Lithium Rechargeable Batteries on DIY EV?

Should you be using lithium iron phosphate batteries (LiFePO4) on your homemade electric car? Lithium rechargeable batteries are the ideal battery choice for a Do It Yourself (DIY) electric car.

Lithium batteries are perfect to be used on EV because they are light weight, durable and can generate the power output almost twice compared to a conventional lead acid battery.

However, before you start stocking up on lithium batteries for your EV conversion project, here are 3 things you should know.

Lithium rechargeable batteries require a programmed charger.

Although the lithium battery has many advantages, it does have an Achilles’ heel. This type of battery can easily be damaged by overcharging. When the LiFePO4 is overcharged, it has a tendency to bulge thus breaking its outer casing. One good example is when we overcharge the battery of our mobile phone.

Over mobile phone uses the same rechargeable lithium battery as it power unit. If we constantly overcharge our phone, you will notice a shortening of your battery life.

If you were to remove the phone battery unit and place it on a table, you will notice a slight bulge at the center. The same scenario will happen with lithium batteries on electric vehicle.

To overcome the issue of overcharging lithium batteries, we have to use a special programmed charger known as a Battery Management System (BMS). It is best to use a BMS from the manufacturer of the lithium batteries because it would have been carefully tuned and adjusted.

Requires power equalization.

In order for the BMS to work properly on your electric car, the individual battery unit on your EV has to be equalized. To perform the equalization, you will need a device known as a balancing module for each battery.

The function of the balancing module is to constantly check and record the condition of the battery from its state of charge to its internal core temperature. All the information will then be sent to a master control unit.

Lithium battery pack master control unit.

The third key component of a lithium battery pack is the master control unit. Its key function is to control the charging and discharging of individual battery.

With its centralized data processing system, the central control unit will prevent overcharge and over-discharging of the lithium rechargeable batteries on your electric car.

If you have the budget, by all means use lithium batteries on your homemade electric car. But before you do so, make sure you understand the importance of the 3 components above. Doing so will ensure your lithium battery pack to last a long time.

Homemade Electric Car Conversion Guide

Do you want to know how to convert a conventional car into a pure plug-in electric vehicle? If you do, check out the Electric Conversion Made Easy guide by Gavin Shoebridge.

Gavin is from New Zealand is a well known as the EV Guy. He has personally converted a Mitsubishi Tredia into an EV in his garage on a shoestring budget. To learn how he did it, click on the link below.

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If you are building your own Do It Yourself (DIY) electric car, having an on board battery pack made of rechargeable lithium batteries would be a dream come true.

At present, lithium ion batteries are considered an ideal choice for homemade electric cars because they are light, last longer before recharge, generate more power output etc.

The list of benefits rechargeable lithium batteries have over deep cycle batteries is very long. The reason DIY electric car builders don’t use them is the astronomical cost. Why are lithium batteries so damn expensive? Do they lack economies of scale or are they simply cost a lot to manufacture?

As a matter of fact, lithium batteries lack economies of scale and cost a bomb to make. Firstly, even though most modern electronic gadgets runs on small rechargeable lithium ion batteries, their demand is still relatively small compared to car lead acid batteries or marine deep cycle batteries.

Another reason why lithium batteries are so expensive is the manufacturing process. Making a lead acid or deep cycle battery is relatively easy and does not require sophisticated equipment.

Building lithium batteries require both precision chemistry and manufacturing which require special custom facilities. To build a lithium ion battery manufacturing plant would require the investment of hundreds of million dollars.

If you have the budget, you still can build an electric car using lithium battery pack. Your investment cost will be somewhere around $5,000. But for most people, that would have burst their EV conversion budget. Until the cost of lithium batteries comes down, EV enthusiasts would have to use deep cycle batteries for the time being.

Convert Your Own Electric Car

Want to know how to convert a conventional automobile into a plug in electric car? If you do, download the 20 DIY Electric Car Conversion Videos e-book.

The e-book will show you videos of homemade electric cars and the different components needed for the conversion project. Click on the link below to download the free e-book now!

==> Click here to download free e-book!

Have you ever wonder how long the batteries of a DIY electric car will last? If you are doing your own electric car conversion project, the cost of buying the batteries for your EV will take up a large portion of your budget. Wouldn’t you want to know how long the batteries will last before you have to replace them?

There is no exact answer to the above question. Different homemade electric cars will have different life span. It all depends on how the batteries are being used.

If you were to drain the battery bank and recharge them many times in a week, generally, the batteries would have a shorter lifespan.

Here’s an example, if you have 15 units of deep cycle batteries on your electric car and you use your EV for daily driving, you may have to recharge the batteries every night in your garage.

If you were to install 25 units of batteries on your EV, with the same driving usage, you may only need to recharge every other day. This means you cycle through your battery bank lesser and in result the batteries will last longer.

Should you install more batteries on your DIY electric car? When your battery bank has more batteries linked together, it would have more stored power hence does not have to be recharged so often.

But more batteries also means more weight on your EV. The key is to find the balance between weight and power availability from the batteries. Unfortunately, this is no easy task.

The best option, if you have the money, is to invest in premium grade deep cycle batteries for your electric car. They are more expensive, but they are capable of storing more power therefore you need to recharge less often.

DIY Electric Car Conversion Tips

Looking for more DIY electric car conversion cost saving tips? If you are, check out Gavin Shoebridge’s Electric Conversion Made Easy e-book.

Gavin is from New Zealand and is well known for converting his old Mitsubishi Tredia into a pure plug-in electric car in his garage.

During his EV conversion project, Gavin did have much money and had to be very creative coming up with ingenious ways to save cost on his EV. Some of his clever ways were included in his EV manual. For more information, click on the link below.

==> Click here to visit Gavin Shoebridge’s web site now!