pack. This is a 24v setup (7s20p, and 7*3.7v is 25.9v nominal), so 24v * 60A (1C discharge - 3A*20) would be 1440w, while 24 * 180A (3C discharge) would be ~4320w and 24 * 300A (5C discharge) would be 7200w. So going for a 1C discharge rate, 3A per cell, 60A per pack, 1440w for the entire battery pack, could easily run a 600w inverter, with surges up to 1500w. So, a 3A fuse wire would make sense for this setup assuming you didn't ever surge past say 1400w. 3.125A fuse wire would cover 1500w surges. Fuse wire is usually sold with a rating on the packaging. You would buy a pack of 3A fuse wire... If you can find it!

[@CollinBaillie]

Here are the videos Adam made of the construction of the packs: kzbin.info/www/bejne/pWO1dqShZ5KknZI kzbin.info/www/bejne/bJ7ddmtjqN6trJo kzbin.info/www/bejne/l3qWqmlrfbytpw You can see the fuse wire used by Adam.

[@mati211p]

You can scratch battery (top and bottom) to make better and quicker good contact during soldering.

[@StuartPittaway]

You definitely need to update the firmware!! Good to see another video from you.

[@RaithUK]

Nice to see you doing another video dude, its been a while.

[@HometownUnicorn]

He's alive! 👏👏👏👏👏👏👏

[@SOLARSHED13]

Where have you been Adam? Great to see you back. 👍

[@Trivimania]

at 2:50 you say you double fused the cells, but I don't see any fuses on your pack. Do you mean that you used some kind of wire that auto-melts when too much current goes through it ? If yes, then what wire please and for how many amps ?

[@lostshadow7161]

He showed it in one if his viedo I am sure

[@bren106]

Welcome back, been gone too long Adam.

[@JLneonhug]

Been following you for years but finally want to jump into the world of solar and batteries. Partly becuase I'm starting to collect enough old car batteries to build a system! I wondered if youve tried this before? Appreciate the capacity maybe dodgy but only looking to power 12v led strips in the garage with these. I suspect you use the power to push back into the house? Could you share any info on inverters switching etc? Thanks!

[@georgef7754]

Great to see another video from you.

[@xanataph]

Happy New Year Adam...great to see you back! Was wondering where you had gone...? I should get on to making a video to show what I am doing with the PWM-85 that you sent me. It's got quite an important role in my system. :)

[@AdamWelchUK]

Please do. I'd love to see that. Thanks Xan!

[@TheKilowattChallenge]

Ive been trying to buy the diyBMS assembled PCB's for a while but they're always missing at least 2 or 3 items... I'll keep trying.

[@andrewwhittaker6622]

What type of flux is the liquid? Nice to see you back Adam cheers

[@samdob9832]

Good morning why not use nickel strips per point and put a bms? That would be easier, right? THANKS

[@ancelmosena9800]

me agrada tu idea, quisiera saber Donde Colocaría yo la Tira de Níquel y los Fusibles? Saludos..

[@andersson.l.e]

Thanks for posting.

[@freshia2008]

Sir i have this EPEVER solar charge controller A series 40A, does it work with lithium battery cell 3.2v 280AH 4S, please guide me

[@UpLateGeek]

RSVP those dead cells. Thankfully you caught it before they started causing some serious trouble. Monitoring is definitely a necessity for a system like that.

[@johndii2194]

Those are 1S20P packs. I like that. Did you also remember to fix the two that were not connected correctly?

[@AdamWelchUK]

I did thanks.

[@vintilis1]

How much you get kwh on this setup safe drop voltage ?

[@mauriceschmicking6720]

Thanks for sharing this and how you handle things like that. Much appreciated 👍

[@RogerioLecariaoLeite]

Hello, good video info! This is a BMS ou Balancer?

[@fredflintstone1]

Yea! nice to see a video 🙂 hope to see a lot more🙂 where have you been

[@BrettCooper4702]

What size if that fuse wire and is there a video if the construction of the pack?

[@CollinBaillie]

Brett, try these videos: kzbin.info/www/bejne/pWO1dqShZ5KknZI kzbin.info/www/bejne/bJ7ddmtjqN6trJo kzbin.info/www/bejne/l3qWqmlrfbytpw

[@skidloaders1]

i solder both ends of the batteries before packing them, have them rest for at least a week and rechecking the voltage - a small percentage fails

[@skidloaders1]

forgot to mention , I now pack my batteries in fire blankets and steel boxes after I had 2 small fires

[@AdamWelchUK]

Useful tips. Thanks.

[@estartermanual]

At least does not fail in a explosive way (catastrophic internal short). Thanks for your info

[@rilosvideos877]

Wouldn't it be better to solder the fuse-wires on the busbars rather than on the cells directly with relative small solderiron? Soldering on the cells puts a lot of stress on the cells - not sure how much that hurts... Anyway - good performce so far for so many years. Would have been interesting if you could find the defective cells easier with an IR-camera.

[@vintilis1]

Can explode ?

[@racia4095]

Would you consider a different type of connector?

[@AdamWelchUK]

Which connector?

[@nin1ten1do]

buddy for soldering there you need a specila corosion flux for make that ENAMEL solderable with ez.. you only heating cels to point where actualy die of heat.

[@uhjyuff2095]

The cell next to 1.6 volts is 3.86 volts and another is 3.99 volts. is that right? You should really write down notes when doing these types of checks.

[@alexxustube]

You should store your spare cells at a lower voltage. Full charge isn't that good. Correct me if I'm wrong

[@JakubChalupnik]

That's right. Some of the cells I left sitting at full charge for two years lost some capacity, some of them even went from "usable" to "junk". I didn't test all of the cells (it's like 150 of them), I just measured their voltage and those who dropped to 3.7V - 4.0V got retested with pretty bad results.

[@pfeerick]

No, you're correct there. Lithium cells shouldn't be stored fully charged or discharged as it stresses the separator. Can result in perforation,/shorts across the separator, and hence the internal resistance increases (and converts it into a heater).

[@piconano]

I would discharge all the cells you've been hoarding, to 3.33V for long term storage.

[@chimpo131]

he's back! woohoo

[@ZephodBeeblebrox]

You;re alive again?

[@GeertDroid]

Nice to hear from you adam !!!! I'm gkad you started making video's again after such a long while I though you where abducted by aliens ;-) I always enjoyed your video's !

[@ThanosSustainable]

Man, you’re not supposed to keep lithium cells at 4.2V for 5 years. Better discharge them to 3.8-ish.

[@AdamWelchUK]

I know, it wasn't really the plan to do that.

[@HellTriX]

@@AdamWelchUK and yet 5 years they are still fine.

[@andytrewin]

you clearly need to go to Specsavers to be able to read the multimeter correctly!!