lithium batteries

beaul · Veteran Member

lithium batteries

Possum3 · Guru

Beaul, Only the manufacturer/dealer could tell you why not to use Lithium (perhaps it has something to do with salt water. You can get fantastic deal on marine deep cycling batteries at the moment from www.crazysales.com.au/online-giantz-150ah-deep-cycle-battery-12v-agm-marine-sealed-power-portable-box-solar-caravan-camping-208183.html

travelyounger · Guru

beaul wrote:
i am planning to buy a 12volt trolling motor for my dingy, and have told by the manufacturer not to use a lithium battery, why is this.

Hi

Salt water penetrating the battery or bms could be the main reason but if sealed properly it should not be a problem ,another reason could be the constant wattage draw of motor could be to high for lithium but thats a guess

Cheers

The Travelling Dillberries · Guru

My cousin's son bought a second hand tinnie with outboard and electric motor all in excellent condition.

He decided to buy a new Lithium battery to run the electronics and electric motor.

With the new battery was the compatible charger.

So he sets up the battery n charger and went to bed. About 2am the smoke alarm starts, he runs down stairs to find the boat and the garage ceiling on fire. He with the help of the brigade get the fire out before it spread to the rest of the house.

So just as a warning (just??), He had purchased an imported Chinese lithium battery and charger, which was on the shelf beside a more expensive Aussie one. The Chinese one has been taken off the market since, but that doesn't mean there aren't other "cheap" ones being sold so be careful.

Bow · Veteran Member

Dont know why, my electric 12v trolling motor has been running on a lithium battery for six years.

Mike Harding · Guru

The Travelling Dillberries wrote:
So he sets up the battery n charger and went to bed. About 2am the smoke alarm starts, he runs down stairs to find the boat and the garage ceiling on fire.
So just as a warning (just??), He had purchased an imported Chinese lithium battery and charger, which was on the shelf beside a more expensive Aussie one. The Chinese one has been taken off the market since, but that doesn't mean there aren't other "cheap" ones being sold so be careful.

A salutary warning above.

A little while back I did some consultancy work for a company importing a European product which had large lithium batteries and a supplied charger. I was organising their EMC and RCM compliance in Australia. Conforming to these requirements is a legal requirement for virtually any electrical appliance placed on the Australian retail market. Failing to comply is an offence and if someone is killed because of these goods a manslaughter charge could follow to the directors of the company. Limited liability is no defence then.

Anyway: the CEO of my company talked to his mate the CEO of a rival company and said "Did you pay someone to do this?" - "No" says his mate. And as I am rather expensive a few days later was told they no longer needed my services.

Through the grapevine I heard they went to market in Australia without approvals.

Through the same grapevine over the next 12 months I heard that three products had caught fire in the night whilst on charge in customers homes. Very, very fortunately for the CEO of the company all fires were extinguished with only medium level property damage. Praise be to smoke alarms.

There are a lot of small to medium businesses who ignore these regulations and unfortunately no one polices them. Government is very remiss in this regard.

If you buy almost anything electrical in Australia it should have a RCM mark - look for it:

RCM mark