# A123 prismatic cells for EV or large aplications



## roflwaffle (Sep 9, 2008)

I think you have the incorrect performance graph. The one attached is for their 32113 cells, but on their website they only list a prismatic version of the 26650.


----------



## _GonZo_ (Mar 23, 2009)

roflwaffle said:


> I think you have the incorrect performance graph. The one attached is for their 32113 cells, but on their website they only list a prismatic version of the 26650.


Yes I know, but it is just in order to give an idea of the life performance of A123 cells.
Not sure but think that the goal is 15 years for A123 systems.
I am as well performing right now a comparation of spam life on A123 cells under different usage conditions, see: http://www.diyelectriccar.com/forums/showthread.php/lifepo4-life-tests-39439.html

I know that on their site there is only 1 size, may be they only put one as sample but actually there is even more than only 2, actually I have seen pictures of 4Ah, 6Ah and 8Ah cells.
And I have been ofered 2 types, so what can I say 
In my opinion they never put much info about theyr prodcts on theyr site and I receive from them very little as well, I usually have to search in orther places to find more info from 3rt parties.


----------



## roflwaffle (Sep 9, 2008)

Why not just use the spec sheet for the 26650 cells? It's what the primatic cells are designed on anyway, just w/ a new electrode for higher capacity.


----------



## Qer (May 7, 2008)

100000 cycles and still more than 90% capacity?!?! Holy f******

Excuse me, I'll have to go fetch my jaw from the basement. Is this typical for Lithium if not discharged deeper than 50% or are A123 exceptionally good?


----------



## MN Driver (Sep 29, 2009)

It all depends on how this chart is read or misread. I'm reading that as 40 to 50% SOC. It looks like about 95,000 cycles of only 10% depth directly in the middle of its capacity discharging 100 amps followed by 75 amps charge with an unknown delay between charge and discharge. Am I reading it wrong? If this is the case, it is hardly a real world situation but rather used as a method of the United States Advanced Battery Consortium (USABC) to abuse batteries and compare them side by side in certain respects. In this case I think it is more of a peak power test, so this will showcase A123 since A123 is very focused on high amperage rates.

I might be wrong about that but searching for information about the United States Advanced Battery Consortium goals made me wonder why some of their goals seemed so easy to reach, easy to the point where it feels like we've already met some of them.


----------



## roflwaffle (Sep 9, 2008)

I think you're right. Here's the original source, and they state that the goal is 300,000 cycles in PHEV charge sustaining mode, where I'm guessing the cells are shallowly cycled.


----------



## JRP3 (Mar 7, 2008)

Actually I'd say it's an accurate representation of how a properly sized pack will be used in a production EV. Since we know the average person drives less than 40 miles a day a 100 mile or better pack will be shallow cycled.


----------



## _GonZo_ (Mar 23, 2009)

You can download the PDF document that talks about this cells from this link: www.rcmaterial.com/pdfs/Prismatic%20cells%20A123.pdf


----------



## _GonZo_ (Mar 23, 2009)

JRP3 said:


> Actually I'd say it's an accurate representation of how a properly sized pack will be used in a production EV. Since we know the average person drives less than 40 miles a day a 100 mile or better pack will be shallow cycled.


I agree with you if the pack is properly sized then the are right.
And if they can get around 100,000 cycles is amazing, I will be even happy with only half of them...
I sign contract.

For my experience with A123 cells ( I tested the first 2.3Ah cells units in Europe when they were released, because I picked up them directly from China) they always have meet what they say at least at a 90% so I do not think this time will be different.

So my EV will go for sure with those cells. (I think I will pick up donor car this christmas  lets see if posible, it is going to take some negotiations)


----------



## RoughRider (Aug 14, 2008)

What is your price of this cells????


----------



## Guest (Dec 20, 2009)

I did a little math and its not all pretty. They have a six cell kit for $110 each, for two kits or more. I came up with a little over $57K. I would hope they might give a little added discount. This part is better. I added up for 150 AH at 158 volts if I did it right. It was 3,120cells at 70 grams per cell came to 218,400 grams divided by 453.9 = 481.16 pounds. This is ball park as I woke up and did this at 4:30am and may not have been running on all 3 1/2 cylinders plus I have a hard time reading my own notes. I am normally up at the crack of noon.


----------



## RoughRider (Aug 14, 2008)

notmrwizard said:


> I did a little math and its not all pretty. They have a six cell kit for $110 each, for two kits or more. I came up with a little over $57K. I would hope they might give a little added discount. This part is better. I added up for 150 AH at 158 volts if I did it right. It was 3,120cells at 70 grams per cell came to 218,400 grams divided by 453.9 = 481.16 pounds. This is ball park as I woke up and did this at 4:30am and may not have been running on all 3 1/2 cylinders plus I have a hard time reading my own notes. I am normally up at the crack of noon.


what is the price of a 15Ah and 20Ah cell??


----------



## AJN (Nov 1, 2009)

Hello everyone

Our german friends are saying 47,50 € for 20 Ah and 38,00 € for 15 Ah (for a small amount of cells?)

http://www.pedelecforum.de/forum/showthread.php?t=3643

Prices might be lower in U.S. due lower taxes and tariffs, but those prices would make 0,72 €/Wh or appr. 1,04$/Wh with 20 Ah cell.

Damn interesting products for sure Not only superior cycle life and good gravimetric energy density, but prismatic cells also use ~25 % less space!


----------



## _GonZo_ (Mar 23, 2009)

RoughRider said:


> What is your price of this cells????


We are still negotiation the prices, but I think that tomorrow we will be able to post prices and volume discounts. 
Prices per bare cells and packs with or without BMS.

If you buy in Europe from an non UE country you do not have to pay EU taxes (VAT)
In Spain this year is 16% and it encreases on 1st of January to 18% (it is diferent for every UE countrie)
Prices in EU are usually given with taxes includes so you have to deduct that from the price given unless it is stated that the price given is with no taxes.


----------



## RoughRider (Aug 14, 2008)

do you have any news?


----------



## roflwaffle (Sep 9, 2008)

JRP3 said:


> Actually I'd say it's an accurate representation of how a properly sized pack will be used in a production EV. Since we know the average person drives less than 40 miles a day a 100 mile or better pack will be shallow cycled.


If they did 10 miles a day it would work out, but in that case the pack would probably age out before coming anywhere close to cycling out. Even at 10% dod that's still impressive, about three to four times more energy storage per drop in capacity compared to A123's older cells, which were great at ~10,000 cycles to 80% capacity.


----------



## JRP3 (Mar 7, 2008)

I'm not sure how you're figuring that. The chart shows discharging to 40-50%, which would be about 40-50 miles for a 100 mile pack. 40 miles is still more than the average driver does in a single day.


----------



## MN Driver (Sep 29, 2009)

JRP3 said:


> I'm not sure how you're figuring that. The chart shows discharging to 40-50%, which would be about 40-50 miles for a 100 mile pack. 40 miles is still more than the average driver does in a single day.


The chart looks like it is cycling a 10% discharge/charge -between- 40 and 50%. This is where we are getting the 10 miles out of a 100 mile pack idea from and it would be more realistic for the amount of cycles they are displaying. It would add quite a bit of weight and size to the pack to multiply the desired usable capacity by a factor of nearly 10 times. More commentary about the goals for the USABC tests would be great, but I'm still thinking its more of a way to compare cells through accelerated use in controlled conditions.

I think that 50% use as you describe is more realistic, based on the information I've come across on the Chevy Volt they are going to be using 50% of its capacity and charging it to 80% SOC and then discharging it to 30% SOC to where the gas engine begins its charge sustaining mode. ...I'm sure those are rough SOC numbers and the real ones are likely confidential within the GM walls though. ...but that pack only needs to make 40 miles and has its fallback engine ready to go all the time in case it doesn't.


----------



## JRP3 (Mar 7, 2008)

MN Driver said:


> The chart looks like it is cycling a 10% discharge/charge -between- 40 and 50%. This is where we are getting the 10 miles out of a 100 mile pack idea from and it would be more realistic for the amount of cycles they are displaying.


I still don't see how you come up with that. The chart is labeled as Cycle life testing on 32113
USABC Cycle (25Wh, 40-50% SOC, -100A/+75A HPPC, 50% SOC) at 30 C. How do you get 40-50% of a 10% discharge from that, and why would they label it the way they did? Looks to me that they are discharging at 100 amps charging at 75 amps. On a small cell why would they use those amps if they were only cycling less than 10%? The 32113 is maybe a 4 ah cell, how could you discharge and recharge less than .4 ah at 100 and 75 amps?


----------



## roflwaffle (Sep 9, 2008)

AFAIK it's not 40-50% of a 10% discharge, it's discharging from 40% soc to 50% soc, then charging up to 40% soc again, so discharging about 10% of capacity, which seems reasonable for a HEV pack or maybe PHEV pack in CS (Charge Sustaining) mode, although the USABC goals for that are the same number of 50Wh cycles. On page 7 of the pdf hosted at the DOE under HEV gap analysis the posted goal of 25Wh cycle life is 300k cycles, so I'm pretty sure the chart is referring to a large number of very shallow (10%) discharges.


----------



## JRP3 (Mar 7, 2008)

I don't see how they can charge 10% of a 4 ah cell, which would be .4 ah, at 75 amps.  Isn't the 32113 a 4 ah cell?


----------



## roflwaffle (Sep 9, 2008)

There's no way it could be just a 32113 cell at 4.4ah, that would only be able to output ~14Wh while the discharge is 25Wh. I'm 99% sure it has to be a 32113 pack. Also, on the page right above the cycle life testing graph, there's a pic of a module containing 9 cells, so about 125Wh/module. I'm thinking the pack being tested consists of two modules (~250Wh) and it's being cycled from 40%soc to 50%soc to simulate a HEV application.


----------



## JRP3 (Mar 7, 2008)

Yes, you must be correct and I misread the whole thing.  Thanks for taking the time to set me straight.


----------



## roflwaffle (Sep 9, 2008)

It's no problem, I was thinking the same thing until MN Driver pointed out the graph description.


----------



## _GonZo_ (Mar 23, 2009)

*Re: Price for A123 prismatic cells for EV or large aplications*

Sorry for the delay but some family issues have kept me busy.

Finally you can find prices and more info here: http://www.rcmaterial.com/tienda/index.php?cPath=21_156&sort=3a&language=en


----------



## JRP3 (Mar 7, 2008)

Ouch, that looks like about $7.00 per Ah for the 20 Ah prismatic cell which can be had for closer to $3.00 per Ah.


----------



## _GonZo_ (Mar 23, 2009)

JRP3 said:


> Ouch, that looks like about $7.00 per Ah for the 20 Ah prismatic cell which can be had for closer to $3.00 per Ah.


?????? where are you looking?

Price depends on how manny cells you order from 4.80€ per Ah (around 6.20$) to 2.40€ per Ah (around 3.00$)

Here it is: http://www.rcmaterial.com/tienda/product_info.php?cPath=21_156&products_id=2841


----------



## JRP3 (Mar 7, 2008)

I was going by your first link which shows the 20 ah cell for 96 euros, which google shows as $138, or $6.9 ah. You can get them for less than $3 ah without having to buy large quantity.


----------



## _GonZo_ (Mar 23, 2009)

JRP3 said:


> I was going by your first link which shows the 20 ah cell for 96 euros, which google shows as $138, or $6.9 ah. You can get them for less than $3 ah without having to buy large quantity.


Were can be bought at that price small quantities?
May be I have to renegotiate with provider


----------



## JRP3 (Mar 7, 2008)

I'll have to check and see how much publicity the guy wants and get back to you. Too much attention and he may get shut down. Are you getting yours from A123 or from a factory in China?


----------



## CroDriver (Jan 8, 2009)

JRP3 said:


> I'll have to check and see how much publicity the guy wants and get back to you. Too much attention and he may get shut down. Are you getting yours from A123 or from a factory in China?


These cells are made in Korea.


----------



## _GonZo_ (Mar 23, 2009)

CroDriver said:


> These cells are made in Korea. I have no idea how they come to the guy you're talking about (I think I know him too).


Yes the cells are form Korea.
Who is that guy?
I think I am missing something.


----------



## JRP3 (Mar 7, 2008)

He should be contacting you. Let me know when you hear from him.


----------

