[RE-wrenches] Absolyte recovery

Darryl Thayer daryl_solar at yahoo.com
Fri Feb 17 19:52:53 PST 2012 

Hi Mac I am a little stupid here so help me out.   if the Apollo's are floating means the batteries are fully charged.  OR  they are charged to the voltage set on the Apollo.   I have several Apollo charge controllers, they work like they are set.  If the voltage set points are to low the batteries will be discharged all the time.  I would set my absorb voltage at 58.4 volts and set the float at 54.4 and as many people here recommended they need to be watched to see how the state of charge is holding.  The Apollo has a built in state of charge indication, if the batteries are older they need to be set with a lower charge efficiency, perhaps 85%. but nothing substitutes for hydrometer readings periodically.  Unfortunately  you said it is a very remote site and it may have very strong seasonal variations, in load and resource.  Also the Apollo inverter/charger has state of charge indication through the charge controller and the current shunt. 
 I again wonder if the inverter charger is set for proper battery charging.  It is classic for batteries to be undercharged to death.  The apollo equipment has excellent internet accessibility contact apollo, if you have a way of connecting,  to the internet.  


As far as recovery of dead batteries, I have seen old dead batteries brought back to some performance never good, by putting on a high voltage charge.  I say do this with the up most caution and it you are not confident in what you are doing do not do this.  it does not always work.  take a high voltage rectifier, Isolate the battery completely,  Connect the rectifier in series with the 120 volt source and a 500 watt halogen work lamp and then the Battery. (if you do not know the polarity do not do this)    I have taken  batteries that would not take a charge and performed this stunt and they have come back.. for some reason a heavily sulfated battery will not convert , this high voltage forces the charge current.  The halogen lamp limits the current to 5 amps.  Always were goggles and face mask and rubber apron, never allow spark near charging battery.  This method can generate hydrogen and oxygen, have batte4ry in well vented place and make
 sure connections are solid.  after the lamp glows bright shut off the charge and let H2 clear and then oan only then remove the connections.   are doing.  



________________________________
 From: mac Lewis <maclewis1 at gmail.com>
To: RE-wrenches <re-wrenches at lists.re-wrenches.org> 
Sent: Friday, February 17, 2012 9:08 AM
Subject: Re: [RE-wrenches] Absolyte recovery
 

Hi Chris,

I suspect that the charger in the Apollo Inverter/Charger is undersized, especially since all of the loads are -48V.  Conversely, the array is very oversized and the controllers float most of the time.  The charge controllers were working fine last I checked.  It's difficult to access the site right now, it includes a 30 mile snow mobile ride.  We intended to put a comprehensive remote monitoring system but it didn't get put in before the snow came.  I want to get up there and help the system limp along until snow melt when we can do a thorough assessment.
The generator guy went up there and someone had pulled the stop switch on the genset.  The battery voltage was around 5V on a 48V bank.  Yikes!

  Thanks for the contact info.


On Thu, Feb 16, 2012 at 2:13 PM, Chris <chris at solarwindworks.com> wrote:

Hi Mac,
>We had a cell failure on an Absolyte system we inherited and contacted;
>Jeff Lambert
>Product Support and Warranty
>East Penn Mfg. Co., Inc. - Unigy Battery Division
>(Office: (610) 682 – 6361 ext. 2848  | ÈCell: (484) 955 – 2899  |  ÇPage:  888-797-8039 (If no answer on Cell) |  *Email:jlambert at eastpennunigy.com
>Jeff was very helpful.
>I do wonder if your charge controllers are getting the array power out to the battery bank, was there any damage to them too? Is the Apollo 4048 inverter/charger doing its job, is it undersized for the size of battery bank?
> 
>Sincerely,
>
>Chris Worcester
>Solar Wind Works
>NABCEP Certified PV Installer
>Phone: 530-582-4503
>Fax: 530-582-4603
>www.solarwindworks.com
>chris at solarwindworks.com
>"Proven Energy Solutions"
> 
>From:re-wrenches-bounces at lists.re-wrenches.org [mailto:re-wrenches-bounces at lists.re-wrenches.org] On Behalf Of mac Lewis
>Sent: Thursday, February 16, 2012 12:43 PM
>To: RE-wrenches
>Subject: Re: [RE-wrenches] Absolyte recovery
> 
> Wrenches,
> 
>We have inherited a Telecomm system in which the batteries have had a very hard life.  A lighting strike knocked the system off line for about 5 months, and ground fault dragged the batteries way down about a month ago.  Now, we are seeing about 10h of generator run time/day indicating to me that the batteries are not holding voltage at all.
> 
>  I am uncertain of the exact specs at this moment, but it is a 24 Absolyte IIP batteries (5 years old), with a 5 kW array, two Apollo T80HV charge controllers and an Apollo 4048 inverter charger.
> 
>I don't have experience with these batteries.  Is there any way to try to recover these batteries?  Any good contacts with GNB would be useful.
> 
>Thanks
>
> 
> 
>>Wrenches,
>> 
>>We have inherited a Telecomm system in which the batteries have had a very hard life.  
>>
>> 
>>-- 
>> 
>> 
>> 
>>Mac Lewis
>>"Yo solo sé que no sé nada." -Sócrates
>> 
>
>
>
> 
>-- 
> 
> 
> 
>Mac Lewis
>"Yo solo sé que no sé nada." -Sócrates
> 
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-- 



Mac Lewis

"Yo solo sé que no sé nada." -Sócrates

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