LiFe Batteries for vehicles

[Stealer Of Souls]

I came across these a little while ago.
http://www.mrpositive.co.nz/life-batteries/
The tech is familiar to me as I have dealings with the RC/hobby world and frankly they're pretty interesting.

Anyone used these? Any long term experience?

[ATAl]

I've got one of those (or very close to it) in my car, can't remember the cca rating but it was equivalent to the full size battery it replaced.

It's absolutely fine for starting the car and normal use, but if I leave the car for around a fortnight without starting it the battery will be flat, however the battery going flat doesn't seem to matter, I've recharged it from flat more than a few times and it's still fine.

Also, I left it for 2 years unplugged and it still had full charge when I used it again.

Oh, it also weighs nothing compared to a normal battery.

In short, I think these things are awesome, especially if you can get them cheap.

Edit:
Found the battery I've got: http://www.batterydirect.co.nz/vertex_d ... attery.htm (these are cheaper too)

[Mr Ree]

Just be sure that you get a maintainer if the one you buy requires it.

Some of the AGM type batteries do not take well to being flattened, and wont take a good charge if you kill them.

I have installed a maintainer in my garage, and simply connect it to the terminals I have coming from each battery post, it senses when it drops below 12.6, and trickle charges it back up to 12.7, and using virtually no power while doing it

[Malcolm]

To clear things up, these batteries are nothing like an AGM battery, which still relies on lead acid chemistry. They are much more similar to lithium ion batteries found in laptops, cell phones etc. We've used the Shorai ones at work quite a bit - they're supposed to be very good and for sure they're ridiculously light and compact (much more so than the vertex which I have in my mr2 - i.e. 6kg for the Vertex or 1.6kg for equivalent Shorai!), but they are very easy to kill. If you over discharge them a couple of times they shit themselves, and if you don't get one of the special chargers for them you can't really trickle charge them when not in use.

We've basically given up on them except in vehicles where we don't have room for a big enough AGM or where we really need the higher voltage for cranking

[BlakeNZ]

if i thought the $400 shorai with the decent Cold cranking amps was cost prohibitive, could i get away with say a 210CCA model, if i was only using it for race days? (2500cc motor) It won't compromise the ECU or the ignition spark etc would it?

[Malcolm]

if i thought the $400 shorai with the decent Cold cranking amps was cost prohibitive, could i get away with say a 210CCA model, if i was only using it for race days? (2500cc motor) It won't compromise the ECU or the ignition spark etc would it?

So long as its the right voltage and has enough grunt to start the car, it should be sweet. 210cca seems like its pushing it a bit though. Should be enough to start it but if something goes wrong and it doesn't start after the first couple of attempts, the voltage may drop too low to get a decent spark. Personally, assuming this is for your Soarer, I'd say its not worth it from a weight perspective (5kg in a 1500kg car if you compare to a Vertex)

[Mr Ree]

My Fullriver 200CCA AGM is more than enough battery for my 3.0, so surely a 220 will be ok for the 1jz, provided its in tune and starts well.

Mine cranks faster than any of the 330/360/380cca lead acid batteries I have run in the same car.