Is Project Lithium / Nexcell a scam battery?

You are literally 100% incorrect on all of your points in this statement. Nothing is correct. In fact some of it is libel.

 

I literally said the same exact thing, not contradictory and not confusing unless you don't understand how a Prius works. Come on DIY'er, you can do better.

 

Brian, do yourself a favor and buy a pack that is engineered and proven reliable for ten years or 150,000 miles, eg a Toyota oem NiMH, not a remanufactured/reconditioned/used oem, not a cylinder NiMH (notice that Priuschat promoter is gone), not a fire or reliability hazard lithium. If you want to experiment and risk everything, buy the hype.

 

It's funny because beyond just completely contradicting yourself, I'm skeptical that you're right about how you think it works. Like, I think either way you take what you said, you're wrong. I don't really think worn pads would affect regen, just stopping distance. Keep in mind I constantly say "I think" because I'm not positive and I'm happy to have someone explain to me that I'm wrong and I won't get all hurt by it and go into troll mode.

 

Your takeaway is not correct!

Again, this a one person business...

He consistently sells out every shipment from the facotry in a day or two and these aren't small shipments. Why would he waste valuable time doing all these things you expect from him when PriusChat and other online forums currently do all that work for him for free?

Once this startup matures, there will be plenty of time for what you want to see happen. For now he's got too much cooking and has got too many fires to put out to get to those less essential parts.

 

Try researching it and come back and apologize. This is a proven concept, it's like arguing the sky is blue or Oranges aren't Orange. Where's the hidden camera here?

 

No one will explain it because they can’t

 

I can see why one might think that would happen, but the way cooperative control is implemented in the Prius would prevent such a situation from ever arising. Great explanation by ChapmanF here.

The distribution of brake force between the hydraulic (friction) and regenerative braking systems is achieved via constant communication between the skid control ECU and the power management ECU. When the brake pedal is depressed, demanding a certain braking force, the following happens:

1. The skid control ECU polls the power management control ECU for the available regenerative brake control ("I need this much total braking force, how much can you do via regen?").
2. Depending on the state of the traction battery, the power management control ECU actuates the regenerative braking system, and responds with the actual regenerative brake control value. ("I can do this much.")
   
3. The skid control ECU finally controls the wheel cylinder pressures to make up for the deficit in braking force. ("Great, I'll do the rest with friction").

Only the amount of brake force that the system determines cannot be met by regenerative braking is achieved by the hydraulic brakes. The conditions for safe regenerative braking must be met before it will be allowed, and those conditions do not include the state of the brake pads. They will grind down to bare metal if necessary to stop the vehicle, but the regenerative load will never increase as a result.

 

Any lurkers here reading should get the opinion of a qualified Hybrid mechanic before taking advice from any of these people explaining how they think service brakes, regeneration and the hybrid battery work. Do not ever let your pads get below 2mm or you will be buying a new hybrid battery. Following the above advice is up to you and your wallet should you want to risk it.

 

what is the minimum toyota spec?

 

We're all hear to learn and debate our opinions... Always more to learn by having more dialogue rather than less...

 

For the sake of learning more I'm willing to be skeptical of the metal on metal brake claim... And yes, you and @ChapmanF are describing the basic operation of the system well, but perhaps there's something that happens during a brake system malfunction from metal on metal and maybe we can explore this further? Such as how does the ABS system alter the function of the brake system?

Currently I'm at the end of my experiments of how long original brake pads can last. I'm at almost 288K miles on original pads and have new pads, rotors, shocks, Corrolla 24mm sway bars on my parts rack ready to go. Currently the left inside brake pad that always had issues with rubbing noises (probably the dust cover, but not sure) is metal on metal to the point of front wheel being covered in rust, but inside rotor isn't gouged or warped, just consistently scraped up to the point that damage exists. Other pads are just about to be metal on metal but no loss of metal on the rotor yet. Brakes still seem to work great with no issue other than noise & metal dust

So today, I put in Dr. Prius app and started watching the amps going into the pack when braking and it did go up into yellow at 8mph in the parking lot, but not red, so it's within normal parameters, but seemed higher than normal to me. Jack would likely say that because V2 circuit is doing what its designed to do by preventing overcharge. But before I rebuild the front end what kind of experiments can I do to prove or disprove these issues?

I'm in month 40 of my prototype project lithium cells and V2.0 circuit that will soon be upgraded to v2.5, but trying to get to 10 years with these cells and only have 6-1/2 years to go. So if you would like me to explore all this in next few days before the original brake longevity experiment ends, please tell me your thoughts.

 

I'm just trying to make the disclaimer since I do this every day, all day and have seen many many examples of it...just please never take a Do-It-Yourselfer's advice on something like brakes or something proven to work a certain way and let them gaslight you into thinking it works another way. If it saves one person several thousands of dollars, then it's worth it.

 

3mm if I am not mistaken, but they are extra cautious with safety item specs. If you have a set of brake pad/caliper measuring tools, usually standard still shows 3mm to be yellow and 2mm and less is red.

 

Bingo..now you are getting warmer. Remember that the ABS master cylinder is the heart of the system..if it's not having a good conversation with everything else in that regenerative system, like the inverter and so on then the HV Battery will be getting a mixed signal during the process between regen and service brake applications.

 

To futher complicate things the ABS systems also coordinates with/is the same system as traction control because the electric motor is so powerful that it could bust an axle if max torque was applied at the wrong moment.

 

Like if the car mysteriously made it into "maintenance" mode and someone were to pour bleach on the tires and start accelerating rapidly?

 

Maybe I should of more accurately said, not only is there a brake system to keep the wheels from locking up, there's also a traction control system to limit the electric motor torque to ensure the wheels don't spin the tires faster than it has traction for. How do these two systems work differently when there's metal on metal brakes?