Lithium and cold weather

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beef56

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Mar 13, 2007
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I have 2 solar panels on my fifth wheel. It came with lead acid batteries. I am considering replacing them with lithium. I store the RV in a shed with no heat or electricity. I can easily remove the batteries in the fall and store them in our heated basement. We usually go south in February and can have temps zero or below when traveling. The rv would be plugged into the pickup, solar or shore power when traveling. Would the cold temperatures harm the batteries in frigid weather if they were constantly powered by solar, 12 volt ot 110 volt AC ? Thanks
 
I contacted Battleborne a while back about this. The answer I got was:

At 25 degrees our batteries will continue to discharge but will stop accepting a charge and at-4 degrees the batteries will turn off to prevent any damage.

Cold weather storage
The storage temperature range is -10F to 140F(-23c to 60c). We recommend bringing the battle born batteries to a 100% charge and then disconnecting them completely for storage. After 6 months in storage you should still have 75-80% charged batteries.
Storing batteries in sub zero weather(-15F or more) has the potential to crack the abs and more importantly could cause a faster loss of capacity, in some cases drastically more than the typical 2-4% per month loss.


I read this as there's little point in attempting to charge below 25F, the BMS will prevent that. So whatever charge is there is all you get. At -4F the BMS shuts the battery off completely. Prolonged storage at -15F or below can cause accelerated self discharge and can potentially cause damage.

Mark B.
Albuquerque, NM
 
I had hoped that with power the batteries being charged would be warmer than the ambient air temperature. Would the heated batteries work in this situation?
 
It really depends on which batteries you buy, some of the better ones now come with internal battery heaters.
 
You have to ensure lithium batteries don't try to charge when their internal temperature is below freezing or they will damage themselves. They'll continue to produce power down to well below 0F but they can be damaged if you try to charge them while they're colder than freezing.

The BMS in better brands like Battle Born, Lion Safari and others will block a charging source if they are too cold, and some of the inexpensive brands now include either this or internal heating pads to keep them warm.

But many of the inexpensive brands ($300 or so) don't include cold temperature charging protection. If your lithium battery doesn't specifically mention this, It's up to you to make sure they don't try to charge when they're below freezing.
 
We live in Iowa, and we had similar concerns. We bought our batteries from LifeBlue with internal heaters. When we travel in cold weather, you can tell some of the charging is being taken by the heaters, but we still get enough power.
 
We run AGM deep cycle batteries within the Rockies in our TT'S. Renogy AGM has a 5F to 104F charging range and is the only battery type listed down to the cold temperatures for both charging and discharge. I don't have any Renogy batteries. I'm not that concerned about below 5F due to it's usually less than 24 hours.


new-battery-chart.jpg
 
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I'm not sure how much the internal heaters can keep up with. If you could insulate them (foam or fiberglass) it would help a lot. Something I'd do at remote radio sites is put the batteries and charger in an ice chest. Then just a little bit of thermal input from the charger or an incandescent lamp was more than enough to keep things above freezing. In the summer, the lid stayed open. There's a lot of variables here and you might not need to do anything most of the time, but would at least have a contingency plan if your trip coincides with a cold snap.

Mark B.
Albuquerque, NM
 
I had hoped that with power the batteries being charged would be warmer than the ambient air temperature. Would the heated batteries work in this situation?
I would think so too but how much warmer.. Better to not take a chace and put them either in a heated area or on a heat pad or heat pad inside an insulated box.
 
Thanks for all the great information! I spoke with a Battle Born dealer and she indicated I would need a new battery monitor. My current system is compatible with lithium but she indicated the biggest issue was an incorrect battery level using the lead acid shunt/monitor. Does this sound accurate?
 
Yep, if the monitor is intended for lead acid, the voltages are different than lithium and likely you'd get wildly wrong results. Shunts are usually "dumb" but it might have some unique interfacing to a specific monitor. So unless the monitor is "smart" and lithium is specifically supported as a chemistry, then you're in the market for a different one.

Mark B.
Albuquerque, NM
 
I was quoted $925/ heated Battle Born battery plus $140 for the monitor and approximately $140 for monitor installation. I am questioning whether the $2,100 investment is worthwhile when I only boondock a few weeks a year. It seems the furnace fan draws my battery down during the night. Otherwise the solar panels keep up pretty well. I also have a Honda generator to help for those overcast days.
 
If the only issue is the furnace, then you can peel back the layers on that problem. I can go three days on battery running everything in the RV without even trying, so pooping out in one night implies a charging problem, a disparity of usages vs battery size, or wounded batteries. A basic battery monitor will reveal the issue - have you watched it to see what it's reporting while in use?

Mark B.
Albuquerque, NM
 
I haven't monitored the battery draw closely but I think the Furrion 12 volt refrigerator draws more than the dealer led me to believe, lol!
 

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