Hi, does anyone have any experience of these (newish) kind of batteries in motorhomes or campers?
I'm thinking of adding a leisure battery to my mobility/camper van, particularly to run a 12v compressor fridge (30-35W), plus phones & perhaps LED lights, and am attracted by the simplicity of the EZA 130 from RoadPro and the sealed nature of the LiFePO4 batteries (so I don't need to vent it out through the metal wall of the van), as well as a heap of other advertised pros (long life,safety etc).
The obvious downside is the price (£599.99 on ebay for a stand alone 100ah battery; or £2500 for the EZA 130 but then that is a complete system, nothing else needed). And you can take it out when you sell on, or so they say...?
Pecamina
LOng life as they hold their charge very well, but if left fully charged or in a low state of charge they deteriorate much faster.
At 70 - 80% charged they can long a long time and lose little charge even if left for a year.
They need careful charging though and if run flat they wont recharge at all.
I have some cells rescued from some old laptops, Usually they fail because of one duff cell. The rest are usually OK.
Charging needs to be controlled and monitored. You dont want one in your van if its overcharged. LiFe are safer than LiPo but still need careful charging/discharging.
Whats the expected duty on the fridge? Almost 3amp draw, How much time will it be drawing that in a 24 hour cycle?
Thanks for that useful info. But from what I have read the LiFePO4 are a slightly different beast from the LiPo & LiFe, with considerably less safety issues, so they say. Do you have experience of the LiFePO4s?
Roadpro say of the EZA system https://www.roadpro.co.uk/images/pdfs/All%20about%20EZA%20power-packs.pdf that it has built in circuitry to prevent short-circuiting, over and under-charging, and over- and under-voltage. But then they would say that wouldn't they!
I'm looking at the Waeco CDF fridges, 16-25 possibly. Dometic say that the 25 inputs 35W & draws between 0.44 & 0.67 ah/h depending on how hot it is outside. Its supposed to be highly insulated too, so perhaps only drawing that in the heat of the day, with minimum draw at night.
Yeah a decent battery should have the protection built in and most do, its just the spurious Chinese ones that are made cheaply and may have more flour in them than genuine battery material.
I use LifePO4's in my radio control handsets. The lower voltages compared to lipo works out better for the controllers.
The voltage is slightly lower than with standard batteries, but the power output is flat and lasts longer.
The fridge will be pulling approx 12Amps a day, will it last long enough?
The issues with the batteries with voltage cutoff's is that they dont give any warning before they stop, with a standard battery as the voltage drops your pumps tend to run slower for a bit, with the life its full power then you think is that slower and its off completely. Shut down to protect itself from total discharge which is bad.
I have a LiIon battery on my Ryobi drill and i dont like it at all, Your drilling away and it just stops dead with zero warning on the voltage getting low.
The old batteries maybe a bit heavier but they warn you the voltage is dropping by getting a bit slower or losing the torque.
Clip of a LifePO4 being punctured, nowhere near as dramatic as a LiPo.
Hi pecamina.
I run a Waeco CoolFreeze CF 25, got that back in 2008, and it is a truly superb piece of kit.
It can run for days on a bog std 85ah Leiusure battery, and since I made the 12v sockets in the new Mk 7 Golf that I drive, to provide continuas power even with the ignition off, the Waeco has been left on 24/7 for over a week, with no adverse effect on the car battery.
As you may well know the Waeco CF range, has a feature, so that the unit can be set, so that it does not deplete you're battery, in fact you can set to any one of 3 levels.
Having said that, whilst in the car for over a week, the Waeco has never implemented it's battery protection function, which just goes to show, how little drain they have on a battery.
Thanks Grampian91, that's really helpful, particularly the scary video...
I'm guessing the 100ah battery on ebay at £599 is a spurious chinese one! All the others are c £1.5 which squares much better with the EZA at £2.5k
I was thinking of having a cheapish fold up solar panel to keep in the van for long stays anyway, although in reality these days I don't pitch up anywhere for all that long, before moving on, when the van battery would be doing the topping up. So I'm hoping that 85 or 100 would see me through say a week.
I don't have anything against sla batteries per se, I just don't want to be sleeping with the discharge gases; and as I've managed so far without puncturing the van (apart from a sunroof) it's becoming a sort of point of principle!
Still if nothing else the cost of the Lifepo4 system will be prohibitive for now, so I shall watch it with interest.
I was thinking of converting my old e bike from NiMHd to Li on the grounds of getting a bigger range, but I shall do a bit more research before I do that - thanks. I shall also store my Li drill a bit more carefully. Haven't had it long enough for it to die on me yet.
PS Have you seen the Hydrogen Reactor Power Bank? Needs some work to be properly useful, so hope they improve the current ones,, which according to reviews are inadequate. Be a while before I can run a fridge off one though I think!
Thank you Francais, that's just what I wanted to hear!
I expect my van has a bigger battery than your VW anyway, so perhaps I'll just get the fridge for now. The current models are CDFs they hopefully they won't have cut the spec since the CFs.
I've been running my old (non-compressor) coldbox and fridge off the van battery until now, but the coldbox is too noisy to run at night, and the fridge is too big!
Waeco have replaced the CF25 with the CDF25, unfortunately they have dropped the Digital LED Display, which had touch button setting function for Temp, not sure if the new model has lost battery protection function as well.
The LED Display has now been replaced with a simple slider for temp control.
If you do not need to use the unit as a Freezer, have a look at the FR-35 still a compressor unit, and with the LED Display.
Built in 240v mains capability as well as 12/24v which is a good feature, as the smaller CDF units require a mains adapter for 240v.
Ooh I'll have a look at the specs a bit more closely. Obviously I was wrong about downgrading... & I may not need as much as 25l or the 31l of the FR35.
Also, I am quite limited for space and the FR35 is bigger I think, shall have to put it all in a table to compare.
ON the face of it the FR35 looks like a good buy but some of the reviews on Amazon suggest less reliability than the CDFs?
Would you think a slider temp control a real problem? My domestic fridges and freezers (admittedly not new or top of the range) don't have DLDs.
Lipo's are good if treated properly, you will see most of the video's of them catching fire are by deliberate and violent misuse.
Not just a slight overcharge. But dumping 60volts + into a sub 12v cell at a very high amperage or physical abuse by punturing the battery whilst its fully charged.
I fitted my electric bike battery into an old computer CD drive case.
The bike originally used SLA batteries and according to the guys that know the 4Ah LiPo cells i used will have a similar power output to the original 10Ah SLA cells. But a fraction of the size and weight.
3x 12v SLA's(10Ah) weighed approx 12kg, 2x 18v Lipo packs(4Ah) = 1.2kg including the case and padding that i added.
The guys that know reckon is will cover the same range if not more because you get to use the full 4Ah of a Lipo and the reduced weight to propel.
Give them a try they are good, and they dont lose their charge over long storage periods. Store at approx 80% charge and come back in 2 years time to find them still close to that state of charge.
The vent pipe on your standard battery only needs to be 4mm silicone tubing, The van should have vent holes anyway to drop the pipe through.
I'm still thinking about it! The cost is still prohibitive for me atm, even though otherwise I'm very attracted to the idea (simplicity, space, low maintenance).
Though I do plan to do something this year. I might try and catch RoadPro at a show, though I guess a battery is an unimpressive item to watch at a show...
Ooh I've just come across an ad in the Caravan Club magazine for PowerXtreme, www.powerxtremebatteries.co.uk
a Dutch company also producing LiFePO4 leisure batteries, at a slightly lower price than than EZA (French) though their 80Ah one is down to £1995 now.
Looks like the only way of getting a PowerXtreme in the UK atm is online http://www.sunstore.co.uk/PowerXtreme-LithiumIon-75ah-battery.html £645 Includes an app for your phone which tells you when it is running low!
Amazing family weekend with old steam engines, classic car displays, market stalls, and full catering and bar. And camping on site - Save £25 by booking in advance.
Topic: Lithium (LiFePO4) leisure battery
