The Ultimate Prius Battery Mod for 44% better Mileage

Preamble

I'm sure many of you would think it fantastic if the internal combustion engine's days were really numbered. Whether your pet concern is air pollution, national security, or global warming, you're hopefully looking forward to the day when the ICE's dominance is undone and PHEV's and EV's are plentiful.

The question is, what is required to make it happen? We need to educate the public for one thing. Secondly, we need better and cheaper ways to generate clean electricity in copious amounts. (I've seen good things recently on this front and wished like hell I had invested in First Solar last year. Nanosolar recently announced that they can produce power at less than $1 a Watt - which is reportedly cheaper than coal).

But the third thing we need, according to many media reports anyway, is the development of a better battery. Now most of us know that this is largely BS, and that there are already batteries good enough to power vehicles, but a better battery certainly wouldn't hurt the cause, if for no other reason than it would remove the last excuse used by those claiming that EVs are impractical.

We know of many entities in the pursuit of a better battery, and I have enjoyed reading about the developments of A123Systems, Stanford University's (Nanowire Battery), and most recently, CSIRO's Ultrabattery, just to name a few.

A123Systems and Stanford U are using nanotechology to improve battery performance and durability. The results are promising, but will the cost be reasonable? If the cost of these technologies remains prohibitively high, then we won't be getting rid of the ICE anytime soon.

The Ultimate Battery Mod

With that in mind, I was very pleased to learn that Dr. Robert O'Brien, Professor Emeritus at the University of Victoria (where I work) has been able to cheaply increase his Prius' NiMH battery's performance by sizable degree.

He claims to have increased the amount of energy (Watt hours) the battery can hold by as much as 5 to 10 times!! Furthermore, his battery's charge and discharge rates are also much improved (increased). And the battery's longevity and safety is also improved. All of this is achieved by lowering the internal resistance of the battery's electrolyte.

In a typical NiMH battery a lot of energy is wasted as heat because of the high internal resistance of the electrolyte. We all know what can happen when batteries get too hot. For one thing, they don't last as long and in extreme cases they can become unsafe i.e. explode.

Dr. O'Brien's approach is to dramatically increase the strength of the battery's internal convection currents and thereby increase the flow of ions across the electrodes. This dramatically improves the battery's performance by lowering the internal resistance.

Increasing the convection currents is done by: 1) saturating the battery cells with more standard electrolyte solution and 2) adding some gadolinium sulphate solution (para-magnetic particles) - a technician drills a hole in the battery casing, add the solutions, and then seals the cells back up again. Lastly, and this is crucial, he magnetizes the battery. i.e. he runs the battery cells through a machine that permanently magnetizes them.

Fairly recently, Dr. O'Brien purchased a 2007 Prius, pulled out it's traction battery, altered it as described above and reinstalled it.

Consequently his mileage improved about 44% and the car had noticeably more pick up.

Right now 3 or 4 Prius taxi cabs in Victoria are running with the same suped-up battery and the owners are about to report back to Dr. O'Brien in the next week or two. The local Toyota dealership is aware of the experiment as they were the ones who conducted the battery swap. A regional Toyota engineer is also involved.

Dr. O'Brien's thinks this approach can work just as well with lithium ion batteries.

I'm certainly looking forward to hearing how the taxi trials work out. I'll post updates as I get them.

Interesting.... The computer does not need any modification? I would think the Battery Management System would need to be instructed in order to dischange more current.

Without BMS mod, the available capacity would be the same. 44% MPG improvement may be a big stretch since the heat loss in the battery pack would not be that much.

Something seems too good to be true about this modification. I think I will let it get validated by some peer reviews before I race out and start having holes drilled in the battery pack. Of course, there is always the chance that Chevy will produce the Volt according to original claims and in response, Toyota will outdo the Volt with its own EV. Sometimes, competition can increase the choices available to consumers.

This thread should be moved to the Prius FICTION Forum.

It is so bogus... the author should just drill holes in his head and get it checked out.

As someone else said, there is not that much heat being generated by the car that can be recovered... ergo, no 44% improvement in gas mileage is possible.

No revenue stream has been established. The President has attended three conferences and has demonstrated the technology to several companies and knowledgeable individuals. Several battery and mining companies and one chemical company have been contacted and demonstrations and continued exposure of the technology is on-going.

Approximately CA$45,000 has been spent and the overseas patenting is being pursued. This patenting cannot be done by the President as has been the case with the US Patent Office and must be done by lawyers. Smart & Biggar in Vancouver have been hired and the new magnetizer material sent to them. The overall MHD patent is in progress (has been submitted as a provisional) and will be presented to Smart & Biggar it is hoped at year end.

MHD Technologies Ltd. FINANCIALS Innovative Electro Magnetic Battery Technology Improvement

Sorry, breathless prose full of "dramatically" and mentioning
magnetization where it's irrelevant doesn't cut it. How do you
stand to make money from this, so we can make sure you don't?
.
_H*

For some real entertainment, check out this old thread:

http://priuschat.com/forums/prius-m...ergy-zpe-opening-path-beyond-fossil-fuel.html

EnerDel is coming out with $1500 Li-Ion Battery at the end of this year. That s HEV not a PHEV also.


One of the industry’s top contenders in the race to manufacture more powerful next-generation batteries for the auto industry has integrated a lithium ion battery into a Toyota Prius. EnerDel, based in Indianapolis, Ind., exhibited the research vehicle with the new battery pack at the International Electric Vehicle Symposium (EVS-23) in Anaheim, California.
EnerDel’s demonstration vehicle is not a plug-in hybrid and does not replace the Prius’s existing control systems. Instead, it demonstrates how lithium ion batteries can double the amount of electric energy storage while taking exactly the same space as the Prius’s current hybrid batteries.
"We have made a major stride toward providing the power, safety, and affordability that the market has been waiting for," commented Ulrik Grape, Ener1 Executive Vice President for Global Sales and CEO of EnerDel. "We believe that ours is the safest high-power lithium ion battery available for hybrid electric vehicles."
The transition to lithium ion from the current nickel metal hydride battery technology found in today’s hybrids could allow gas-electric vehicles to stay in all-electric mode for greater distances—substantially increasing the fuel economy. The exact benefit of EnerDel’s Prius—in terms of mpg—will not be known until EnerDel releases third party testing in early 2008.
One More Step Toward Lithium—With or Without Plug

A number of battery companies, utilities, advocacy organizations and individuals have used lithium ion batteries to convert Priuses into plug-in hybrids. In fact, Toyota exhibited its own plug-in Prius research vehicle at EVS23. As with the independent plug-in conversions, Toyota’s plug-in Prius require space beyond the compartment found behind the back seat which houses the conventional Prius's battery pack. The conversions usually usurp the space provided for the spare tire. Toyota opted for nickel metal hydride for its plug-in prototype to produce a vehicle that can travel further in all-electric range than conventional hybrids (approximately seven miles), but not as far as if lithium batteries were used. The company has not announced any plans to bring a plug-in Prius to market.
Many industry observers had expected the next generation plug-less Prius, due in 2009, to use lithium batteries. But Toyota announced in May 2007 that the company’s flagship hybrid would continue using nickel metal hydride batteries. The decision reflects Toyota’s strategy to protect its lead in the hybrid market, rather than taking chances with lithium batteries that carry greater cost and safety concerns.
EnerDel’s lithium-powered Prius is one more step in what many see as a likely transition of auto batteries to lithium technology—first in conventional hybrids and then in plug-in hybrids and electric vehicles.

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ImTvv-kJkWo&feature=related]YouTube - EVS23 Enerdel Lithium Prius - Tape 5[/ame]

I can understand your wanting to be skeptical, but I don't understand why you are acting so pissy. It's like you wish it weren't true when we all know it would be a good thing if it were. I certainly don't stand to make money from it. I just happened to work at UVic and I asked Dr. O'Brien one day how he like owning a Prius and the conversation started from there. I'll post more data/info as it becomes available. It will be particularly interesting to see if the taxi's mileage improved.

The problem is that when the claims we can check are wrong, that makes us suspicious of the other claims.

For example, the amount of battery capacity available isn't going to give it "noticeably more pickup". The amount of power is regulated by the engine's computers, which aren't going to be aware of the battery mod. Even if the battery is capable of more current output, the computer isn't going to allow it. Even if the computer is reprogrammed, the other electronics and motors aren't rated for the higher current.

Also, I'm dubious that simply increasing the battery capacity would have that much impact on MPG. All the energy comes from the gasoline, so the extra battery capacity only comes into play in cases where the Prius has to "throw away" energy because the battery is fully charged. Although this happens, I doubt it's enough for a 44% MPG increase.

For people that have made their own plug-in hybrids with larger batteries, I haven't seen a claim for increased mileage running on gas only.

I'm not a scientist, an engineer or even a hobbyist, so I can't add any more info on the electronics issue, but I will see next week if Dr. O'Brien has something to say about the car's electronics/software managing the extra power (discharge rate). Although it kind of makes sense to me that if the electronics/software can sense how well the battery is doing at accepting charge from the regen braking or ICE charging software it might be able to adapt on it's own. As Tideland said, when the battery is cooler it can accept more charge (8 bars instead of 7).

The computer simply tracks the battery voltage to see how full it is.

Higher voltage = higher battery charge.

So as long as the replacement battery maintains the same voltage / charge characteristics, it is possible that more battery capacity could benefit mileage (but I also doubt the 44% mileage improvement, that would mean mid 60s mpg without any change in driving style).

I don't know how the computer would react to a battery that has lower internal resistance...

Hi,

I've trimmed everything down to what is supported by other data:

I was able to find US 6,936,371 B2, awarded to Katsunori Komori, Noriyuki Fujioka, Tadao Kimura, Haruyoshi Yamashita, Yasuhiro Takahashi and assigned to Matsushita Electric Industrial Co., Ltd. and Toyota Jidosha Kabushiki Kaisha. It is an excellent patent with sketches that look nearly identical to our NHW11 / NHW20 batteries.

Then if you look at "Hybrid Electric Vehicle Testing", Jim Francfort, INL/CON-05-00964, Dec. 2005, pp. 18, titled "Fleet Testing Monthly MPG" you find:

• 02 Prius goes from a high of 52 MPG to an average 42 MPG in 3 months, ~23%
• 04 Prius goes from a high of 53 MPG to an average 45 MPG in 3 months, ~17%
• unpublished, Prius Technical owner saw early high MPG reduce to a lower value over 4 months after battery replacement. We are waiting on a couple more months of data to confirm improvement

There is evidence that a newer battery pack improves Prius performance. It is an experiment I hope to repeat using a combination of the battery refurbishment patent and a plug-in lite approach:



As for the claims of magnetic material improving battery performance, I would like to see an "A" vs "B" comparision of just adding electrolyte versus the electrolyte and paramagnetic compound. Also, does the effect go away if the battery assembly is demagnetized and return when magnetized. Finally, I would prefer to see use of an MRC 989 or equivalent in bench testing.

Bob Wilson

Hi All,

Atilla's measurements indicate the efficiency of reuse is about 45 % in a Prius generation 2. Even though the motors are recovering in excess of 85% of the braking energy, getting that energy out of the battery and back to the road appears to be where there is low effiiency.

So, its plausible that improving the battery's source resistance would could have an impact. Both in reducing the heating within the battery, and yielding more electric miles for the energy put into it.

At a minimum, a Prius mileage driver could run the AC at 85, rather than 80 F for long distance suburban driving, and still avoid battery heating effects. I found I need to run AC at 80 to 82 to keep the battery happy for my July commutes home.

Thinking further...

Considering one bad cell with high internal resistence can bring down the overall MPG significantly suggests 44% may be possible. It may be in specific situations.... we need more information / clarification please. Is 44% improvement under congested city driving? I would think highway MPG will virtually remain the same.

Remember, 04+ HV battery cells has lower internal resistence than the cells 01+ classic Prius. Toyota's official regen graph shows some huge gains but only little room left for further improvements.

Hi usb...,

What that graph is showing is the use of the effect of the higher voltage motor (500 v) and lower voltage battery (201 v) used in the 2004+ Prius. When regenerating, the higher voltage of the motor allows slower motor speeds to generate a voltage high enough to push charge into the battery.

Attilla's data shows that the regeneration is actually very good. Its the other half of the reuse cycle that needs improvement.

>Dr. O'Brien's approach is to dramatically increase the strength
>of the battery's internal convection currents

Does this refer to the electrolite physically circulating in the cell?

I think that yes, that was what he was saying to me when we spoke.

I hope to post more info in the future...