Call me mad.... but

Almost exactly a year later.... one Vectrix down and i'm getting second one.

Thanks to Paul in Tasmania who has decided his journey with his VX-1 is over, it's being shipped over the next month to NZ

Admittedly his batteries are well past their prime as its got 27,000km on the clock, so my first job will be to replace his pack with mine which i was still getting a decent range with before the crash.

Other than that - this will be the 3rd or 4th RED vectrix in nz !

Congrats!

I got an email about batteries in the Prius. Why do Vectrix ones die so quickly??

"Toyota called me – they checked and they said you CANT actually replace individual cells (yet), but a new battery (trade price) is $2800 …plus 1 – 1.5hrs to fit (about $150). The guy I spoke to said he’s been working at the dealership for more than 9 years and they’ve never had to replace a battery. He also confirmed the warranty on the battery is 8 years / 160K kms."

Probably not the right place to ask this question, but anyway, you saying at 27000km the batteries are past their prime reminded me.

I think the prius batteries last so long because they use so little of their available charge ? Whereas Vectrix tries to drain every last drop. Hence the general consensus to use just 20AH out of the 30AH will make the batteries last consderably longer.Just a thought.

makes sense.

Do you think our batteries would last 8 years+ if we only drained to 20% and didn't charge over 80%? of course, that would give us a range of about 5km!! lol

Do you think our batteries would last 8 years+ if we only drained to 20% and didn't charge over 80%? of course, that would give us a range of about 5km!! lol

30 Ah give a real range around 60-70 km.
20 Ah 40-50 km

I got an email about batteries in the Prius. Why do Vectrix ones die so quickly??

"Toyota called me – they checked and they said you CANT actually replace individual cells (yet), but a new battery (trade price) is $2800 …plus 1 – 1.5hrs to fit (about $150). The guy I spoke to said he’s been working at the dealership for more than 9 years and they’ve never had to replace a battery. He also confirmed the warranty on the battery is 8 years / 160K kms."

Probably not the right place to ask this question, but anyway, you saying at 27000km the batteries are past their prime reminded me.

Just came across this and thought I'd add my 2 cents worth...

I just bought an '05 Prius with 200,000 miles on it. And the pack was reporting issues (warning symbols on the dashboard). I disassembled the pack and checked the voltage of each individual module (each module is 6 cells and there are 28 modules in series in the pack). One module was reading significantly lower than the rest. I bought the replacement module on ebay for $35. Bingo - no more pack problems - although I expect that this is only a short term fix because of pack imbalance. So, while it's not a Toyota approved process it certainly is possible to replace a module yourself - the usual caveats apply due to the fact that you're dealing with a ~230V pack that can deliver over 100A. IMHO it's really not that bad or that hard to do - but in no way should you trust me. Read the big scary warning labels and decide for yourself. It certainly can be lethal ...

And, yes, the reason the Prius pack lasts a long time is because they use it in an entirely different fashion than the Vectrix. They aim to keep the pack between 40% and 70% SoC. They also limit the max discharge and max charge based on temperature. Their control algorithms are very different. Even if you limited the discharge / recharge range your Vectrix battery is going to have a "harder life" than a hybrid vehicle (remember your pack is providing all the power, whereas a hybrid uses the electric to assist the gas). On the other hand the Prius does discharge at very high C rates given the small size of the pack (I think it's a 6Ah pack and I think you can see 120A peaks which is a whopping 20C rate !!!!)

BTW, I bought a Prius so that I can rip out the old battery and make it a plug-in with a 10kWh Lithium pack - consider it a poor man's Chevy Volt...

Do you think our batteries would last 8 years+ if we only drained to 20% and didn't charge over 80%? of course, that would give us a range of about 5km!! lol

30 Ah give a real range around 60-70 km.
20 Ah 40-50 km

you can achieve this just by changing the assumed battery capacity to 20Ah

self discharge will naturally keep full bars to a real 80% SOC, while only using 20AH will keep you above 20% SOC

Matt

Do you think our batteries would last 8 years+ if we only drained to 20% and didn't charge over 80%? of course, that would give us a range of about 5km!! lol

30 Ah give a real range around 60-70 km.
20 Ah 40-50 km

you can achieve this just by changing the assumed battery capacity to 20Ah

self discharge will naturally keep full bars to a real 80% SOC, while only using 20AH will keep you above 20% SOC

Matt

gee I wish I had 20Ah!

I could never find the settings in the software to do this on the system

I know you've mentioned it before but i think i'd need a careful walkthrough on which version of the software - what section and what to enter and where.

Its not exactly straight forward but here's a crash course in it:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Km4U0d1okRc&list=UU8vCzJJI9NYIdU57vGu6VNQ&index=9&feature=plcp

Matt