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Charging traction battery with led driver

Discussion in 'Gen 2 Prius Technical Discussion' started by jeremy3s, May 23, 2017.

  1. jeremy3s

    jeremy3s Junior Member

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    I just finished replacing the engine on a 2005 prius I bought with an overheated motor. The traction battery had just enough power left in it when I bought it to drive it off the trailer and into the garage. Now there's not enough power to spin up the new engine for the first time.

    I ordered a Mean Well lpc-100-350 to charge up the battery which should arrive tomorrow. I've never charged a battery with an led driver so I have a couple questions.

    First of all, can I just hook the led driver up directly to the battery or do I need a diode or some other type circuitry to go between them? Second, how long can I safely let it charge for? Techstream showed a min of 15 volts and a max of 15.1 volts on the module pairs.
     
    #1 jeremy3s, May 23, 2017
    Last edited: May 23, 2017
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  2. jeremy3s

    jeremy3s Junior Member

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    The led driver arrived today. I'm not sure if it was necessary, but I installed a diode on the positive output wire to protect the unit from the battery. I know just enough about electricity to be dangerous, so it may have been pointless or even a bad idea.

    In any case it charged up the traction battery enough to use in about an hour. I monitored the temperature with a laser thermometer. The battery temperature barely moved and the led driver was about 80 degrees fahrenheit at it's warmest point. Ambient temp was around 60 degrees.

    Would be great if someone could chime in on whether a not a diode is helpful so the next person who is looking for this info can find it in this thread.
     
    #2 jeremy3s, May 24, 2017
  3. JC91006

    JC91006 Senior Member

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    I have the same setup with a diode installed on mine.

    You would need to run the cars hv battery cooling fan while you're charging, or you'll cook your modules

    On your first post, 15v on a block is more than enough power to start your motor. The pack would have been at 210v, not an issue
     
    #3 JC91006, May 24, 2017
    Last edited: May 24, 2017
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  4. jeremy3s

    jeremy3s Junior Member

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    Not sure what the problem was then. The motor wouldn't spin up when I was trying to diagnose the blown head gasket. Hopefully there isn't some other intermittent issue.
     
    #4 jeremy3s, May 24, 2017
  5. JC91006

    JC91006 Senior Member

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    If you charged 1 hour without the fan running, it MIGHT be ok. To really balance your battery pack, you would need to charge it about 18 to 24 hours. That amount of time, you'll need the hv cooling fan going the entire time.

    I used a 12v power supply and bought an extra fan connector on eBay, just plug into the fan and switch it on while I'm charging

    Used gen 2 motors are pretty cheap, better to put in another motor than to mess with a bad head gasket
     
    #5 JC91006, May 24, 2017
  6. jeremy3s

    jeremy3s Junior Member

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    Since there was no rise in temperature on the modules, I'm sure they're ok.

    As far as balancing the battery pack, would I want to discharge it before charging 18-24 hours?

    Yep - the engine was $150. I was going to replace the headgasket, but the block deck warp was out of spec.
     
    #6 jeremy3s, May 24, 2017
  7. JC91006

    JC91006 Senior Member

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    There are many treads on here regarding balancing. Most will have 3 discharge cycles. You would need to fully charge the pack before starting a discharge cycles. The final charge and balance should be around 24 hours
     
    #7 JC91006, May 24, 2017
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  8. MTL_hihy

    MTL_hihy Active Member

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    Ideally you would grid charge the battery (using your LED setup or HA Prolong type charger) for around 24 hours (or until the overall voltage stops rising). Then you can do some deep discharge cycles if you wanted to bring back some capacity, then finally grid charge again before use. If your motor doesn't turn over after that, make sure you're following the procedure in Techstream for compression test. If you still have trouble then it may be another issue at hand as well. I agree with blown HG you're much better off just installing a good used motor.
     
    #8 MTL_hihy, May 25, 2017
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  9. SFO

    SFO Senior Member

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    What kind of diode setup did either of you end up with?

    Any information might be helpful for others interested in using an LED driver/power supply for top balancing/charging.
     
    #9 SFO, Mar 17, 2018
  10. JC91006

    JC91006 Senior Member

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    I think these are called rectifiers. Mouser electronics has them for a few cents

    512-1N4004
     
    #10 JC91006, Mar 17, 2018
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  11. Dxta

    Dxta Senior Member

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    Did you get a number of LED drivers to make up say, about close to 300V(that's you connected the various leads of the LEDs, in series)?

    How did you setup your connections, and made the HV cooling fans run?

    Thanks for the replies.
     
    #11 Dxta, Mar 17, 2018
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  12. Dxta

    Dxta Senior Member

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    Did you remove the HV battery from the car before charging em, or you did the connections onboard the car? Could you explain your setup connections?
     
    #12 Dxta, Mar 17, 2018
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