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Wall charging HV battery

Discussion in 'Gen 2 Prius Accessories & Modifications' started by shortbus, Jan 3, 2008.

  1. shortbus

    shortbus N00B

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    Is there a way to wall charge my Prius battery so that the battery is all green when I go to work in the morning?
     
  2. Flying White Dutchman

    Flying White Dutchman Senior Member

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    yes
    buth it needs some instalation work..

    any money

    there is a company ( going to look it up ) that provides a straight current 500 volt output from a 110/220 volts wavevorm input
     
  3. Flying White Dutchman

    Flying White Dutchman Senior Member

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    here is one
    http://www.brusa.li/e_welcome.html
    not the 1 i was looking for but anyway when i find it i wil post it
    was a us based company and the charger was green colored
     
  4. shortbus

    shortbus N00B

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  5. Flying White Dutchman

    Flying White Dutchman Senior Member

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    http://www.Manzanitamicro.com/

    yes thats the one
    just found it myzelf

    i emailed them to
    only a long time ago..... got a price back somewhere around 2600 dollars and 75 for shipping within us
     
  6. shortbus

    shortbus N00B

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    Alright.

    HAH.

    I buy one and hook it up how?
     
  7. hawaiiguide

    hawaiiguide Junior Member

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    Why do you need it? I can make my 06 go all green within 5 miles.
    Suggest you try experimenting with the accelarator pedal to get green bars. On our car they come and go quickly... easy come... easy go.

    Good luck.
    hawaiiguide :)
     
  8. patsparks

    patsparks An Aussie perspective

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    The traction battery isn't 500 volt, isnt it more like 210V?
     
  9. bestmapman

    bestmapman 04, 07 ,08, 09, 10, 16, 21 Prime

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    Please describe what you are doing to accomplish this.
     
  10. shortbus

    shortbus N00B

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    More reading and a few emails from people that know more then me got me the conclusion that this is pretty pointless.

    Sorry for wasting your scroll mouse. ;)
     
  11. Flying White Dutchman

    Flying White Dutchman Senior Member

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    wy?

    because for you it means spending a lot of money on it because you can not do it yourself?

    if you can DIY then its not pointless i think

    what are the arguments?
     
  12. shortbus

    shortbus N00B

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    Well, It id completely do-able.

    That was a clip from an email I received. So, yes it would be do-able, but no one has done it because it is pretty much pointless.
     
  13. Flying White Dutchman

    Flying White Dutchman Senior Member

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    o yes
    always add battery's when using plugin:D

    i am sorry i think plugin and add. battery's as the same thing:)
     
  14. David Beale

    David Beale Senior Member

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    It's worse than pointless to try to charge the stock NiMH battery. It's going to shorten the battery life. There are very good reasons Toyota doesn't want the battery fully charged - EVER!

    1. A NiMH battery becomes inefficient at accepting a charge once it gets to about 80% charge, and begins to convert about 1/2 or more of the charging energy to heat. In other words, you could easily overheat the battery, if not when charging, then after, when driving. Yes the system will sense the temp rise and cut off the charging, but that happens -after- it heats up. The cells with the lowest capacity will heat up the most, and they -could- overheat enough to loose electrolyte. They would then have even lower capacity. You would quickly (perhaps as quickly as a few weeks) spiral into a non-functioning battery.

    2. You will fool the system as to its' state of charge. It's not nice to fool the system! You DON'T want it not knowing what's what!

    The reasons the stock battery lasts so long include:

    a) Care was taken to "match" the cells in each battery re capacity and chemistry (both vary a bit in a production line).

    b) The battery is never allowed to fully discharge or even approach full discharge. This is to ensure the lowest capacity cell will not fully discharge. If it does and the system continues to discharge the battery that cell will be charged in reverse. This is death to NiMH cells. They "whisker", shorting themselves out of the battery.

    c) The battery is never allowed to fully charge or even approach full charge. This is to ensure the lowest capacity cell will not fully charge. If it does and the system continues to charge the battery that cell will overheat a lot and vent electrolyte, loosing still more capacity. The next cycle will be worse still, the cycle after that even worse again. The cell will quickly loose enough capacity that the battery will loose the function of that cell.
     
  15. shortbus

    shortbus N00B

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    Yeah, thanks.

    That is pretty much a rehash of the emails I got.
     
  16. Syclone

    Syclone Member

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    The whole point of the battery is to accumulate what would otherwise be wasted energy using regenerative braking, allowing the ICE to operate in it's most efficient power band and dumping the excess power into the battery, etc. During driving you can go from a virtually discharged battery (20 - 30%) to 7 green bands in a few minutes.

    Externally charging the NiMh battery would, at best, give you about 1 - 1.5 miles of range before the ICE kicks in.

    Based on this, there is, truly, no point to externally charging the NiMh battery. If you were able to install a battery with about 10 times the capacity, an external charging system would become practical.
     
  17. Flying White Dutchman

    Flying White Dutchman Senior Member

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    stop talking about the standard batt.

    put in some add. batt's and use them to keep the stock batt no more then 80% ( i am reading post above about this ) charged
     
  18. AkustaVirtaa

    AkustaVirtaa Sähköistäjä

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    Is this still true?

    I really like to charge it anyway. For me half mile is something…

    Any new chargers in market or DIY experiences?
     
  19. andyprius

    andyprius Senior Member

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    Yes it is still true, there are however a good range of add on battery packs that are relatively cheap IF; you want to go to the trouble. There are several threads on this, do a PC search.
     
  20. vertex

    vertex Active Member

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    Well, It may or may not be pointless. I am making an inexpensive charger for this purpose. My case may be unique however. My morning commute is 2.2 miles. I can make it in EV mode if I start out with a green, or almost green battery charge. The ICE does not run at all for the commute then. I end the trip with about the same charge I start with, the last part of the trip is a steep downhill grade that recharges the battery.