Would you feel confident in buying US-made LiFePO4 (LFP) batteries? While the answer here is generally expected to be ‘yes’, especially compared to getting an unbranded LFP battery off eBay from a random seller, the outcome may not be that different. Case in point the 100 Ah, 12 VDC LFP Battle Born battery that [Will Prowse] took a look at to see why its positive terminal gets positively crispy.
Once the lid was cut off, it’s easy to see what the problem is: the positive terminal is only loosely attached to the bus bar, leading to extremely poor contact. It also appears that there’s a plastic spacer which has properly melted already in this well-used battery that [Will] obtained from a viewer.
This overheating issue with Battle Born batteries has been reported for years now, which makes it a great idea to take a good look at any Battle Born LFP batteries you may have kicking around, as they may be plagued by the same design flaw. Trying to make use of the manufacturer’s warranty could be complicated based on the commentators in the DIY Solar Forum thread, as Battle Born likes to claim that the overheating issue is an external problem and not a design flaw.
Either way, it looks like an incredibly sketchy way to design a battery terminal on an LFP battery that is supposed to surge 100+A. [Will] is requesting that anyone affected posts details in the forum or similar to get all information together, as he looks to push Battle Born on this issue.
What makes this issue worse is that shortly after releasing that first video, Battle Born responded to some concerned customers with a response that claims that their terminal design is a ‘thermal fail-safe’, but as can be seen in [Will]’s follow-up video, it absolutely doesn’t look like one.
“Would you feel confident in buying US-made LiFePO4 (LFP) batteries”. NO. The answer is NO. I would not feel safe buying anything US made or US certified.
The lowest standards and the lowest bidder, what an awesome combination.
As a personal choice i prefer German-certified (TüV) Chinese-made batteries. Decent price and rock-sold certification. No, TüV is not affiliate to Volkswagen :)
“made in the USA” hasn’t been synonymous with “high quality” for a very long time. It basically just means “overpriced.” And, with recent US trade policies, it also means “avoid” for other readons too.
Also means “shipping will cost more than the product” :(
Because that cheap shipping from China is subsidized by the US taxpayer among other countries.
Episode of The Simpsons, Homer was in a car driving itself. Lenny comments “hey, look it’s Homer in one of those self driving cars”. It hits a tree and falls apart. Lenny goes – “an American self driving car”.
Would be OK, as long as the cells are Chinese
First, I can see some sparking at 02:30 and that’s not good. But it is in very poor lighting conditions and I’m not sure what’s going on. He does not disconnect the battery terminal to examine what is going on in any more detail.
There is a lot of “whining” in this video about the manufacturer stating some protection mechanism by plastic that deforms when it gets too hot. I agree that sounds a bid dodgy, but at the moment I assume this is in a different location in the battery and has no relation to the arcing bad contact.
So this needs a more in depth review instead of just a youtuber complaining about some overheating terminal. The attitude of the battery manufacturer seems a bit lax, but again, it’s all much to vague to draw any conclusions from.
It’s worth noting that this fellow is pretty much an expert in all things battery and solar. Just check his channel. He has so many videos, and the explanations and testing he goes through is very in-depth. I likely wouldn’t buy any batteries unless I felt like he was giving them a thumbs up.
I’m a full-time RVer, and my current 4x100ah Battle Borns, well…. these are manufacturer replacements. The first ones had this exact problem a few years ago. Three of them went bad. Battle Born (through one or their approved shops) replaced all four.
If by expert, you mean someone who does it a lot and is generally insufferable (except to fanbois), then yes.
You just described most of YouTube.
I assume that was an affirmative response to my comment :)
There are a few Dr’s and even a Professorthat I know of that are on youtube, but you are indeed correct, there are also Drs that are total crackpots.
I find YT to be the relatively clear water between the mud of the pond bottom (reddit) and the stinking green slime on the top (Twitter, not calling it that other thing)
Great bait, mate.
Partial connections in electrical joints cause resistance outside of design specifications, which causes heat, which leads to creep and arcing, which causes oxides and pitting which cause poor connections, which leads to more resistance, which leads to more heat, which leads to more resistance, which leads to more heat, which leads to more resistance, which ends in an open circuit caused by melting.
They created a poor quality product because they didn’t want to spend money on proper fusing.
I install industrial grid level solar + batteries.
you do not solely rely on a bolt for current carrying, and no connection should get higher than 90C/194F.
the main reason you don’t rely on a bolt for current carrying is thermal expansion of the bolt. if you ever look at 99% of properly hooked up equipment, the busbar has direct contact with the lug or other busbar. the only thing the bolt should be doing is holding torque/tension between the two surfaces.
if the bolt/ connection is going above 90C the metal will start to anneal (soften) and tension of the connection will be lost causing a worse connection that can cause a runaway.
Don’t suppose I can pick your brain on Redox Flow systems?
Samsung learned this with their E2 batteries that used the captive nuts embedded in platic
When I made a high current connection to a PCB bus, I used a conical (spring) washer between the bolt head and the terminal lug, to insure clamping force if the bolt expanded or the PCB shrank.
“Made in USA” ceased to be a synonym for quality internationally many years ago.
Honestly, if they just paid someone to do QC inspections it would build their customer loyalty base faster than anything else.
My office has been fighting basic QC hardware issues from AEM weather and creek monitoring systems since they bought out High Sierra and a bunch of other brands.
Private equity bros thought they corner the environmental monitoring market by grouping everyone under the same brand, then drummed out all the engineers who pushed for quality builds. Been finding loose wires and polar components installed backwards… soup sandwich all the way.
Private equity = enshittification, writ large.
It’s cheaper for them to sue people for bad reviews than the properly QA.
I have two SOK 12v 100AH batteries for our camp trailer. They are a littler heavier but I can easily open them up and service the internal compoments id ever needed.
It looks like a tug or strike on that terminal will loosen that double nut no compression washer “connection” however little, it’s loose now.
Battle Born?!?
There’s something wrong with you people
Most any US history book will tell you that’s the state motto – Why? Because they became a state during the civil war to help the Union fight the disgusting southern slavers. It’s literally the only state motto that’s actually earned.
If you want to slag the sh***y battery company that’s trying to hide behind patriotism ROCK ON! Just don’t be a goofy goober and drag the state motto into it like you slept through history class lol.
Which state?
Nevada
The Volunteer State would like to have a word.
As would the Nutmeg State.
This is stupidly easy to fix, and it might be a case of cost cutting where a metal spacer was intended to connect the bus bar to the terminal.
Ideally of course either the bus bar itself could come out of the case, or the terminal could be shaped like a q so that it contacts the bus bar on its own.
Terrible design all around though.