Nickel Iron (was Battery Experience/Suggestions for Grid Tie?) [RE-wrenches

[Travis Creswell]

Lb per Lb they are twice as energy dense as Lead Acid.  And supposedly can
be taken down to almost nothing with no effect on cycle life.

In real general term that means that 500lbs of NiFe's are equivalent to
2000lbs of lead acids!

But they self discharge faster and are less charge efficient then lead
acids.  

In college I was on an electric race car team.  Eagle Picher (the guys that
build pretty much every battery for space applications) supplied NiFe
batteries and a few engineers.  We asked about self discharge and the
engineer joked that it would be ideal if we could start the race with a long
enough cord so that it didn't quit charging until we were up to racing
speeds.


Travis Creswell
Ozark Energy Services

-----Original Message-----
From: Roy Butler, Four Winds RE [mailto:roy at four-winds-energy.com] 
Sent: Friday, May 25, 2007 8:06 AM
To: RE-wrenches at topica.com
Subject: Re: Battery Experience/Suggestions for Grid Tie? [RE-wrenches]


Todd,

You're quite right....the old NiFe batteries are not very efficient.
But the way I look at it, they certainly make up for it with a century 
of service life!

The cases on these batteries are steel....and yes, you can measure 
voltage between the case and the positive terminal.
That's why they came from the factory installed in a nifty code 
compliant white oak battery rack with rubber spacers ;-)

Roy Butler
NABCEP Certified Solar PV Installer®
NYSERDA eligible PV & wind installer 
Four Winds Renewable Energy, LLC
8902 Route 46
Arkport, NY 14807
607-324-9747
www.four-winds-energy.com

Although no trees were killed in the sending of this message, 
a large number of electrons were terribly inconvenienced.




Todd Cory, Mt. Shasta Energy Services wrote:

>
> What kind of cases did they have for batteries in the 1930's?
>
> I have heard the Nickel/Iron batteries do last basically forever, but 
> that they are very inefficient.
>
> Todd
>
>
> Roy Butler, Four Winds RE wrote:
>
>>
>> Matt,
>>
>> This post will probably wind up in electron limbo...but here goes...
>>
>> I have a bunch of Edison NiFe cells...made between 1932 and 1940 that 
>> Bob Ellison and I took off of a steam train in Virginia.
>> Some had been in continuous for a lot of years on the train and now 
>> 20 of these form a 24 volt bank I use here in the shop.
>>
>> Others from this same group had been discharged, shorted with jumpers 
>> and stored for about 20 years.
>> These are working quite well....accepting a charge and load testing 
>> to 70-75% of their rated capacity.
>> As with the NiCads, the Edison manual says to change the electrolyte 
>> if the capacities drop over the years.
>>
>> 75 years and counting.....I'm thoroughly impressed!
>>
>> Roy Butler
>> NABCEP Certified Solar PV Installer®
>> NYSERDA eligible PV & wind installer Four Winds Renewable Energy, LLC
>> 8902 Route 46
>> Arkport, NY 14807
>> 607-324-9747
>> www.four-winds-energy.com 
>
>

No virus found in this outgoing message.
Checked by AVG Free Edition. 
Version: 7.5.472 / Virus Database: 269.8.1/822 - Release Date: 5/28/2007
11:40 AM
 


- - - -
Hosted by Home Power magazine

To send a message: RE-wrenches at topica.com

Archive of previous messages: http://lists.topica.com/lists/RE-wrenches/read

List rules & how to change your email address: www.mrsharkey.com/wrenches/etiquette.php

Check out participant bios: www.mrsharkey.com/wrenches/

Moderator: michael.welch at homepower.com
--^----------------------------------------------------------------
This email was sent to: michael_welch at sbcglobal.net

EASY UNSUBSCRIBE click here: http://topica.com/u/?bz8Qcs.bz9JC9.bWljaGFl
Or send an email to: RE-wrenches-unsubscribe at topica.com

For Topica's complete suite of email marketing solutions visit:
http://www.topica.com/?p=TEXFOOTER
--^----------------------------------------------------------------