# Review of new 3C HiPower LiFePo4 cells



## etischer (Jun 16, 2008)

Wow, crazy terminals. Does Hipower sell a lug kit? Maybe our buddy HiPowerKevin can send you pics of how they have connected their cells in the past. They are a big company after all.


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## dimitri (May 16, 2008)

I drilled and tapped bus bars for #6 screws and connected BMS modules, then put the battery on 12V car battery charger at 6 amps. Will see how long it will take to bring it up to full charge. Once it maxes out at 14.4V (3.6V per cell) I will top it off with bench supply to 15V to see how much more it would take.

Since 4 cells came with 4 bus bars, but it only takes 3 to connect the cells, I cut last bus bar in half and used it as terminals for now. Bus bars are made from copper, but plated with some other metal, I assume for corrosion resistance. There might be just enough of bus bar surface left for me to drill 3/8" hole and try to bolt cable lug to it. If that doesn't work, I'd have to fabricate new terminals.


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## piotrsko (Dec 9, 2007)

my memory fails me often, but I think aircraft have lug terminals for up to 2-O wire, try wag-aero.com.


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## etischer (Jun 16, 2008)

piotrsko said:


> my memory fails me often, but I think aircraft have lug terminals for up to 2-O wire, try wag-aero.com.


I'm using 4/0 wire, and have never seen a ring lug that huge. Never seen a Line lug that huge.


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## david85 (Nov 12, 2007)

Look to be a very similar size to mine. Never saw that kind of terminal before though.

FYI, the sample order I made was by air and I think it came to $700. I would be very surprised if you were able to get a sample of that size delivered to your door for that little by air. Main order was by sea.

Having to pay charges at the border is pretty much standard when ordering from offshore. In some cases I used to pay fees even ordering stuff from the states. Seems to be getting a little better though.

Some offer shipping to the nearest port in your country. Others offer shipping only to the seaport on their side and its up to you to arrange for the rest of the distance. Again, its up to you to make everything clear because they might expect you to already know this.

Do you know the weight per cell? I'm curious to know how the energy density compares to other lithium versions.


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## dimitri (May 16, 2008)

Each cell is 7.2kg or 16lb. Weight seems to be similar to other 200AH prismatic cells, but the volume seems too large. HiPower tells me that oversized terminals both inside and outside of the cell help sustain high currents, reduce internal resistance and reduce heat losses. I guess it makes sense to some point, but size must be managed too, or we can't fit them in the car. I suppose sturdy build and oversized terminals speak well for cell's quality, but we'll have to see how well they work in a car before making conclusions.

I'll post the datasheet here, so people can reference it without having to look for it in other threads.

View attachment data sheet of 200AH high power cell DOC.pdf


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## SimonRafferty (Apr 13, 2009)

By business uses a shipping agent to import stuff from China and the US. Sent by sea, it starts to become very good value at above 200Lbs. The agent is very good at sorting out the paperwork and more importantly, coming up with an item description which attracts the least tax & duty! 

Agricultural or classic car parts are a favorite as the duty is zero in to many places.

For the terminals, at least they are easy to fabricate / get laser-cut - then just use a copper bolt through a smaller hole to attach cables.

Si


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## tomofreno (Mar 3, 2009)

Looks like the area of the ring of metal on the lug which contacts the terminal isn't larger than the area of a standard 2/0 lug, but dunno. Seems one advantage of the ring is that it is more easily deformed than a standard lug to obtain more actual area of contact to the terminal. Your comment about size is well-taken. I looked at these when doing my conversion, but dismissed them as they would have required significantly deeper battery boxes due to their height.


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## hipowerkevin (Jan 14, 2010)

I think the next station is to design suitable size for lifePO4 battery ...


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## roger (Jan 24, 2010)

Kevin, 

I agree, cell height for example is the most problem to mount pack in the cars. Very often we must use space in front top over the electric motor or in boxes in the back using sparewheels place by cutting the bottom. Here in Europe we have official technical control and we have to make such changes in agreement with them and their rules. 
For this reason the Thundesky 90 and 100AH cell size is most popular, their height is only about 22cm. 
Some guys mount the cells on their side or ly them flat but what´s about the crash safety? Ok, they will not explode or catch fire, but I think the safest mounting is to stand in a well done metal box and isolated cover. 
At the moment I can´t find any narrow Headway cell over 50 AH. The only I can do is to connect always two or three cells parallel to have needed cell size by narrow height. 

Roger


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## hipowerkevin (Jan 14, 2010)

Thank you, Roger.
Yes the size of new cells should be well considered.
We now just consider from lead acid battery box, and find the 100AH /200AH heigh is below 9.5 inch/ 10 inch. 
is that enough for lifePO4 cells? we hope new cells could replace LA.

And the length of new cells size have not be decided yet, still in diszussing, it is hard to make dicision.

Kevin, from Hipower


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## dimitri (May 16, 2008)

Finally had some time to put HiPower cells in a car. This is not permanent setup, as you can see, since I am not sure I want these monsters in the car for good. I can run like this for a while, collecting data. Today I have not hooked up PakTrakr to new cells yet, so no logging yet. I simply added 4 cells to my 40 cell pack, making it a 44 cell pack temporarily. I wanted to see the difference in running 10% higher pack voltage. I definitely felt the difference in extra punch at the takeoff and less current while cruising, but it was not very dramatic, afterall it was only 10% more voltage.

Next I will hook up the Paktrakr to new cells and see how they compare with TS160s in voltage sag under load.


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## dimitri (May 16, 2008)

hipowerkevin said:


> Thank you, Roger.
> Yes the size of new cells should be well considered.
> We now just consider from lead acid battery box, and find the 100AH /200AH heigh is below 9.5 inch/ 10 inch.
> is that enough for lifePO4 cells? we hope new cells could replace LA.
> ...


Kevin, here is the link to a table of standard BCI battery group sizes.
http://www.rtpnet.org/teaa/bcigroup.html

Look at the part named Heavy Duty Commercial Batteries. These are the typical batteries used in marine and RV house banks and some EVs and Golf Carts. Marine and RV industry has a bunch of standardized battery boxes for these batteries. It would be nice if 4 200AH cells could fit into 4D box, but these 4 cells you sold me only fit into 8D box.


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## david85 (Nov 12, 2007)

Just my $0.02, but I would try to keep the height of the battery no higher than 9 inches. That is an ideal size that allows it to be installed in areas that are common on many car conversions. Spots like where a fuel tank may have been or below a trunk floor. It also allows for possible stacking in places like the engine bay for some conversions.

13 inches is way to high to be practically installed unless you install them on their side but even then its not as convenient.


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## ElectriCar (Jun 15, 2008)

http://solarelectricdistributor.com...mination-Products/Lugs-&-Distribution-Blocks/FYI lugs. Here's a link to some larger lugs. However these lugs must be crimped. I used 2/0 lugs on my build, crimped then soldered to reduce resistance/corrosion issues. 

BTW, *just what do this type batteries cost now?* I looked at some two summers ago when I built my truck but the cost was astronomical so I went with lead. I'm now looking to convert to lithium for longer driving range and less sag. I'd like a pack of 25kw or so. 

My truck uses 600W/mile on lead but I understand with lithium it will drop due to less sag, internal losses in charging, discharging. Just how much will I expect to drop, any idea? Also my system is 144V but I'd like to bump it up to around 150 maybe.

And thanks for your research!

http://solarelectricdistributor.com...mination-Products/Lugs-&-Distribution-Blocks/


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## tomofreno (Mar 3, 2009)

> I agree, cell height for example is the most problem to mount pack in the cars.


 It is true that height is an issue, but so is width. For example the TS 200 Ah cells in original form factor were short enough to fit under the rear seat in my car, but I couldn't fit enough of them into the available space in the car due to their much greater width. Any box has to have a dimension which is a bit more than an integral number of the cell width, if that is large, like 14 inches, you end up with a lot of wasted space and not many cells in the space you can fit a box. It would be nice if a 200Ah cell could be 9" or less in total height, 7" or less in width, and 4" or less in thickness. Most spaces for a box are rectangular so this gives some chance of packing cells in with as little wasted space as possible.


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## hipowerkevin (Jan 14, 2010)

tomofreno said:


> It would be nice if a 200Ah cell could be 9" or less in total height, 7" or less in width, and 4" or less in thickness.


Thanks for you suggestion, Tomofreno, when I searched in google, I find group 31 is common size for 12V100AH lead-acid, and 4-D for 12V200AH lead-acid, also 8-D is for stand by.
I know group 31 would be nice, your suggestion of less in 7'' is well match group 31, about 6.75''. but in 4-D here are all about 8.75'', and I not sure if the 4-D is also common.
So, is that OK for new 100AH cells take Height less than 9'', Length of 6.75", the rest is width. the new 200AH cells take Height less than 9.5'', length of 8.75'', the rest is width, depends on capacity.
Anyway, We would modify our sizes with info from conversion market.


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## david85 (Nov 12, 2007)

It almost sounds like for the sake of installing them in a car, a cube shape would be idea (smallest cross section in all 3 directions), but think that would present cost problems for manufacturing. 

I think what would be preferred from the view of the battery factory is to have at least 2 dimensions a standard size (height and width) that can be applied to module sizes of different AH ratings. That way, the soft packs can still be stacked in different numbers to get the different battery sizes as I suspect happens now. Larger modules don't actually have a single internal cell but instead have several internal cells connected in series to produce the large reserve capacity. The fewer different sizes of these internal soft cells you have to produce and stock, the easier and cheaper it is to supply the market. Does that sound about right, Kevin?

I personally would have no problem with 9 x 8, but what would the 3rd dimension be?


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## tomofreno (Mar 3, 2009)

> So, is that OK for new 100AH cells take Height less than 9'', Length of 6.75", the rest is width. the new 200AH cells take Height less than 9.5'', length of 8.75'', the rest is width, depends on capacity.


 You might consider setting up a poll with choices in size that are convenient for you to make, to see which are most popular. I don't want to tell you to make something just because it happens to fit my boxes.


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## JRP3 (Mar 7, 2008)

Those terminals are a non starter for me. Standard sizes please, I don't need one more thing to custom fabricate during a build, and the actual contact area of the connecting straps looks very small, so I don't see any benefit at all.


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## samborambo (Aug 27, 2008)

JRP3 said:


> Those terminals are a non starter for me. Standard sizes please, I don't need one more thing to custom fabricate during a build, and the actual contact area of the connecting straps looks very small, so I don't see any benefit at all.


I work in the electricity supply industry. 1.25" copper lugs are common place on HV and LV networks. Tyco should be able to source them for you fairly cheaply.

Sam.


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## GizmoEV (Nov 28, 2009)

ElectriCar said:


> My truck uses 600W/mile on lead but I understand with lithium it will drop due to less sag, internal losses in charging, discharging. Just how much will I expect to drop, any idea?


While my rig is a tad smaller than yours I might be able to give you a little idea on the efficiency question. I don't have an emeter so I can't speak for the drive train efficiency between lead and LFP. I was running eight 6V flooded Pba batteries and when measured with a Kill-a-watt meter at the wall I was able to go a little over 4 miles on a kWh. When I had six 8V flooded Pba batteries I went a little less than 4 miles/kWh. I believe this was because I routinely pulled 250 battery amps on my hill climb home. The current per square inch was lower with the 6V batteries so the losses were lower.

I installed 36 TS-LFP100AHA batteries in 18 buddy pairs. The dimensions of the 200Ah cells wouldn't allow me to get more than 14 in the box. I needed a minimum of 16 cells. I'm using the same Zivan NG-1 charger with the same charging profile as before. I just adjusted the voltage adjust screw to get it to charge my pack completely. I have been recording my energy consumption from the wall and I am going 6mi/kWh. I was getting about 6.5mi/kWh early on but either my meter was giving low readings (I had to replace it) or I'm not driving as efficiently as I used to. With a 60mi range compared with 20mi I can "afford" to have a little more fun. See 2003gizmo.blogspot.com for more info.

David


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## Grant_NZ (May 28, 2008)

dimitri said:


> Finally had some time to put HiPower cells in a car. This is not permanent setup, as you can see, since I am not sure I want these monsters in the car for good. I can run like this for a while, collecting data. Today I have not hooked up PakTrakr to new cells yet, so no logging yet. I simply added 4 cells to my 40 cell pack, making it a 44 cell pack temporarily. I wanted to see the difference in running 10% higher pack voltage. I definitely felt the difference in extra punch at the takeoff and less current while cruising, but it was not very dramatic, afterall it was only 10% more voltage.
> 
> Next I will hook up the Paktrakr to new cells and see how they compare with TS160s in voltage sag under load.


Hi dimitri, how are you going with the testing? 
Grant


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## ElectriCar (Jun 15, 2008)

Gizmo that is some useful info. I've been wondering what difference it would make converting to lithium. So with your conversion you basically gained 50% on your distance per kw. That's awesome!

You can add to this with the weight of your pack before and after the conversion. My lead pack is 1560 lbs. I can lose about 1000 lbs I think and still gain some distance.


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## dimitri (May 16, 2008)

Grant_NZ said:


> Hi dimitri, how are you going with the testing?
> Grant


I have been super busy last couple of weeks, working 16 hours a day on various projects, so I haven't had much time to spend on HiPower cell testing.

However, I ran these 4 cells in my car every day for 2 weeks, monitoring them with PakTrakr. I did a test run specifically to create a log graph of these cells side by side with the rest of my TS160 cells, some of which are weaker than others. I tested at 2 different discharge levels, 200Amp and 400Amp, which is 1C and 2C respectively for these cells.

Of course this is the least scientific test you can imagine, but I never planned on bench testing these, I don't have equipment or desire to bench test batteries, there are plenty of other people in much better position to do such testing and I will refer to them for scientific results. I was only interested to see how they perform in the car.

Also, this single log mixes 2 different, although somewhat comparable, cell sizes, so you can't draw simple conclusions from this graph, since 200A and 400A currents represent different C values for 200AH cell and 160AH cell, but it gives an approximation you can use as a rule of thumb.

I am unable to pull 3C from 200AH cells, since that would murder my 160AH TS cells, so I decided to do 1C and 2C only.

Bottom line, these cells appear to be high build quality, they work very well in the car, they have less voltage sag than Thundersky cells. On the flipside, they are too big, their terminals are huge and very inconvenient to work with. I think overall HiPower cells can be put in the same product line with SkyEnergy ( CALB ) and ThunderSky cells, as long as you compare HiPower 3C cells with TS and CALB. You can't compare HiPower 1C cells with TS and CALB 3C and 4C cells, those weren't designed to be comparable. There is nothing wrong with 1C cells as long as you design your EV not to exceed 1C rates. You just need to know what you are buying and how you will be using it.

I think HiPower has a lot of potential, if only they can design their 3C cells packaging a little smaller and use similar terminals as TS and CALB.

I witnessed first hand an EV conversion with HiPower 1C cells, using high voltage pack with AC motor/controller. The system was designed not to exceed 1C and it performs great with those cells.

I think the biggest issue people have is they undersize their packs to save money and minimize space and weight, which results in using cells at their max loads, which increases the risk of cell failures and shortens their life. 
I learned this first hand and I always recommend people to try and oversize their packs as reasonably as possible, which would increase the range and put less stress on the cells.

Here is my test log, I know its not as pretty as others, but I literally had 3 minutes to create it.


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## favguy (May 2, 2008)

Good feedback Dimitri, whilst were on to Hi-power about changes to thier cells to make them more desireable, how about a middle cell of around 140 to 160Ah?, this would be very popular if in a more user friendly size.... Are you listening Kevin??!!

Paul


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## hipowerkevin (Jan 14, 2010)

We would update the three dimension of cells,

200AH would be about 10''H, 8''L, 2''W

160AH would be about 9.5''H, 7''L, 2''W

100AH would be about 9''H, 6.5''L, 3''W

Detail demension would be confirmed by engineers, we hope those dimensions would be convinance for DIYers. And thanks for peoples efforts for dimension feedback, for those pioneers are keeping runing and really pushing the industry of new energy, green for earth. 

Best Regards !

Kevin from Hipower


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## favguy (May 2, 2008)

Excellent news


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## JRP3 (Mar 7, 2008)

hipowerkevin said:


> We would update the three dimension of cells,
> 
> 200AH would be about 10''H, 8''L, 2''W


That would be impressive as TS 200Ah cells are 10.98"H, 7.17"L, 2.8"W. I'm not sure your dimensions are possible at 200Ah.
What would the 200Ah cells weigh? The TS cells are 6Kg.


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## hipowerkevin (Jan 14, 2010)

JRP3 said:


> That would be impressive as TS 200Ah cells are 10.98"H, 7.17"L, 2.8"W. I'm not sure your dimensions are possible at 200Ah.
> What would the 200Ah cells weigh? The TS cells are 6Kg.


It is still in research yet, we have found a new technology that could greatly pressing space, but it seem to have some limit and some matials add, we need to test the stability of cells with those New metials.
If we fail to do this, we would reverse back to norminal technology, the power cell type, and the 200AH dimension would be 9.6''H, 10.2''L, 3''W.

However, are you sure that thundersky new 200AH cells are 10.98"H, 7.17"L, 2.8"W? It seems that their dimension are 10.98"H, 7.17"L, *4"W.*
As I know, they want to push 2.8''W but they fail to offer ?


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## ElectriCar (Jun 15, 2008)

My US2200xc are 11.25" high and are fine so for me 11" would be ok.


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## JRP3 (Mar 7, 2008)

> However, are you sure that thundersky new 200AH cells are 10.98"H, 7.17"L, 2.8"W? It seems that their dimension are 10.98"H, 7.17"L, *4"W.*
> As I know, they want to push 2.8''W but they fail to offer ?


I just took it from their data sheet, not an actual cell, so maybe they were being optimistic. I know the SE200 cells are closer to 4"W.


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## MN Driver (Sep 29, 2009)

JRP3 said:


> I just took it from their data sheet, not an actual cell, so maybe they were being optimistic. I know the SE200 cells are closer to 4"W.


I'm looking at the data sheet now. It says

280mm tall, 183mm wide, 100mm thick
100mm/25.4mm=3.93 inches thick
Both 200Ah designs are 7.3kg, the 160Ah battery is 5.6kg.

About SE/CALB: I haven't seen anyone selling the larger SE sizes over 200Ah, I only saw them offered on their Alibaba page they seem to have multiples of the same capacity but different listed specs too, listing different uses. I'm curious if there is something against the larger ones or possibly they are at a different price point or something.

While looking up those specs, I ran into something new. The big long submarine cells are gone but there are new huge "LFP AHC" cells 1000Ah and 7000Ah Rated for 5C charge, 5000 80% DOD cycles, 7000 70% DOD cycles. The terminals look the same as the rest of the Thunder Sky cells, the 1000Ah only has 2 and I can't imagine that they can charge at a rate of 5000 amps through them or discharge at 20,000 amps. I'm curious what their design intent is.


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## CroDriver (Jan 8, 2009)

MN Driver said:


> ...I can't imagine that they can charge at a rate of 5000 amps through them or discharge at 20,000 amps. I'm curious what their design intent is.


Grid stabilization...?

http://www.a123systems.com/a123/applications/grid-stabilization


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## ElectriCar (Jun 15, 2008)

Kevin, since you're with HP, why don't you (HP) buy TS and SE cells and compare them with HP. I think HP will come out on top from what I've read, but until SOMEONE does this testing, we're going to remain in the abyss of ignorance.

However, for the testing to be credible, HP needs to have an independent unbiased source do the testing and report back.

As Jim of EVC says, people are more confident in TS due to the experience of others as they have been on the market longer. * If YOU want to gain market share, YOU need to do something to earn it, like PROVING that TS and SE are not as good to buy as HP * and not leave it up to consumers to do. By doing NOTHING credible, battery manufacturers are not enticing consumers to open their wallets. If you show us we're not wasting our money buying HP cells more of us will buy them.

*You can speak your claims all you want but you know the reputation of China on this forum. *It's not good so people aren't going to listen to what you have to say without credible documentation.


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## JRP3 (Mar 7, 2008)

MN Driver said:


> I'm looking at the data sheet now. It says
> 
> 280mm tall, 183mm wide, 100mm thick
> 100mm/25.4mm=3.93 inches thick
> Both 200Ah designs are 7.3kg, the 160Ah battery is 5.6kg.


Here's the sheet I was looking at. 279mm tall, 182mm wide, 71mm thick


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## hipowerkevin (Jan 14, 2010)

ElectriCar said:


> Kevin, since you're with HP, why don't you (HP) buy TS and SE cells and compare them with HP. I think HP will come out on top from what I've read, but until SOMEONE does this testing, we're going to remain in the abyss of ignorance...


Thanks for your kind info, your just pointed out the key of thing.

It is hard for pushing, for thundersky have make business with conversion DIYers long time, but people are not so familar with Hipower, We are privously working on OEM, You may also know I effort for pushing battery to Dimitri for testing, and I even don't know Dimitri before, I just have confidence so I done this.

However, I am searching for 3rd-orgnaziation testing, once I find Doctor Ira's email, who is on duty of American National Lab, argonne, for Lithium battery testing. But after communication, I know for 3 cells need 134K USD for testing, it is hard for us to offer, because LifePO4 is hi-technology, it means if improved, we need testing again. So we need to find another lab, not cost so much as we can undertake the cost.

In my opinion, I would very glad to see people in forum testing our cells, and do comparison test, you know, it is hard for us got TS cells, and if comparsion test done by us, it is unfair.
And what I can do is find some independent lab test our battery and offer result, it is my first thing. But it is more easiler for people in forum do comparsion test, more fairly.


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## JRP3 (Mar 7, 2008)

ElectriCar said:


> However, for the testing to be credible, HP needs to have an independent unbiased source do the testing and report back.


I think Kevin has expressed a willingness to submit his cells for independent testing by a reliable company or individual, but no one has stepped up. I think I mentioned Exponent but I'm not sure if he pursued that or if they are affordable.


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## tomofreno (Mar 3, 2009)

> ...but you know the reputation of China on this forum.


 ...and that would be the largest supplier of LiFePO4 cells to diyers in the U.S., with many satisfied customers like myself.


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## JRP3 (Mar 7, 2008)

tomofreno said:


> ...and that would be the largest supplier of LiFePO4 cells to diyers in the U.S., with many satisfied customers like myself.


Indeed. Try getting similar cells from International Battery here in the US....


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## hipowerkevin (Jan 14, 2010)

JRP3 said:


> Here's the sheet I was looking at. 279mm tall, 182mm wide, 71mm thick


If this is ture, the energy density would be 179wh/L !
I don't know how they got it, but till now Hipower only reach 150wh/L, if they achieved that they should apply for patent of that technology, *But is here any people have Real see of those cells? *We also know TS say their battery are 80% DOD 3000 times, 70%DOD 5000 times, But I need to say Hipower cells could only offer 2000 times with 80%DOD, and 1000 times with 100%DOD.

I have an important thing to offer: *it is not so simple thing form single cells to battery pack*. In Lithum battery industry, battery pack have very important key judgment, that is "correspondence".
It means cells would have most same performance, then they could be assemble to battery pack. It means in different discharge rate, difference tempature, cells need to performance as same! Even slightly difference would greatly low down the performance of battery pack.

We offer battery pack with selected cells all the time, we do cycle test with hundreds of cells one time of one batch for many time and different conditions, finding the most same performance cells to make up battery pack. So we have accepted by OEM, famous company.

Please seriously notice on what I metioned - "correspondence", you may know this by famous EV company, or have a call to BMS manufacturer, or consult with Lithium battery engineers. 

Hope those info would be helpful.


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## hipowerkevin (Jan 14, 2010)

I searched by google PDF format in thuder-sky.com, find the dimesion is 100AH width, I download PDF in EVcomponents.com and width is 71mm.
Our customer contacted with TS company, they say 71mm is old version and new version is 100mm and would be much better... I nearly confused..


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## ElectriCar (Jun 15, 2008)

tomofreno said:


> ...and that would be the largest supplier of LiFePO4 cells to diyers in the U.S., with many satisfied customers like myself.


It's good that you weren't one of those hosed, at least you've not been hosed yet. BTW how long have your had yours? You still don't know that you're not going to be among the hosed. When you do have a failure what will you think if they don't stand behind their product after you've spent several thousand hard earned dollars and suddenly find you have nice little set of lithium boat anchors???

I've not been among them thankfully. But we need MORE POSITIVE COMMENTS in order to help overcome the ones who have been hosed. You know it only takes one *credible *poster on here to get screwed to ruin the image of a company with MANY others.


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## dimitri (May 16, 2008)

ElectriCar said:


> *You can speak your claims all you want but you know the reputation of China on this forum. *It's not good so people aren't going to listen to what you have to say without credible documentation.


Please take your negative attitude towards China elsewhere. There are plenty of scumbags right here in US, probably much more than in China. I am sick and tired of whining that someone needs to do independent testing before I spend my hard earned money. Every time you buy expensive product, especially the one based on chemical reactions, which can be ruined easily by failing to use it properly, you are subjecting your money to a certain level of risk. It can be low risk if company you buy from has proven reputation and solid warranty, or it can be high risk if you buy from unknown company. Either case you can be satisfied or you can be screwed, even large US company can deny warranty if they suspect product misuse.

Also, warranty is not free, its included in the cost of the product, so same product backed up by better warrannty will cost more. Everyone wants cheapest cells with best warranty, but you need reality check, its usually one or the other, not both at once.

So, I chose to risk my hard earned money to buy 40 TS cells a year ago, after doing my own research rather than waiting for someone else to do it for me. After a year of daily use I am mostly satisfied with results, there were some issues, much of it due to my own learning curve, but overall very positive results. Recently I chose to risk more money and buy some HP cells from Kevin, while others were blaming his poor English, and again, results are positive and I believe Kevin is cincere and trying to do his job the best he can. HP has a lot of potential, but its a young company trying to grow in difficult global economy, so give them a break, they should not have to spend 100K on independent testing just to convince you to spend 10K, knowing that many people still find reasons to complain no matter what.

I still recommend against buying individual packs direct from China, but only because of difficulties with US import process and miriad of fees and parties involved, none of which is China's fault, but our own damn government. HP or any other cell manufacturer should establish US based warehouse and sell locally, just like all other big companies do, but it takes time and effort and we should be grateful for what we get from China, since NONE of US companies care about our DIY market.

Granted, there are plenty of scumbags in China who rebrand same TS or HP or SE cells and try to sell them as OEM, but that is not the reason to blame all Chinese, just like plenty of US scumbags who sell same Chinese product at 200% markup don't make you critisize all US businesses.

Sorry for my harsh attitude, I don't mean any offense, just really tired of all the finger pointing here. Since I started this thread I thought it would be OK for me to lash out a little


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## ElectriCar (Jun 15, 2008)

Dude you're the one whining. If you have money to throw out your car window, you go right ahead. It's your prerogative. I for one won't do that. As I said in another thread, I don't gamble. Neither will I entrust 12000 to a company who has no track record to speak of and that applies to any company, Chinese or otherwise. 

Not sure how much you've read here nor how much you've retained of what you've read but there have been people on THIS forum who did just that, trusted some company with little or no track record with a wad of money and didn't get what they were promised and the company didn't stand behind it. 

That's not whining or bashing that's stating the facts. And as the facts change so will the perception. Now go ahead and whine some more.


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## dimitri (May 16, 2008)

Now you are backpedaling. My whole rant was based your singling out Chinese suppliers, you even put it in bold letters.

If you treat all suppliers fairly based on their record and not on their origin, then I have no beef with your position at all.

No sane person likes to gamble with their hard earned cash, no argument here, but we in DIY EV community are on the leading edge and so certain risk is implied. If you want zero risk, you are in the wrong hobby, just sign up for Nissan Leaf.


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## MN Driver (Sep 29, 2009)

ElectriCar said:


> Dude you're the one whining. If you have money to throw out your car window, you go right ahead. It's your prerogative. I for one won't do that. As I said in another thread, I don't gamble. Neither will I entrust 12000 to a company who has no track record to speak of and that applies to any company, Chinese or otherwise.
> 
> Not sure how much you've read here nor how much you've retained of what you've read but there have been people on THIS forum who did just that, trusted some company with little or no track record with a wad of money and didn't get what they were promised and the company didn't stand behind it.
> 
> That's not whining or bashing that's stating the facts. And as the facts change so will the perception. Now go ahead and whine some more.


We all take risks with using batteries in a DIY fashion. Based on the results with LiFePO4 so far, I would never touch lead-acid, to me that is throwing money out the window, short life of just a couple of years, limited performance, high maintenance. 

You very quickly took someone using cells of a brand that look better based on testing and who have many users here on this site than most of other options that are available at a decent price and you knock it down and tell them that they are being hosed or going to be hosed. You need to check your cynical attitude at the door and calm down a bit. He didn't buy a whole pack worth of them and he is satisfied with the cells he bought. I don't think he is getting screwed at all. Checking out EVAlbum will show you many vehicles who have more miles on their Chinese bought lithium of various brands than lead-acid can dream of with minimal issues and performance that doesn't offer a reason to be complained about. You are bashing the people who are producing real-world results using these cells. You can't produce real world results if nobody ever uses them, usually it starts with small steps and moves up from there. I know someone using HiPower cells and occasionally bringing them beyond their spec and is satisfied with them and they bought them over a year and a half ago and they have been in use since Jan of 2009. It might not be that long of time but you can't dismiss something that you haven't given a chance to.

"That's not whining or bashing that's stating the facts. And as the facts change so will the perception. Now go ahead and whine some more."

I'm not whining but you should drop the attitude and stop calling your opinion 'facts'. People have used these cells and there are satisfied customers and I don't like hearing your baseless statements. They aren't underperforming the Thunder Sky cells he has now, that is a positive thing, granted we don't have new TS cells or other brands to directly compare with at the moment, but things like that will come.


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## ElectriCar (Jun 15, 2008)

You're right Dimitri but who has that history? I think Kevin is above board and I have a Chinese customer who is. But you know the perception is there on this board. I personally don't have a dog in this fight, just commenting about what I've observed.

I like what I've read about HP, and what you wrote about your experience is helpful. I thought I made myself clear re Kevin and about HP proceeding with testing at their expense. If their product is superior or even acceptable at a reasonable price, independent testing will get a lot of folks off the fence and ordering HP cells, which is why HP is in business.

I like what he's said about testing cells if they're to be used as a pack to ensure we get a good pack. But until more gamblers take the plunge and report back good results several months from now or someone does some serious testing, a lot of folks are going to proceed with lead that are not confident about buying any brand Li cells right now.


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## ElectriCar (Jun 15, 2008)

MN I don't have an attitude and I'm not sure who "he" is. Not sure even what you're referring to or why you think I have an attitude. 

What I see though is that you fail to see in this thread that there are people wanting to know how the various brand cells stack up to each other, ie what happens when you abuse them? How is the life affected by abuse? What is the life to be expected with normal driving with an occasional 5C momentary discharge etc. 

Sure as you say there may be on this forum scattered about in bits and pieces adequate enough information to make a purchase with confidence but not everyone or even most people who are considering a purchase are going to undertake the herculean task of researching this entire forum for the pieces of that puzzle. I've done some searching myself but it's a real challenge at times to find adequate information in a reasonable amount of time. Published testing results could be posted somewhere making it much easier than slogging through this swamp of information.

It is admirable for anyone to take the plunge with their money, cross their fingers and hope for the best but MOST folks, I feel, don't want to do that. My point was that independent testing will help alleviate those fears and create sales, not just for the Chinese but all you guys (if you're a reseller) will see sales increase, cleaner air and less money wasted on lead, gasoline etc.

OTOH I can't begin to understand why it would cost over $100K for testing by someone with donated batteries. Then again I'm not in the testing business either so I really can't discuss that.


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## jeffkruse (Aug 3, 2009)

hipowerkevin,

You should try marketing your batteries to the off-grid solar people. Sign up on the NW Arizona forum. These batteries sound to good to be true. How about working with Xantrex to get their charge controller to work with your type of battery? 2000 cycles at 80%DOD is good but 5000 cycles at 70%DOD is incredible. For us off-griders we are use to only 20%DOD, we are happy with very long life.


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## MN Driver (Sep 29, 2009)

'He' was the person using Sky Energy who replied to you after you said "It's good that you weren't one of those hosed, at least you've not been hosed yet. BTW how long have your had yours? You still don't know that you're not going to be among the hosed. When you do have a failure what will you think if they don't stand behind their product after you've spent several thousand hard earned dollars and suddenly find you have nice little set of lithium boat anchors???"

I agree that it's a 'time will tell' sort of thing and I don't think it costs that much for people on this forum to do the testing but it is a significant expense for anyone to do that sort of testing due to equipment cost and even once that is all done there is always something to pick on about the results. The answers that I am, along with most of us here, about the prismatic LiFePO4 that many of us are using involve real world lifetimes of the batteries and how they will end up failing. ...then I realize that we have ICE-based where an engine has all sort of problems within its own warranty and then I see where things get gray in the fog. It would be cool if someone had the resources to setup a 3C charge, 3C discharge with cool off time in between each and see how long they really last with that type of use. Many of us are warding off and delaying the inevitable failure by buying more range than we need so as the pack declines we have a cushion but the guys who are running 70% discharges or more at higher rates because of smaller packs might teach us a thing or two and its those people who we will probably learn from. I agree that reading through forums is difficult due to the amount of information to absorb but it's also the best way to see individual experiences in an unedited format. I pay attention to batteries more than anything else at this point because to me, the other options are simpler and cheaper to choose. I understand where you are coming from as far as boosting sales.


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## EVfun (Mar 14, 2010)

I'll be launching into that kind of 'abuse' of TS cells soon enough NM Driver. My '66 Datsun has a 40 cell pack of 60 amp hour cells. With 128 volts I will be demanding 3C regularly. I'll be pushing at least 5C peaks every drive. My cells are the newer Yttrium doped cells that the manufacturer claims can handle 20C peaks. I won't go anywhere near that point, but I will be deep into what many on this list consider abuse.


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## MN Driver (Sep 29, 2009)

EVfun, I'll be paying attention, watch their temperature at the end of discharge. If you can keep them under 60 Celsius I wouldn't expect issues but then again we don't have much data. If they are hot after a drive, it might extend their life to let them cool off a little before charging.


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## strawberry (Feb 22, 2010)

jeffkruse said:


> hipowerkevin,
> 
> You should try marketing your batteries to the off-grid solar people. Sign up on the NW Arizona forum. These batteries sound to good to be true. How about working with Xantrex to get their charge controller to work with your type of battery? 2000 cycles at 80%DOD is good but 5000 cycles at 70%DOD is incredible. For us off-griders we are use to only 20%DOD, we are happy with very long life.


Dear Jeff :
Thank you so much for your kindly suggestion. this is Candy who is sales from Hipower Battery , I mainly take charge for the Solar industy, and actually the LifePo4 battery for solar industry in France is very popular now, and one of my customer has been testing our battery for more than 4 monthes, he said our battery can work more than 15 years for the small discharge current.
by the way, NW Arizona forum , can you tell me the website ?? which I check on internet, seems not for solar ? so can you help me for this ?? your great help will be highly apprecited.
--
TKS and Best regards!
Sales dept: Candy Yan
Mobile: CN +86 13874997703
MSN: [email protected]
Skype: candy_apple1296
China Shandong Hipower New Energy Group
website :English Version is www.chinabatteries.net & Chinese is www.haiba.net.cn
Address of production base: HiPower Industrial Park,Noth of PuDong Rd, Hi-Tech Development District Zaozhuang, Shandong, CHINA


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## jeffkruse (Aug 3, 2009)

That would be http://www.wind-sun.com/ForumVB/index.php

The company is Northern Arizona Wind & Sun.

If your batteries last 10 to 15 years with DOD's of 70% or less you will make a lot of off grid solar people happy.


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## GerhardRP (Nov 17, 2009)

dimitri said:


> Here is my test log, I know its not as pretty as others, but I literally had 3 minutes to create it.
> 
> View attachment 6703


I'm curious if you have done this sort of logging during the beginning of a recharge cycle from relatively deep discharge?

Gerhard


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## dimitri (May 16, 2008)

GerhardRP said:


> I'm curious if you have done this sort of logging during the beginning of a recharge cycle from relatively deep discharge?
> 
> Gerhard


No, I have not. What would be interesting to see during the charge? Typical charge currents are fractions of 1C, so there isn't anything exciting going on until the cell is close to full and voltage starts rising fast.


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## GerhardRP (Nov 17, 2009)

dimitri said:


> No, I have not. What would be interesting to see during the charge? Typical charge currents are fractions of 1C, so there isn't anything exciting going on until the cell is close to full and voltage starts rising fast.


I think we could see the internal resistance...the bad cells should show a higher voltage than the good ones. If you are using a shunting BMS then as you near the end of the constant current phase, the weak cells would dump charge... not because their capacity is low but that the resistance is high, This could be particularly true on regen.


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## dimitri (May 16, 2008)

GerhardRP said:


> I think we could see the internal resistance...the bad cells should show a higher voltage than the good ones. If you are using a shunting BMS then as you near the end of the constant current phase, the weak cells would dump charge... not because their capacity is low but that the resistance is high, This could be particularly true on regen.


I thought you were talking about HiPower cells. You are right, my weak TS cells are always first to hit HVC, due to increased IR, but BMS is managing it nicely, so I am not worried. The graph and the test was for HiPower cells, my weak TS cells were just marked to explain why some cells sag more than others.


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## MN Driver (Sep 29, 2009)

The reason that I'm curious and the reason that I think GerhardRP is asking about it is your weakest cell is at 3.15 volts without a load which makes it appear as if it is undercharged. When you stop charging, is this cell also at the lowest voltage when manually measuring the voltage as well?


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## helluvaengineer96 (Oct 8, 2010)

Kevin,
A few questions:
1) Does HiPower have a distributor in the US yet?
2) When do you expect you batteries to be GA? Sounds like you are in the Beta testing phase.

Your 160 Ah @ 9.5"x7"x2" are a perfect fit for my application.
Can you provide data sheet for this battery?

BTW your data sheet for the 200 Ah contains a lot more information than the ones I have seen for TS or CALB.



hipowerkevin said:


> It is still in research yet, we have found a new technology that could greatly pressing space, but it seem to have some limit and some matials add, we need to test the stability of cells with those New metials.
> If we fail to do this, we would reverse back to norminal technology, the power cell type, and the 200AH dimension would be 9.6''H, 10.2''L, 3''W.
> 
> However, are you sure that thundersky new 200AH cells are 10.98"H, 7.17"L, 2.8"W? It seems that their dimension are 10.98"H, 7.17"L, *4"W.*
> As I know, they want to push 2.8''W but they fail to offer ?


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## ZEVUtah (Apr 10, 2008)

helluvaengineer96 said:


> Kevin,
> A few questions:
> 1) Does HiPower have a distributor in the US yet?


One of the guys in our local club has just started carrying these cells. Give him a call.

http://www.evequipmentsupply.com/


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## hipowerkevin (Jan 14, 2010)

The sample of batteries (160AH and other typies) already be produced, at this time we are doing cycle test on those samples, we need to got steady technical datas, so we need to do many cycles. At least hundreds of cycles (or nearly 1000 times) need to be finished, to see whether life cycle is well enough. And after those cycles, all performance should be tested again, to see the diffenrence is slightly enough? Till now those batteries are going well. If passed the test, I would let all of you know, and offer some sample to do tests.


Best Regards!
Kevin Tang, from Hipower


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## helluvaengineer96 (Oct 8, 2010)

There is a little confusion on my part over which HiPower Cells are available now (their size,weight,and output) vs what will be available in the near future (road map).

Is there a link that summarizes this information? Or can you provide it here?



hipowerkevin said:


> The sample of batteries (160AH and other typies) already be produced, at this time we are doing cycle test on those samples, we need to got steady technical datas, so we need to do many cycles. At least hundreds of cycles (or nearly 1000 times) need to be finished, to see whether life cycle is well enough. And after those cycles, all performance should be tested again, to see the diffenrence is slightly enough? Till now those batteries are going well. If passed the test, I would let all of you know, and offer some sample to do tests.
> 
> 
> Best Regards!
> Kevin Tang, from Hipower


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## lou-ace (Jul 21, 2009)

Fabulous post dimitri, I was pretty well solidly committed to lead up to this point but may consider these lipo's now, I'm still quite concerned with this foriegn supplier and their costomer support but I have marked their site in my favorites and will continue to follow them for signs of stability. How do you think they compare to thundersky ( which I've read some really bad reviews on). thanks and please continue to post your results.​


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