Renogy 50A DC-DC On-Board Battery Charger with MPPT

Renogy DC-DC Chargers

So you want to be able to charge your new Lithium Battery from your Vehicle and from solar without multiple expensive hardware. Well, it doesn’t take much effort to realize that Renogy owns the DC-DC space with their Renogy 12V 50A DC-DC On-Board Battery Charger with MPPT for Flooded, Gel, AGM, and Lithium Batteries Using Multi-Stage Charging The best place currently to buy these is on Amazon.

You will find it on Amazon for only $299AUD. Its a pretty awesome deal, and I would highly recommend you choose this for your Lithium Battery charging, from the alternator and Solar panels.

About this item

Dual Input Operation- Can charge the auxiliary battery using the Alternator and Solar when available.
MPPT Technology- The unit utilizes sophisticated MPPT (Maximum Power Point Tracking) to maximize the power generated by the solar panels that is then sent to the auxiliary battery.
3 Stage Charging- The sophisticated 3-stage charging (Bulk, Boost & Float) process results in a faster and more powerful charge, ideal for deep cycle batteries.
Multi-Chemistry Support- The unit support AGM, GEL, Flooded, and Lithium batteries.
Smart and Safe – Built-in electronic protections along with temperature and voltage compensation.

Renogy 50A DC-DC On-Board Battery Charger with MPPT

System Voltage	12VDC
Battery Type	AGM, GEL, FLD, LI12, USER
Charging Efficiency	Up to 98%
Maximum Solar Input Power	660W
Alternator Input Voltage	Traditional Alternator: 13.2-16VDC; Smart Alternator (Euro 6): 12-16VDC
Work Environment Tempera Range	-31°F~149°F / ﹣35℃~65℃
Weight	3.13 lbs / 1.42 kg

Maximum Charging Current	50A
Backup Battery Charging Model	MPPT
Max. Solar Input Voltage	25V
Battery Voltage Range	9-16VDC
25A	Max. PV Charging Current to Starting Battery
Temperature Coefficient	-3mV/℃/2V
Dimensions	9.6 x 5.7 x 3.0 in / 24414677 mm

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admin 100AH, 48v, 51.2v, off-grid, RACK BATTERY, SEPLOS

Seplos Battery Australia

Seplos is a battery factory in China, alot like many other Alibaba sellers, they put together batteries. They sell a number of Batteries along with some DIY kits to make your life a little easier. The truth is, that although these KITS are easier, they work out a lot more expensive than if you just purchase the cells and the BMS and case yourself. They use B-grade cells, and you can find that information on some Youtube channels.

Should you want to choose Seplos, reach out to me and I can source anything you require. But my recommendation is to not choose Seplos for your next DIY project, as they are expensive for what you get, should you want to do DIY we can get everything you require for better pricing and we can guarantee the quality of the cells and other aspects of your build. We highly recommend not building anything larger than 48v 100ah banks as they get too heavy to be moved. That’s why every company has settled on such a size of 5kwh.

Some examples of their products are

Seplos mason 206 51.2v 16s 206ah 10.5kwh solar energy storage lifepo4 battery pack
PUSUNG-R 48V 100Ah residential solar power energy home battery storage system
PUSUNG-S Stackable Household Lithium 48v 100ah lifepo4 10KWh
MASON 51.2V 135Ah LiFePO4 Battery

And of course, we can help you to get this product. But even the BMS is cheaper than they are asking from the actual manufacturer, not through Seplos.

Seplos rose to fame because of the BMS, and its support for some Inverters on the DIYSOLARFORUM. However alot of time has now passed and almost all decent BMS can communicate with most inverters

EVE vs CATL

Both EVE and CATL are professional LFP Prismatic manufacturers in China.
CATL is the world’s largest battery manufacturer, and EVE is inside the TOP 10.
Both companies work with car manufacturers, like Tesla, Geely, and Dongfeng Motors.

Both of these companies are poised for huge growth in the coming decade.

Both of these manufacturers have produced slightly different battery compositions to cater for either a high C rate discharge or a longer life low C rate prismatic cell. The LF280K from EVE is now widely respected and known to be of high quality.

CATL however, is not selling cells directly to the public, so all CATL cells are sold on the grey market, on places such as Alibaba, and Made in China. Many of these sellers, do sell B-grade cells, so you are taking a huge risk to purchase from these marketplaces.

EVE does allow the purchase of LFP cells directly to the public however, most people choose not to purchase from EVE because they don’t understand that a huge percentage (98%) of Alibaba and Aliexpress cells are actually B grade cells. They also have very complicated shipping procedures which are very difficult for the average person wot work with.

Model	Voltage	Capacity	Height	Length	Width	Weight (g)
LF50K	3.2v	50ah	185	135.3	29.3	1395
LF80	3.2v	80ah	170.5	130.3	36.7	1630
LF90K	3.2v	90ah	200.5	130.3	36.7	1970
LF100MA	3.2v	100ah	118.5	160	49.9	1920
LF105	3.2v	105ah	200.5	130.3	36.7	1980
LF173	3.2v	173ah	207	174	41	3250
LF230	3.2v	230ah	207.3	174	53.9	4110
LF280	3.2v	280ah	200	173.7	72	5220
LF280N	3.2v	280ah	200	173.7	72	5300
LF280K	3.2v	280ah	204.6	173.7	72	5420
LF304	3.2v	304ah	208.8	173.5	72	5490

Model	Voltage	Capacity	Height	Length	Width	Weight (g)
CB50	3.2v	50ah	135	175	30	1390
CB60	3.2v	60ah	220	135	29	1900
CB86	3.2v	86ah	133	173	47	2160
CB100	3.2v	100ah	170	200	34	2270
CB105	3.2v	105ah	167	200	34	2260
CB120	3.2v	120ah	170	174	48	2860
CB140	3.2v	140ah	171	200	46	3200
CB176	3.2v	176ah	205	174	54	3800
CB202	3.2v	202ah	201	174	54	4120
CB271	3.2v	271ah	207.2	174	71.7	5470
CB280	3.2v	280ah	207.2	174	71.7	5340
CB310	3.2v	310ah	208	174.5	72.5	5800

How to tell them apart visually

Let’s begin with the most common cell the 280ah capacity cells. The first thing you will notice is both have the QR code in the same location. However, the EVE cell has oval-shaped terminals and the CATL has circular.
Genuine EVE cells will also state the cell model. eg LF280 or LF280K

CATL 280AH

EVE LF280K

How to Quickly Identify Fake Batteries Part 3 QR code parsing

LIFEPO4 QR VENDOR CODES

According to the rules of QR code parsing, we know that the first three characters represent the vendor code.

Many customers emailed us asking if we have a list of vendor codes. Because there are two cases that need to know the vendor code.

1, You do not know the manufacturer of the LiFePO4 battery cell you are using.

2, You want to confirm whether the LiFePO4 battery cell you received is the one you are targeting.

Unfortunately, there is no official list of LiFePO4 battery cell vendor code so far.

We have maintained the following vendor code list based on our past experience, and hope it can help you identify the manufacturer of the battery cell.

LiFePO4 Battery Cell Vendor Code List

Manufacturer	Vendor Code
CATL	001
EVE	02Y
EVE Power	04Q
REPT	081
Lishen	08B
Ganfeng	0AL
CALB	0B5

Although this list does not cover all, but most of the popular LiFePO4 battery cell manufacturers on the market are on the list.

So you can identify which manufacturer your battery cell comes from based on the first 3 characters of the QR code on your LiFePO4 battery cell.

Weize 12V 100Ah LiFePO4 Australia

Recently we watched Will Prowse review a OEM battery that we can and have been able to source in small quantities for some time, one of our trusted suppliers sent us one of these Batteries for review last year, this battery is a made-to-specification battery by one of the largest LIFEPO4 drop-in replacement manufacturers in China. You probably have some questions you want to know the answer about China and the Lithium drop-in replacement industry, because its really hard to know who is making and selling what. And its an eye opening journey.

Over the past few years, a few of the OEM Battery suppliers have come up with some reliable and high quality drop-in replacements. This is one of the reasons Will has only recently discovered these better quality OEM batteries. Because they have been a work in progress, as each company gets a little better, so do the batteries they produce.

If you think, it’s actually in the best interest of both the consumer and the manufacturer to make a battery that does work and doesn’t fail. The competitive nature of business drives the improving product all the time.

We have been testing batteries like this since 2015. And they have been available in a similar form since about 2014 from these manufacturers.

What has happened is that the product has matured, they have got to the point where the BMS is very reliable, and the cells are better than what most people need.

To find out why we won’t be importing this Weize 12V 100Ah LiFePO4 Battery in bulk read along further

Questions

Q. Can we get this in 50ah, 100ah, and 200ah capacity from the same manufacturer?
A. Yes, we can

Q. Will we be ordering these into stock?
A. No, we won’t, because there are too many brands of 12v 100ah drop-in, already on the market, and we would prefer to only bring in products we love and recommend for our customers.

Q. How much would we charge for this?
A. Not as much as you might think, being Amazon is very competitive, the price of this is $350-450USD.

Lets do some quick math. based on the 2 prices $350USD and $450USD.

$350 = $470 AUD
$470 + 10% GST = $517
$517 + 5% DUTY = $542.85
$542.85 + Shipping $60±
$600± AUD

$450 = $603 AUD
$603 + 10% GST = $663.30
$663.30 + 5% DUTY = $696.50
$696.50 + Shipping $60±
$766.50± AUD

As you can see, there is no real business case for importing these into Australia. In fact they are already here, just labelled with a different brand. I know these are here in the $600-1000 range already.

It does make you wonder, should you buy a $400 eBay battery or should you buy a $2000 Enerdrive? In my view, I would buy somewhere in the middle, but I also build my own batteries which I prefer, as I can choose which cells I use, and which BMS I use, and that is exactly why we at Lifepo4 Australia choose to use the EVE and Ganfeng lithium cells primarily, because they are both A grade products, and they both use Australian Lithium inside them.

I don’t know about you but if Victron would just release a 100ah battery for $600-800, they would destroy every other battery retailer in one go. As long as it had 4 Series and 4 parallel, with an easy to use management software for when it’s used in various configurations. Victron would absolutely own the market.

Why Lithium Batteries are getting more expensive

The time has come, when Lithium Batteries are starting to reverse the pricing trajectory, they have since the 1980s only ever become cheaper for ever increasing capacity of Batteries.

Now in 2021, the price trend is reversing. As you can see in this very well researched youtube channel by the Electric Viking. The price of Lithium Carbonate has increased by 170% this year alone. Sure other factors play a part, but since the price per KWH fell to under $100USD, the demand spiked and the amount of car manufacturers is also growing at a dramatic pace, my guess for the next 10 years is some ups and downs probably within 100-200% of current pricing. Meaning we will see prices for LFP Batteries around the $200USD a KWH in the DIY Market.
For pre assembled professional CEC approved house batteries such as LG produces, the price per KWH will likely stay around $500 USD KWH plus Installation, which in Australia is extremely expensive due to our extremely high Labour costs.

Why is Shipping from China so expensive?

Since 2020 the price of shipping has risen by up to 1000%.
And it is having quite a significant impact on our LIFEPO4 cells and Batteries

Watch this very detailed YouTube video which attempts to tell us as much about the reasons as possible.

Ganfeng LiEnergy commission 10GWh battery production facilities in Chongqing

Jiangxi Ganfeng LiEnergy Technology Co.,Ltd. (aka “Ganfeng LiEnergy” ), is a Chinese lithium battery manufacturer
Ganfeng LiEnergy signed an agreement on September 1 to build the battery technology industrial park and an advanced battery R&D center in Chongqing’s Liangjiang New Area.

It is estimated the development will cost in excess of 5 Billion Yuan (CNY). Around 400 Million of which is to be used for R&D for Solid State technology.

The majority shareholder of Ganfeng LiEnergy is Ganfeng Lithium, one of the world’s top producers of the commodity used in electric vehicle batteries. Ganfeng Lithium is well known as a supplier of battery-grade lithium to clients including automakers like Tesla, BMW, and Volkswagen Group. They have offices in Australia along with 2 mines, that I am aware of at the time of writing.

According to an announcement Ganfeng Lithium issued in early August, Ganfeng LiEnergy will spend about 3 billion yuan ($463.851 million) on another 5 GWh battery plant in Ganfeng’s home province Jiangxi, which will be put into operation in October 2023.

(Source – Ganfeng LiEnergy WeChat Account)

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admin YOUTUBE

The Best LiFePo4 Battery Youtube Review Channels

Over the last 4-5 years a number of prominent youtube channels have been created by DIY enthusiasts.

Will Prowse – Link
Off Grid Garage – Link
David Potz – Link
The Electric Viking – Link
LithiumSolar – Link
JerryRigEverything – Link

Who makes Lithium Batteries?

Brands who manufacture Lithium Batteries

1. China – CATL
2. South Korea – LG Chem
3. Japan – Panasonic
These 3 Brands enjoyed a combined EV battery market share of 68%, according to Goldman Sachs’ estimates in 2020/21 FY.

#1 CATL – Contemporary Amperex Technology Co. Limited, abbreviated as CATL, is a Chinese battery manufacturer and technology company founded in 2011 that specializes in the manufacturing of lithium-ion batteries for electric vehicles and energy storage systems, as well as battery management systems.

#2 LG Chem Ltd often referred to as LG Chemical, is the largest Korean chemical company is headquartered in Seoul, South Korea. first established as the Lucky Chemical Industrial Corporation, which manufactured cosmetics. It is now solely a business-to-business company.

#3 Panasonic – Famous around the world, a japanese conglomorate who has been enourmously successful for decades
#5 BYD – The newest entrant here, Build YOUR DREAMS is an AMAZING COMPANY THAT IS GOING TO BE ONE OF THE LARGEST COMPANIES IN THE WORLD WITHIN 5-10 YEARS
#4 CALB

Other Manufacturers
EVE Energy
Winston
Headway

Links to DYOR
1. Forbes Link
2. GlobalX Link