Wishlist - Battery Monitoring

[system 4-50]

I need a device that will:

 

1. Sit in the battery cell top-up hole.

2. Power itself up once a week.

3. Measure the specific gravity of the cell it is in.

(Ideally of multiple levels within the cell)

4. Measure the temperature of the cell.

5. Measure the liquid level in the cell.

6. Measure the wind direction.

7. Where possible measure the voltage across the cell

8. Transmit the above information via wifi together with date & time & id.

9. Power itself down again.

10. Consume negligible power until next power-up.

11. Not get in the way of auto-watering systems.

12. Not cost more than about £10 per cell

13. Be transferable to the next set of batteries.

14. Match the rest of my electrical panels.

15. Be readable without my glasses on.

 

If anybody knows where I can find some, or better still has some going for a song second-hand, please PM me.

[Nickhlx]

Hmmm.... sounds useful (and expensive !)

 

Nick

[OldGoat]

Correction -

You 'want' not 'need'

 

Such a device probably doesn't exist, possibly because of the costs involved and a demand of one unit so far.........

[Loafer]

I need a device that will:

 

1. Sit in the battery cell top-up hole.

2. Power itself up once a week.

3. Measure the specific gravity of the cell it is in.

(Ideally of multiple levels within the cell)

4. Measure the temperature of the cell.

5. Measure the liquid level in the cell.

6. Measure the wind direction.

7. Where possible measure the voltage across the cell

8. Transmit the above information via wifi together with date & time & id.

9. Power itself down again.

10. Consume negligible power until next power-up.

11. Not get in the way of auto-watering systems.

12. Not cost more than about £10 per cell

13. Be transferable to the next set of batteries.

14. Match the rest of my electrical panels.

15. Be readable without my glasses on.

 

If anybody knows where I can find some, or better still has some going for a song second-hand, please PM me.

 

How much are you prepared to pay?

[system 4-50]

 

How much are you prepared to pay?

This is not GCHQ so I am able to give a clue! See No 12!

[Loafer]

This is not GCHQ so I am able to give a clue! See No 12!

 

Ah yes. I see! No, I can't do it for that. Sorreeee!

[system 4-50]

 

Ah yes. I see! No, I can't do it for that. Sorreeee!

I'm intrigued. What price can you do it for then?

[Loafer]

I'm intrigued. What price can you do it for then?

 

Well I was thinking that a couple of million would get me a team of decent blokes on the case. I might even get Gibbo interested for a slice of that!

 

I'm sorry s4-50, I'm a bit 'refreshed' following a bit of a Sunday lunchtime, and I'm purely out for laughs!

[dmr]

I have thought about such a device myself, and I expect many companies have done a feasibility study.

We could relax many of your constraints and esoteric desires (conflict with watering systems and bluetooth etc) and home in on a device that just monitors specific gravity. Its still not easy. I can't see how to do it. Living in a pot of acid does not really help either.

Something based on the optical approach might be a starter but optical stuff is not usually cheap.

 

Any forum ideas????

 

.............Dave

[George94]

I have thought about such a device myself, and I expect many companies have done a feasibility study.

We could relax many of your constraints and esoteric desires (conflict with watering systems and bluetooth etc) and home in on a device that just monitors specific gravity. Its still not easy. I can't see how to do it. Living in a pot of acid does not really help either.

Something based on the optical approach might be a starter but optical stuff is not usually cheap.

 

Any forum ideas????

 

.............Dave

 

Compromise a little and buy a Smartgauge.

[system 4-50]

 

Well I was thinking that a couple of million would get me a team of decent blokes on the case. I might even get Gibbo interested for a slice of that!

 

I'm sorry s4-50, I'm a bit 'refreshed' following a bit of a Sunday lunchtime, and I'm purely out for laughs!

Sorry, I forgot to put the smiley in again!.

 

Compromise a little and buy a Smartgauge.

Got one & very good it is too. However, it does not make my aged batteries as good as new, as promised by the various posts of this forum (possible slight exaggeration here) & I understand this involves watching every twitch of every molecule in each cell.

[nicknorman]

 

Any forum ideas????

 

.............Dave

I'm sure it could be done esp. for the likes of Trojans with their reasonably large cell caps with bayonet fitting.

 

Two floats, (both pretty small of course) one very light so it floats on the surface, one the appropriate density to float according to the fluid density. The top of each float is inside a triple coil, top and bottom are sine waves in quadrature, middle one is the pickup whose phase depends on the vertical position of a small core on the top of the float - ie measures the float's position (ie LVDT). Thermistor in there somewhere to measure temperature. So the floaty float measures fluid level, the sinky float's level compared to the floaty float's level is the sg. All fed and picked up by a SMD Pic micro, which only powers up from time to time and for milliseconds to take readings, data sent along canbus or SPI or I2C along with the other cells, to a hub with wifi. Not sure if you can send power over canbus etc, if not you'd need power wires too ( but could all be in a small 4 core cable).

Auto-cal function so you measure the level and SG manually once (full, and fully charged) and it would adjust the LVDT decoding accordingly.

Simple!

[ROBDEN]

I need a device that will:

 

1. Sit in the battery cell top-up hole.

2. Power itself up once a week.

3. Measure the specific gravity of the cell it is in.

(Ideally of multiple levels within the cell)

4. Measure the temperature of the cell.

5. Measure the liquid level in the cell.

6. Measure the wind direction.

7. Where possible measure the voltage across the cell

8. Transmit the above information via wifi together with date & time & id.

9. Power itself down again.

10. Consume negligible power until next power-up.

11. Not get in the way of auto-watering systems.

12. Not cost more than about £10 per cell

13. Be transferable to the next set of batteries.

14. Match the rest of my electrical panels.

15. Be readable without my glasses on.

 

If anybody knows where I can find some, or better still has some going for a song second-hand, please PM me.

You're in luck. Aldi special next week.......have to rush though, they only have two.

 

Rob....

[system 4-50]

Ok, I've slated the build for 2017, once I've finished the tilt alarm... Which is waiting on finishing the kitchen. Ok, galley.

[Tony Brooks]

I wonder if the conductivity or capacitance between two electrodes would alter according to the specific gravity? If it does then that might be the way t go, especially with auto top up so the length of electrode in the acid is more or less constant.

[nicknorman]

Ok, I've slated the build for 2017, once I've finished the tilt alarm... Which is waiting on finishing the kitchen. Ok, galley.

Just on the subject of the tilt alarm (and hopefully this hasn't been covered before) but are you familiar with the Sense Hat for raspberry pi? Someone gave me one and it has, amongst other things, a triaxial angular rate sensor (vibrating mass type), triaxial accelerometer and magnetometer (aka compass) all for less than £30. Plugs straight into the pi and driver software is available.

Edited February 1, 2016 by nicknorman

[system 4-50]

Just on the subject of the tilt alarm (and hopefully this hasn't been covered before) but are you familiar with the Sense Hat for raspberry pi? Someone gave me one and it has, amongst other things, a triaxial angular rate sensor (vibrating mass type), triaxial accelerometer and magnetometer (aka compass) all for less than £30. Plugs straight into the pi and driver software is available.

I've tried various components and have completed it using a 3 axis accelerometer and an arduino Due. I have rejected the magnetometer and barometer though playing with the latter was fun until the wind got up.

[Top cat]

The trouble is we are all using the wrong batteries , just compare the faffing about we do with our boat batteries to the ease of use of the ones in our mobile phones. Yeah I know I wouldn't want to pay for 400Ah of phone batteries at current prices but given the huge advances the car companies are making with electric power I dont think it will be very long till we can forget hydrometers, smartgauges and the like. Better batteries, charging and monitoring systems exist they just haven't filtered down to us yet.

How long will it take ? dunno but if we don't start asking it will be never.

 

Top Cat

[nb Innisfree]

The trouble is we are all using the wrong batteries , just compare the faffing about we do with our boat batteries to the ease of use of the ones in our mobile phones. Yeah I know I wouldn't want to pay for 400Ah of phone batteries at current prices but given the huge advances the car companies are making with electric power I dont think it will be very long till we can forget hydrometers, smartgauges and the like. Better batteries, charging and monitoring systems exist they just haven't filtered down to us yet.

How long will it take ? dunno but if we don't start asking it will be never.

 

Top Cat

Tesla have introduced one for domestic use, they consider they could be reconditioned using their electric car batteries once they have become unusable for traction purposes.

[Tony Brooks]

The trouble is we are all using the wrong batteries , just compare the faffing about we do with our boat batteries to the ease of use of the ones in our mobile phones. Yeah I know I wouldn't want to pay for 400Ah of phone batteries at current prices but given the huge advances the car companies are making with electric power I dont think it will be very long till we can forget hydrometers, smartgauges and the like. Better batteries, charging and monitoring systems exist they just haven't filtered down to us yet.

How long will it take ? dunno but if we don't start asking it will be never.

 

Top Cat

 

That is brilliant, when a battery develops a fault now it either dies or in a rare cases caused a bot of a pop and covers the area in acid. With those things we risk the whole back end being blown off or a major fire.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

PS, I assumed that post as a bit tong in cheek.

[smileypete]

Just properly charge the battery often enough, seems that's what 90% of batt problems typically boil down to.

[George94]

Just properly charge the battery often enough, seems that's what 90% of batt problems typically boil down to.

 

99.9% probably.

[Top cat]

That is brilliant, when a battery develops a fault now it either dies or in a rare cases caused a bot of a pop and covers the area in acid. With those things we risk the whole back end being blown off or a major fire.

 

PS, I assumed that post as a bit tong in cheek.

I am thinking that we could adopt automotive technology rather than putting a load mobile phone batteries together. One doesn't hear about Toyota Priuses catching fire and there are a lot of them about. My Yaris hybrid uses a NiMh battery which tolerates abuse without exploding. I'm not sure what the Nissan Leaf uses but it will tell you with some accuracy your state of charge and how many miles you have left (assuming your driving doesn't change)

So the technology is there we just haven't applied it to boats yet.

 

Top Cat

[nicknorman]

I am thinking that we could adopt automotive technology rather than putting a load mobile phone batteries together. One doesn't hear about Toyota Priuses catching fire and there are a lot of them about. My Yaris hybrid uses a NiMh battery which tolerates abuse without exploding. I'm not sure what the Nissan Leaf uses but it will tell you with some accuracy your state of charge and how many miles you have left (assuming your driving doesn't change)

So the technology is there we just haven't applied it to boats yet.

Top Cat

Jeff has recently got a 2008 Mini Cooper with stop/start technology. It has an AGM battery and a chunk of electronics on the battery negative terminal which includes a shunt. It certainly knows the SoC and declines to stop the engine if it is low. It also seems to know the battery health and is able to tell you when the battery needs replacing, so perhaps it has some sort of Smartgauge-type algorithm as well as the shunt. ie the datacell II type of technology presumably without the price tag.

[dmr]

I am thinking that we could adopt automotive technology rather than putting a load mobile phone batteries together. One doesn't hear about Toyota Priuses catching fire and there are a lot of them about. My Yaris hybrid uses a NiMh battery which tolerates abuse without exploding. I'm not sure what the Nissan Leaf uses but it will tell you with some accuracy your state of charge and how many miles you have left (assuming your driving doesn't change)

So the technology is there we just haven't applied it to boats yet.

 

Top Cat

 

Its available now if you want it, I think there was a thread on here a while ago. I did briefly look at the specs: twice the cycle life of Trojans for only ten times the cost, not a bargain. Easier charging was the only real advantage.

 

..............Dave