well, boys 'n' girls, the price of LiFePO4 batteries keeps going down. Will Prowse, whose youtube channel tests and then tears apart solar gear, has now posted a video about a $132, 100 AH 12 volt battery that is impressively high quality. This is a price that is actually less than the going price for high quality AGM batteries.
Agreed. I've been watching the Lithium trend since it started and waiting for prices to come down to a more reasonable level. It looks like it might finally be time to get serious.
ya I don't think they can go much lower, well they probably can.. but my 304AH cells are now 85 bucks each from the expensive but fast place in the USA, but 64.00US on a direct order from China. ordering from the US actually has a ton more charges and really isn't worth it, if you are not living in the US
I'll probably swap out in the spring. Cheaper than lead-acid, doubly so when accounting for the fact 80-90% of the rating is usable amp-hr vs 30-50% for lead-acid (quadropoly so for AGM)
Never got the fascination with AGM. They make sense for planes and boat where spiled acid is a real risk as they rock and roll but any RV 30deg off level has bigger issues. Otherwise, they are expensive, fragile versions of standard lead-acid. If you don't want to fill them with water, get sealed lead acid.
My fascination with my group 31 AGM batteries is NO maintenance. At all. That was worth the price for me when I bought them nearly 8 years ago.
I am probably going to switch to LiFePO4 batteries this year, because I want to. The AGMs are still going strong.
um, 100% of the rating is usable to get the rated life. if you use 80 to 90% your going to get more, and to be frank either us or the battery will age out before the extra cycle life is ever hit 🤣
so say it is rated for 3000 cycles (that's on the low end now days) but that is 8.2 years with a full cycle every day. if we only use 80% of the capacity you could in theory get 5-6000 cycles but at 5500 that's 15 years. its going to be interesting to find out when they will start aging out vs cycling out for the average rv'er. I don't know anyone who does a 100% cycle at 0.5C charge and discharge with only 30 min rests at the top and bottom. (that's EVE's cycle life testing protocol)
now having said that, I only use 10 to 20% of my capacity, but that is because I set my battery up for reserve capacity so if my solar craps the bed I don't have to stop my trip early. and with the pricing of 100AH batteries now there is no reason someone can't upgrade there reserve a little bit and do a shallower daily draw but have the extra capacity incase of an emergency, weather it is running the furnace for a cold weekend or charging up the battery of the unit parked next to you. I have actually done this a few times, the guys camping next to me were running a darn noisy generator to charge their trolling motor battery. I told them to bring it to me when they come off the water and I'll make sure it is charge for them as long as they promise to not run the genny.
yup, just watched that one, at that price we are dealing with scall of economy pricing, I can find 100Ah cells as low as 14 bucks on ali express, but that is 56 bucks, then say 50 bucks for the same quality BMS as they are using that's only leaving 26 bucks for the wiring and some sort of case. so it is cheaper than you can diy for. even then I would want a different BMS that is about 100 bucks. I was wondering when the actual prices of premade batteries was going to start reflecting the drop in cell prices and it has started to this year on the smaller batteries.
never mind AGM, as a high quality agm up here is over 400 bucks, a 12V normal deep cycle with 80ah is more expensive than that now.
