Angela you can use Lithium batteries on any E-Bike as long as you match the required voltage that the original Lead Acid battery pack was. So for my Condor or your Veloteq you would need a 48Volt Lithium battery pack of 10AH or higher. You would need to remove your old Lead Acid batteries out of the battery box and put the Lithium battery pack in their place and wire the Lithium battery pack to the battery boxes power outlet port. Then you would have to mount the Lithium battery packs charger port on the battery box. Your original Lead Acid battery charger would be useless to use on the Lithium battery pack. You would need a 48V Lithium battery charger to charge the Lithium battery pack up with. Also having a BMS (Battery Management System) installed between the Lithium battery pack and the battery boxes power outlet port would be recommended. Since Lithium battery packs are lighter and hold their voltage better during the discharge curve you will get better range then you did with you Lead Acid batteries. But do not rely on you battery gauge anymore, it will show almost full power till the last bit of power is used up in the Lithium battery then the power will drop very quickly with virtually no reserve power left, possibly leaving you stranded. Lead Acid batteries have their voltage drop as they are discharged so you pretty well can see when they are almost dead. and Lead Acid batteries have good limp home characteristics. Lithium gives good power to the last then drops its voltage at the end very fast with no real power left or limp home characteristics. So you have to know when to quit riding and charge up your Lithiums on your own without any instrument help.

Ken and Lock...thankyou SO much for this info....oy! ok...so a learning curve these Lithium batteries - but that makes it all the more interesting. Ken - would Mobility Unlimited order a Lithium battery? If so, how much are they now? Also, could I pay you to set it up/show my how to?

I actually rode the last couple of nights...brrr, but I'll take it over TTC. Yep, crazy woman I am.
angela


Kenneth
Edward
Finch

Well best I can say is call John or Svend at Mobility Unlimited and ask them. Yes I could install them and show how to use them for a small fee if any. I am still riding my Condor from my North York home to work in the mornings and back home from work at night. Each way is 15.3kms and takes about 40 minutes or so. But still cheaper and less time then taking the TTC.

Kenneth
Edward
Finch

Interesting thread from the EVDL where one EV'er upgraded his "car-style" EV from lead to lithium:

Re: [EVDL] Gizmo Efficiency with T-875 vs U2200 vs TS-LFP, can this be?
Saturday, February 6, 2010 11:48 PM
From: "Matt Lacey" <mc.lacey@iinet.net.au>
To: "'Electric Vehicle Discussion List'" <ev@lists.sjsu.edu>
Hi David,

Your findings are similar to what Rod Dilkes found when he went from lead to lithium in his mightyboy.
IIRC, the difference was (measured at the powerpoint):
Lead acid: 420wh/mile
Lithium: 300wh/mile

I had a similar experience with one of my scooters,
Went from 70wh/mile to 55wh/mile.

With lead you lose both coulombs (to secondary reactions) and voltage due to internal resistance.

With lithium, you lose only to internal resistance.

Matt


-----Original Message-----
From: ev-bounces@lists.sjsu.edu [mailto:ev-bounces@lists.sjsu.edu] On Behalf Of David Nelson
Sent: Sunday, 7 February 2010 2:04 PM
To: Electric Vehicle Discussion List
Subject: [EVDL] Gizmo Efficiency with T-875 vs U2200 vs TS-LFP, can this be?

I have now had three different battery packs in my Gizmo. It came with 6 Trojan T-875 batteries which I ran until the middle of 2009. I installed a used pack of 8 Interstate U2200UTL batteries which I used until I installed
a buddy-paired TS-LFP100AHA pack of 18 cell pairs.
More detail is on my blog at
http://2003gizmo.blog....
I've summarized the data below. The charger is a Zivan NG1 in all cases. I adjusted the voltage pot to charge the TS pack.

As you can see, the 6V pack, while heavier by over 120lbs, was more efficient than the 8V pack. I think this is because of pukerts. On average I could go about 0.25 miles farther on a kWh from the wall than with the 8V
pack. What is more surprising is that I am able to travel over 2.25 miles farther per kWh from the wall with the TS pack than the flooded lead acid packs! I'm still looking for where I made a mistake in measurement but I
haven't found it yet. I'll be trying out a different Kil-a-Watt meter to see if I get the same results.

Note that the energy values below are all as measured from the wall so include charging inefficiencies.

2006
Total Miles: 967
Total kWh: 272.81
Average miles/kWh: 3.54
Average Wh/mi: 282.1

2007
Total Miles: 2364
Total kWh: 682.15
Average miles/kWh: 3.47
Average Wh/mi: 288.6

2008
Total Miles: 497
Total kWh: 138.53
Average miles/kWh: 3.59
Average Wh/mi: 278.7
(On March 28 I sent the NORM Circuit, which reads the hall effect throttle sensor and sends the appropriate signal to the controller, to Black Sheep Technology to get a replacement built. I didn't realize at the time that I
could have kept using the old one with my manual override switch until the new one arrived so I was without a Gizmo until April 2009. The new interface was worth the wait!)

2009 (8V T-875 pack)
Total Miles: 1180
Total kWh: 315.47
Average miles/kWh: 3.74
Average Wh/mi: 267.4

2009-2010 (6V U2200UTL pack)
Total Miles: 1180 (This number isn't a typo. I had to double check it, too.)
Total kWh: 294.24 Average miles/kWh: 4.01 Average Wh/mi: 249.4

2010 (TS-LFP100AHA buddy paired pack)
Total Miles: 216
Total kWh: 34.47
Average miles/kWh: 6.27
Average Wh/mi: 159.6
(January 18, 2010 through February 5, 2010)

--
David D. Nelson
http://evalbum.com/13...

Terrific whitepaper here by a Toronto EVer (battery electric car) where he compares SLA batteries to LiFePO4 lithium cells:
http://www.myelectric...

tks
Lock

Fun thread on the Endless Sphere at the moment, where one poster asks:

LiFePO4 versus SLAs
I'm closer to giving up on SLAs and going to a LiFePO4. Especially since EV posted their sale for the Headway 36v10ah with rack. Tempting. I have ordered a Watt Meter to give me more info so that I can determine whether or not 10ah will be enough for a round trip commute, charging only once at home.
My question is this: how much longer will a LiFePO4 last than SLAs (currently I'm using 3x12v12ah)? One crucial piece of info: I would ensure that the LiFePO4 I bought would have enough amp hours so that I could charge once daily. With my 3x12v12ah SLAs I charge twice daily.
I suppose another question is whether or not it's better for a lithium battery to be charged once daily versus twice daily? Or does it matter in terms of how long it will last?


And some of the replies:
One thing about LiFePO4 is less voltage sag means though the capacity of the two chemistries may be the same your going to be able to do a lot more with Lithium. My old 12Ah SLA's got me to work and back with some cutting out near the end, my 10Ah LiFePO4 pack gets me to work and back and probably would take me back to work again. (For reference, 20Km to work and back) I would strongly recommend the LiFePO4 over the SLA's, I made the change and I can never go back.


Yes, you should be able to get to work and back on the lifepo4 10 ah pack. It would be likely that 10 ah of lifepo4 would take you twice as far as 12 ah of sla.


lifepo4 for the win!
I just want to add that I'm glad I went with the A123 lifepo4 instead of the other types of batteries. The weight is so much less then SLA's My whole 66V, 6.9AH weighs about 10 lb's compared to an 12AH pack setup with the same voltage of around 40 LB's!!!! That is a huge difference. And your bike wont feel like you have a kid on the back of it. LOL!!!! You will get more range out of the lifepo4's, more life and more performance because of the more capable cells. I can squeeze about 15 miles out of my 6.9AH pack if I go easy and cruise. It's well worth the extra bucks.


The difference is huge. With my 9AH SLA batteries, I must have been getting about 2 AH out of the whole 9 AH battery. I know this because 2 AH on lifepo4 takes me about 3.5 to 4 miles and that's all I was getting out my entire SLA pack. With Lifepo4, it seems like I can go on forever. It's crazy. I used to be limited by the battery, now I go inside when I want to. I'm still conditioning my battery but it was definitely a great purchase. Also, the power of the lifepo4 is sustained throughout the entire trip so if you go 30 mph in the first 5 min, then you 30 mph 45 min later too. With SLA, if you go 30 mph in the first 5 min then you are probably going about 15 mph , 15 min later if you are stilling moving at all.


For myself I get between 6-6.5 amp hours out of my 10ah 48V SLA pack. I have got 19.2 ah out of my 20ah 48v LifePO4 pack. I might have got slightly more out of the lithium but that was a one time experiment last summer which I don't feel like repeating.
SLA pack weighs 28 lbs. LifePO4 pack weighs 22 lbs.
4.48 lbs/ah with lead. 1.12 lbs/ah with lithium. No contest.


I had a lead powered bike first. I'm glad it broke, and I would never go back to lead. The guys with lead powered cars have my respect for tolerating the lackluster performance to be EV pioneers.


Cheers
Lock

Back on February 8 (above) I posted a link to Robert Weekleys whitepaper about lithium cells versus lead.
Here is Robert again making this comparison in a recent message. The talk is about larger batteries and packs for electric cars, but the principles are the same and the mathematics and costs can be scaled down to ebike levels!
*******************************************************

From: durhamelectricvehicleassociation@googlegroups.com [mailto:durhamelectricvehicleassociation@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of Robert Weekley
Sent: Sunday, April 11, 2010 1:07 PM
To: durhamelectricvehicleassociation@googlegroups.com
Cc: evsofcanada@googlegroups.com

Subject: Re: Registration of Electric Vehicles (EV) Conversions

Hi Eric,

(This is a long message, Grab a coffee, and a snack!)

Thanks for the serious and clearly stated points on this issue. You could say - that when my 'electricfly' was first made, as a conversion, in a high school, by a Certified Mechanic and his students, some 14 years ago, that was the best we could do with donated Forklift Motors and Controllers, Flooded Lead Acid Batteries, and sticking them up front in the Radiator Area, on the Firewall, and in the back, just in front of the Bumper, and an extra one in front of them for the full 96V required. However - the Time has also come to 'Get the Lead Out' of EV Conversions!

It was with great interest - that I noticed that at our 'EV Show & Shine BBQ' event yesterday - that one of our first leaders, Brian Kirk and Graham Lambert, with their Porsche 944 Conversion Project, had both taken the plunge, and had already received their 50 Thundersky 100 Ah Cells, and Gavin Bogle had already ordered his Thundersky Cells for his Dodge Dart Swinger Project - Motivated by conversations with me and my information shared on my web site. In my own planned upgrades for my electricfly, they include putting together a 33-Cell pack of 100 Ah Thundersky Cells in the space where my gas tank used to be, for a total usable energy increase of over 3X, plus a weight reduction of about 160 lbs! (This is a further weight Reduction, beyond the 56 lbs. I reduced the car by going from Group 27 Surrette Marine Batteries to the Group 24 Trojan SCS150's) This puts the Cells in the space usually considered to be the safest place in Vehicle Designs, rather than where they are - in the "Pinto Crush and Explosion Zone!"

Further - The cycle life of a set of the Thundersky Cells - starts at 1000 cycles for repetitive 1005 DOD cycles, and goes up to about 5000 Cycles for 70% DOD Cycles. So the Cost Factor per mile, even without the life long equation, = just about equal $ for $ per mile of range, plus - the life factor makes them 5X to 20X Less Expensive, and 2X to 3X more Viable in terms of usability, and marketability.

Additional Tools are needed in the conversion business - in the before conversion and post conversion tests: an integrated 4-corner scale system for measuring corner weights at the wheel, and I have yet to hear about anyone making that kind of a product available to support the EV Conversion Business. Having 4 Scales, each with gram level precision, and ranges from 10 to 1000 Kg, with USB connections for integration and PC data recording, would for the most part, solve the issue of the Data requirements, for any conversion we might do - from Motorcycles, up to quite large vehicles (up to 4000 Kg Curb Weight = about a normal 10 Ton Truck, I would guess).

I have Read over the years - Magazine Delivered Road & Track Vehicle tests, which usually included some interesting road tests that I have not heard EV's being Tested in: The Radius 'Skid Pad', the 'Slalom' Handling Test, and the Accelerate & Break Tests for 0-60, and 60 - 0, among them.

In the 'Get the Lead Out' concept, I do not think of just getting Lead Acid Batteries out of our EV Conversions because of their Poor Power delivery, but also their poor energy capacity! http://www.myelectric... Shows a simple chart - giving a small EnerSys 12V, 17.2 Ah SLA Battery - the 20 Hr rate of 0.86 Amps to the cut-off voltage of 10.5 V yields up 17.2 Ah. However - moving along in the chart - at the 10 hour rate, with a load of just 1.6 Amps, to the same cut-off voltage of 10.5, yields just 16.0 Ah. Continuing to increase the load, to 2.9 Amps, for a 5 hour run time and a lower 10.2 Volt cut-off voltage, yields just 14.5 Ah, and further - at a rate of 10.3 Amps, the 1-hour rating with a cut-off voltage of even lower at 9.6V delivers just 10.3 Ah!

This is an exceptional Power Delivery at the high rate, for a lead-Acid Battery - with 59.88% of its rated energy delivered at the 1 hour rate, which is drawing power 11.97X as great as the 20 Hour test!

When you take a deeper look at the specs of PbA Batteries, while the Peukert Factor Varies among them - you find it is hard to get specs like that which that tell the Power and energy ratings at various levels - in an hour by hour basis. Fortunately - I did find that Surrette lists such data.

(continued)

(continued)

An example would be the table for the Marine Group 24 battery at - http://www.surrette.c.... From this table - you can see - that the normal 80 Ah Battery that we thought we bought - with a load of just 29 Amps for 1 hour - is really only a 29 Ah Battery!!! If you look a their group 27 Battery - http://www.surrette.c... - Also a Common EV Choice, the figures show that the Normal 90 Ah Battery - is just a 32 Ah Battery with a simple 32 Amp load, at the 1-hour rate. Remember - the 20 hour rating of PbA's means the standard load for the group 24 listed here would be just 4 amps, and for the group 27 listed here, would be 4.5 amps.

Total Amp-Seconds available from each then are:

For the Group 24 Battery, Rating versus 1-hour, are: Rating = 288,000, 1-hour = 104,400. This means that - at a load of just 29 amps, we are getting just 36.25% of the Energy we thought we bought! Still, at the 1-hour rate, our current draw is 7.25X what it is at the 20 hour rate! However - as we showed above - the 1-hour rate draws the battery down to a much lower voltage before cut-off.

For the Group 27 Battery, Rating versus 1-hour, are: Rating = 324,000, 1-hour = 115,200. This means that at a load of just 32 Amps, we are getting just 35.55% of the energy we thought we bought! Still, at the 1-hour rate, our current draw is 7.11X what it is at the 20 hour rate! However - as we showed above - the 1-hour rate draws the battery down to a much lower voltage before cut-off.

So - my point is With Lead Acid Batteries, we are paying for a lot of what we are not getting (Energy), and too much for what we are getting - excess weight: the Surrette 24 HT 80 weighs 50 Lbs, and the 27 HT 90 Weights 62 Lbs. Of Course - we could compare the Deep Cycle 6V Batteries, but please tell me where I can Get such detailed specs for a Crown or Trojan Battery!!

OK - the best I can find in short order - the 'Detailed Data Sheet for the Crown CR-225 Deep Cycle Battery
- http://lib.store.yaho.... It shows the for the CR-225 model, just the 20-hour and the 5-hour Ratings at 225 Ah and 185 Ah Respectively, but without an indication of the Amp loads, or the Cut-off voltages! Of the 2 page sheet - it spends the first page on look-good feel good images! On the first half of the second page on saying why they are so good! It just spends about 1/4 of a page on the data I want! (And that is even very limited for real energy evaluations specs!)

If we too the Reserve Capacity (Which - to my best understanding - is a figure that equals a single deep cycle to 100% DOD) they show 115 Amps at 75 Minutes. So - that equals 8,775 Amp Minutes, or 526,500 Amps Seconds. This Battery weighs in at 63 pounds, and two are required for a 12V comparison = 126 lbs. Comparing with the Surrette, two of the Group 27 Batteries in Parallel, would be the closest weight, at 124 lbs., and would deliver 230,400 Amp Seconds, but - this is at the 1 hour rating, and the Crown is at the Reserve Capacity rating - so this is not an equal comparison!

So - lets back up an look at the Surrette 27 HT 90 at the 5 hour rate. At the 5-Hr rating - it is listed as delivering 56 Ah, at a current of 11 amps.

The Crown says it can deliver 185 Ah at a 5-Hr rating, so it would appear that the Crown is a better battery - since two of them in series, weighing in at 126 lbs, just about 2% heavier than the Surettes' two in parallel, can deliver 165.17% of the power than the Surettes'! Excellent! Now How about that Reserve Capacity direct comparison - The Surrette is listed at 183 minutes at 25 Amps: 4,575 Amp Minutes per Battery, or 9,150 Amp Minutes with two in Parallel (549,000 Amps Seconds), versus the Crown CR-225 at just 8,775 Amp Minutes (526,500 Amps Seconds). Now we get a different Picture with this comparison!

Either way - that 500,000+ Amps Seconds cost us about 125 Lbs on Average. Also - Based on the Surrette Specs which are more definitive and complete, we still don't have what the battery would do it I loaded it at a steady load of about 140 - 175 Amps! (What my car would use in Normal Highway Driving), so - we still are guessing at what the actual range would be able to be estimated at from these Batteries, since they don't provide enough information to make a decent estimate. All we do know is that If I used the Crown CR-225 in my car, I could get at least one good cycle out of them at 125 Amps - for 75 Minutes, and the pack would weigh in (16 x 63 lbs) at 1,008 Pounds!!!! Maybe More - More Wiring connections with Heavy Gauge Copper! that would get me about 80 Kmh for about 75 minutes, or about 100 Km Range. At least once! Maybe further with some luck, but for how many cycles, we don't know.

Oh - and the cost - for the 16 Crown Batteries - (16 X $118 - Volume Discounted): $1,888.00, Plus Shipping of a half ton of Lead!!

So - lets take that 100 Ah Thundersky Cell that was chosen for the Porsche 944 Project. Here is a basic Spec Sheet with Load and Temperature Performance Graphs: http://evolveelectric....

At 0.5C (50 Amps), The Battery is said to deliver about 105 - 107% of it's rated Capacity, or 105-107 Ah. Yet - let's just take out 100 Ah (100% DOD), the Voltage is still up at about 3.1V at cut-off, and the Cell can deliver about 1000 Cycles like this. At 1C or 100 Amps, with a 3.0V cut-off, it can still deliver 100 Ah, and 1000 cycles. At it's Maximum constant Current Discharge Rating of 3C or 300 Amps, it is rated to deliver about 92-94% of its rated capacity, or about 92 Ah, or about 80% of its capacity at a cut-off voltage of 3.05V!

(continues)

(continued)

So - The cell, can deliver 80% DOD with a fairly High Discharge Rate, and a fairly high Cut-Off Voltage as well. At 3.2V Nominal, and 3.2 Kg +/- 100 gms., 33 such cells in my car, using the max weight of 3.3 Kg, would weigh in at just 108.9 Kg, or 239.58 Lbs. Comparing that with the Crown at 1,008 lbs makes the choice easier in terms of weight.

Looking at cost. Using the same source - Evolve electrics, with the cell cost at $140.00 (Not the Lowest source Price), Gives a cost of $4,620.00

Checking Alliance Renewable Energy, we find a cell cost of $107.50 (About the lowest price I have seen), Which Gives a cost of $3,547.50.

Comparing this $3,547.50 price to the 1,000 Lbs of the Crown Batteries CR-225 means it costs just 1.88X the Purchase Price for a Pack that weighs just 240 lbs instead of 1000 lbs! Plus - It will deliver More Energy, fit in a smaller space, and last at least 5X as long!

If we could just accept a low current draw - Like the 1-Hour rating of the Surrette Group 27 Battery like the 32 Amps listed, and compared that to the Thundersky 40 Ah cell, it means we would be drawing about 0.75C ( 30 Amps ), and we could get out from the 40 Ah Cell, and easy 40 Ah with a 3.0V Cut-off Voltage, and - we could get a run time of about 1.3 Hours or an Hour and 20 minutes, for a Battery Pack (In my case of a 96V-99V Nominal Target) of 33 Cells at 1.6 Kg +/- 100 gms.., or 33 x 1.7 Kg max = 56.1 Kg, or 123.42 lbs. That means that the whole Low Power TS Pack Delivering 25% More Energy than the Surrette Battery, would weigh as much as just two such batteries, and therefore be 1/4 of the weight of the 8 of them I would need in my car! (Not to mention - the TS Cell could also push out a pulse power of 20C [20 X 40 Amps = 800 Amps, for about 10 Seconds], and a continuous power of 120 Amps for 20 minutes!). With this Small Pack - the cost would just be $1,419 from Alliance!

I believe - it can be seen - anyone arguing to keep Lead Acid Batteries of any kind in EV Conversions, is simply not comparing value for value!

Read Through my first Whitepaper on this subject completely if you want to get a full grasp of this concept.

http://www.myelectric...

More Later!

Robert Weekley
www.myelectricfly.com

I just dropped my scooter off to be fixed at Segway in the Distillery.
I talked with the manager (Jason) there about how I'm looking into Lithium batteries this time around.
He said that, yes, the Veloteq e-scooters can be rigged up to use Lithium batteries...but cautioned me to do my research around the quality of Lithium battery. To make sure it's been tested and a good one and has a manufacturer's warranty.
He showed me this utube clip on lithium battery safety.
http://www.youtube.co...

If link doesn't work. Search under Segway Saphion battery.

Thoughts?

Angela

I just dropped my scooter off to be fixed at Segway in the Distillery.
I talked with the manager (Jason) there about how I'm looking into Lithium batteries this time around.
He said that, yes, the Veloteq e-scooters can be rigged up to use Lithium batteries...but cautioned me to do my research around the quality of Lithium battery. To make sure it's been tested and a good one and has a manufacturer's warranty.
He showed me this utube clip on lithium battery safety.
http://www.youtube.co...

If link doesn't work. Search under Segway Saphion battery.

Thoughts?

Angela

Me too I had my condo maintenance man JC research it now it's going to cost $150/ea x 4= $600 for a Lithium Battery pack. Now the upside is 3 times the "touring range" which would be a real Plus.