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Forum Index : Other Stuff : NiFe, Nickel Iron Batteries, Ni-Fe
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| ChargedUp Newbie  Joined: 23/12/2012 Location: United StatesPosts: 4 |
Here are some more project photos: 700 Ah 24 Volt battery near Moab, UT 
400 Ah 24 Volt battery in New Mexico 
800 Ah 48 Volt battery near Cadillac, MI 
Wind turbine to power up the 800Ah battery bank 
Solar Array to charge up a new 1000 Ah 48 Volt bank in Colorado 
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| Warpspeed Guru  Joined: 09/08/2007 Location: AustraliaPosts: 4406 |
Wow! Thank you ChargedUp, that is an absolute goldmine of information. Cheers, Tony. |
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| ChargedUp Newbie Joined: 23/12/2012 Location: United StatesPosts: 4 |
Thanks for the positive feedback. I love this stuff!!! Here are some more historical documents you may enjoy. This 1914 Manual was purchased from Ebay, is a one-of-a-kind, and is the most expensive book that I own... just don't tell my wife how much it cost! 2012-12-28_204353_Edison_Manual_--_Battery_Charging_1914.pdf This document is from 1911 Scientific American magazine 2012-12-28_204453_1911_Edison.pdf A pertinent Edison quote... 
And Edison's original EV that was Ni-Fe powered (but only went about 10-15 mph) 
One more fun photo... 
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| Warpspeed Guru Joined: 09/08/2007 Location: AustraliaPosts: 4406 |
Truly fascinating stuff ChargedUp. How are modern NiFe cells constructed ? Do they still use the perforated tubes and stacked oxide/nickel flake method that Edison used, or some other method. Cheers, Tony. |
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| Georgen Guru Joined: 13/09/2011 Location: AustraliaPosts: 462 |
E-Bay 130Ah Deep cycle AGM battery with free delivery $299 need 4 of them to make bit over 500Ah 12V storage. Just $1,200 for all 4 Making it 4 lots for the price of one. “Inexpensive” Edison 500Ah 12 V system $4,500 plus delivery http://ironedison.com/nickel-iron-ni-fe-battery Break even mentioned on Edison page after 8 years, which suggests that AGM batteries system will break down in about 2 years, as you can get 4 lots AGM for the price of one Edison. George |
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yahoo2 Guru Joined: 05/04/2011 Location: AustraliaPosts: 1166 |
Hi George, you are not really getting this are you! I have looked at the web site for the best part of 2 minutes and a number of things things are immediately obvious. 1. Nickle iron batteries are discharged to 95% NOT 35%, you are not taking this into account. 2. The middle sized batteries in their range in a 12volt bank loaded with electrolyte are going to be a total weight close to half a tonne. This is a whole different league to cheap-arse AGM's on ebay. Electrolyte volume is king when it comes to battery capacity and longevity. 3. The site is in American dollars. An equivalent mid range battery bank to compare it with would be a 1500Ah trojan or Raylite. Rolls/surrette $3500-$4500 (they don't last) raylite or trojan $4,500 + BAE / trojan industrial $6,000+ (the next level up again) I'm confused, no wait... maybe I'm not... |
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| Georgen Guru Joined: 13/09/2011 Location: AustraliaPosts: 462 |
Looks better now George |
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| MasterCATZ Regular Member  Joined: 25/03/2011 Location: AustraliaPosts: 52 |
I am also thinking about building my own nife batteries I was wondering what fish tanks would be like for containers I know a guy that just makes heaps of them for something to do ... just unsure how silicone reacts with the chemicals needed I have fish tanks that have lasted over 20 yrs in the sunlight and these seem more like HH0 generators reversed maybe looking for nickel / ion foils might work out cheaper / surface area |
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| Warpspeed Guru Joined: 09/08/2007 Location: AustraliaPosts: 4406 |
Don't know about the silicone rubber sealer, but should be o/k ?? Edison built his original NiFe batteries in a hard rubber case. Silicone rubber is impervious to just about anything except petrochemical solvents. Do they make small plastic framed glass fish tanks ? I have no idea. Cheers, Tony. |
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| jack fork stik Newbie Joined: 08/12/2012 Location: AustraliaPosts: 34 |
are nife's like nicad's as in for every ah taken out you need to put 1 1/2 ah back in compered to lead acids that you only need 10% more? |
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| MasterCATZ Regular Member Joined: 25/03/2011 Location: AustraliaPosts: 52 |
From my workings I should be able to DIY for around the same price as buying manufactured lead batteries / AH for now I will just do a 12v system and if it works go for a 48v system and hook it up to a solar inverter I should be able to store 6kw worth of power easily even if I get poor ah per cell pretty confident I can make 200 ah cells cheaply enougth the guy practically gives away his small fish tanks for like $5 for 30x15x15 tank and the large 180x90x90 one I got from him was only $80 pretty sure he has something along the size I need looks like I will have to get the foils from china could not find any supplies in AU guessing .5 mm thick will do and just use plastic washers and rods like we use in HH0 generators just unsure if I should get expanded foil or not ( mesh / matt design ) I am pretty sure I would loose the surface area http://www.simon.richardson.net/homepower/edison.html What are the characteristics of the cell? iFe cells are a fully-charged voltage of 1.25v per cell, a fully discharged voltage of 1.0v per cell, and a charge endpoint of 1.8v per cell. They have a rather high rate of self-discharge: 0.33% per hour. That equates to about 8% per day, about 43% per week. about 67% in a fortnight, about 90% in a month. A trawl online also uncovered a manual for the original Edison product. nickel hydroxide surface area of 17 to 19 m2/g. typical Ni(OH)2 particle sizes are around the 20μm diameter. Since conductivity is through particle contact, a covering layer of 20μm should be good. The material has a density of 1600kgm-3 An ampere-hour of charge is approximately 37.3mMol of electrons. Here are the weights of various active reagents in this cell:- Reagent Molar Mass Mass for 1Ah Notes Hydroxyl Ion 17.0g 630mg Nickel 58.7g 2190mg 8900kgm-3 Nickel Hydroxide 92.7g 3460mg 1600kgm-3 Nickel Oxyhydroxide 91.7g 3420mg Iron 55.8g 1040mg 7850kgm-3 Iron Hydroxide 89.8g 1675mg Surface area and dimensions To obtain the required surface area, each gram of Ni(OH)2 will need to occupy about 20m2 of electrode. That means about 70m2 per Ah. Anything much less than this is going to give excessively high internal resistance. If we use nickel wire where 75% of the wire reacts, then we need 2.92g of wire, which has a volume of 3.28 x 10-7 m3. Modelling wire as a cylinder of area 2πrl and volume πr2l gives a ratio of volume to area of r/2. Substituting our area and volume gives a radius of 9.4nm, or a diameter of 19.8nm. That's silly. However, the particle sizes of 19μm clearly don't match this area/volume ratio, so the material itself must be porous. By substituting in the densities and molar masses, we can see that to produce 20μm of nickel hydroxide requires 2.3μm of nickel. Given that using 75% of the wire means using 50% of the diameter, a diameter of 10μm would seem about right. In volume terms, for each Ah of capacity, 0.25cc of nickel combines with 1.26cc of water to form 2.16cc of nickel hydroxide. So the initial charging process that creates the nickel must increase the volume of the cell by 0.65cc. A similar expansion is likely to occur at the iron electrode. |
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powerednut Senior Member  Joined: 09/12/2009 Location: AustraliaPosts: 221 |
I can't provide any info as to the accuracy of the information in this link, but the article "How to Make Economical, Green, High Energy Batteries" may be of use: MakingBatteries |
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| Warpspeed Guru Joined: 09/08/2007 Location: AustraliaPosts: 4406 |
Catz, It will be a long time before I am free of all my existing projects and can look into all this myself. The main advantages of NiFe batteries seems to be the very long life of these batteries and freedom from all the slow deterioration and failure modes common to many other battery chemistries. While initial cost is always a big factor, a battery that lasts 30 years or 60 years has to be better than a 3 or 6 year life battery. The big disadvantage appears to be that of high internal resistance, unless extraordinary measures are taken to keep this low. As I see it, if the battery is sized to have a very high total amp hour capacity, relatively fast discharge rates are not going to be required anyway. If very high intermittent discharge rates are a prime requirement, as it could well be with a huge oversized inverter, and motor starting. How about combining some Ultracaps to a NiFe battery ? These could also soak up large infrequent peaks in charging current without wasteful load dumping. Cheers, Tony. |
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| Tassie Mike Newbie Joined: 29/05/2008 Location: AustraliaPosts: 13 |
I found some really old DEAC batteries at the scrappies ! orig Edison config, covered in black tar paint and metal cases. Pix when I get them charging Am going to replace the electrolyte in a month or so when I get back to Tassie from the mainland -- leaving tomorrow. Here is a guy who mixes Potassium Hydroxide with a small amount of Lithium Hydroxide to make a better electrolyte ! :-) BY THE TONNE ! Really, by the tonne Brad Parker ph 0410146356 Cheers all Tassie Mike |
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| Georgen Guru Joined: 13/09/2011 Location: AustraliaPosts: 462 |
Found this supplier : http://ironcorebatteries.com.au/page2.php 10 pieces 500 Ah about $4,000 US plus delivery 10 pieces 200 Ah about $1,700 US plus delivery Also payment for currency exchange, plus few more. On top of that GST 10% and probably duty too. George |
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Downwind Guru Joined: 09/09/2009 Location: AustraliaPosts: 2333 |
One would think lithum might be more cost effective in the longer view. Also if you were to import a quanty for self use, you would want to order them in at least 1 week intervals, and stay under $1000.00 per order, as in this great country there is no duty on import orders under $1000.00 Althought if all orders arrive on the same day you will be charged duties on the total combined orders. Its a simple use of the system, but overseas sellers dont care and dont understand the importants of dispaching goods over a time period, and tend to send all orders together. This is why you need to watch the limit and stretch the order out, even with added freight charges it still often works out far cheaper and no import hassels to stay under the $1000.00 limit. Pete. Sometimes it just works |
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Bryan1 Guru Joined: 22/02/2006 Location: AustraliaPosts: 1210 |
G'Day Guy's, Finally got around to reading this thread and I do have a bank of old cells that a mate gave me. They came from an airforce base and have been powering my shed radio for the last 10 years via an 80 watt pv panel. I have set the dump charge to 16 volts and for years they worked 24/7 but now they are getting a bit tired mainly due to me adding distilled water over the years. I do think a fresh wash of distilled water and new batch of electrolyte may bring these babies back to life again. It is good to see that soap company is in Adelaide so I'll have to go grab a 5kg bag and do a good readup on the whole process. Cheers Bryan |
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| Georgen Guru Joined: 13/09/2011 Location: AustraliaPosts: 462 |
From what I read 10 years is long run on one batch of electrolyte. (You are very lucky to get set. Pity that it is so hard to buy old stock locally) George |
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| Georgen Guru Joined: 13/09/2011 Location: AustraliaPosts: 462 |
Relevant link to this thread: http://ps-survival.com/PS/Batteries/NiMH/Iron-Nickel_Battery _2008.pdf From page 15 of this thread: http://www.thebackshed.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=2979&PN =1&TPN=15 Suppose best to come back here with Ni-Fe batteries or we might start another thread on: ‘Home made Ni-Fe batteries’ George |
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| Tassie Mike Newbie Joined: 29/05/2008 Location: AustraliaPosts: 13 |
Just saw this link, http://www.noonco.com/edison/improvements.htm Cheers Mike |
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