Upgrade to Lithium Batteries?

[snoobler]

Originally Posted by TimC

I’m curious where you ordered from, and if you got some sort of price break by ordering direct from a supplier overseas.

I ordered mine last week from “Current Connected” through Amazon. And, to my surprise they were at my door today when I returned from a 15 min trip down the road to the local farmers market. I paid about $1,050 each for two of them and got free shipping. I’m thinking I probably paid a lot more than you ordering from a supplier who has them stocked in the US. If that’s true I’ll probably go the same route as you when I buy more of them since I’ve already got two. I can afford to wait longer for my next order if it saves me some money.

Watch out for the 50A charge/100A discharge limit. The BMS on the 206Ah is underwhelming.

Your price is pretty much the going rate.

[TimC]

Originally Posted by snoobler

Watch out for the 50A charge/100A discharge limit. The BMS on the 206Ah is underwhelming.

Your price is pretty much the going rate.

That is something I did notice when researching, and would definitely be something that would concern me if I were only installing one battery. With just the 2 I should be ok on both limits, but I do plan on adding more.

[snoobler]

Originally Posted by TimC

That is something I did notice when researching, and would definitely be something that would concern me if I were only installing one battery. With just the 2 I should be ok on both limits, but I do plan on adding more.

Glad to hear it. It's a great battery, but that irks a lot of folks that don't do the research first.

[pasayten]

Just bought a pair of Battle Born Heated 12V 100Ah Lithium batteries for our 2021 Keystone Cougar 26RBS... $730 each on a cyber week sale... That with our solar panel options give us great boondocking potential. The WFCO charger that came with the trailer did NOT have the lithium battery option. I found a lithium option model (WFCO WF-9855-LIS Deck Mount Converter/Charger W/ LIS Switch) of the same charger for $200... Very easy to swap as the wiring was all the same. Our solar panel charging unit did have a lithium option. That and a little trimming of the larger group 27 battery cases to fit on the front tongue replacing the group 24's, and I am set to go for warm or cold weather!!!

[jvbutter01]

Originally Posted by pasayten

Just bought a pair of Battle Born Heated 12V 100Ah Lithium batteries for our 2021 Keystone Cougar 26RBS... $730 each on a cyber week sale...

WOW, smoking deal, those are typically $1k ea. Nice score. Yup swap out that charger you have for a Lith type and you are good to go.

[mikec557]

Originally Posted by pasayten

Just bought a pair of Battle Born Heated 12V 100Ah Lithium batteries for our 2021 Keystone Cougar 26RBS... $730 each on a cyber week sale... That with our solar panel options give us great boondocking potential. The WFCO charger that came with the trailer did NOT have the lithium battery option. I found a lithium option model (WFCO WF-9855-LIS Deck Mount Converter/Charger W/ LIS Switch) of the same charger for $200... Very easy to swap as the wiring was all the same. Our solar panel charging unit did have a lithium option. That and a little trimming of the larger group 27 battery cases to fit on the front tongue replacing the group 24's, and I am set to go for warm or cold weather!!!

You won't regret that!

[Kzneft]

I finally received my SOK battery. Looks like really good quality. That's a good price for the heated BB battery! You will have to let us know how everything works. I am probably waiting until Spring before I tackle installing them on mine.

[Kzneft]

Originally Posted by TimC

I’m curious where you ordered from, and if you got some sort of price break by ordering direct from a supplier overseas.

I ordered mine last week from “Current Connected” through Amazon. And, to my surprise they were at my door today when I returned from a 15 min trip down the road to the local farmers market. I paid about $1,050 each for two of them and got free shipping. I’m thinking I probably paid a lot more than you ordering from a supplier who has them stocked in the US. If that’s true I’ll probably go the same route as you when I buy more of them since I’ve already got two. I can afford to wait longer for my next order if it saves me some money.

I ordered directly from their we site, www.sokbattery.com. I didn't know Amazon had them. I paid $570 ea. The reason I bought these as at the time BB batteries were about $1100 each, and DIY Solar with Will Prowse did a great review on them and said he thought they were very high quality. He is a good source, as he strips them down and tests them to see if they actually meet specs.

[TimC]

Originally Posted by Kzneft

I ordered directly from their we site, www.sokbattery.com. I didn't know Amazon had them. I paid $570 ea. The reason I bought these as at the time BB batteries were about $1100 each, and DIY Solar with Will Prowse did a great review on them and said he thought they were very high quality. He is a good source, as he strips them down and tests them to see if they actually meet specs.

Assuming $570 for the 100ah version? Not sure if I specified previously, but the $1050 I paid was for the 206ah version.

I actually first ran across SOK from a Will Prowse review as well. I was originally going to go BB because I wanted low temp disconnect, but just couldn’t bring myself to pay that much when other options were out there. Almost went with Ampere Time after finding Will’s review on those, but then stumbled on the SOK review.

[pasayten]

As previously posted, I bought a pair of Battle Born Heated 12V 100Ah Lithium batteries for our 2021 Keystone Cougar 26RBS... $730 each on a cyber week sale after Thanksgiving...

Currently the BB website shows a list price of $1049 and on sale for $899... I bet if you called them they might give you an additional $99 off and get them for $800 each... That was a deal I was quoted before the cyberweek special. :-) These are INTERNALLY HEATED...

Renogy just came out with a heated model also... Currently $899 with a new year sale code "happynewyear10" of 10% off so $810...

Heated batteries takes all the cold weather worry out... The Battle Born batteries have the option to turn the heating function on/off... The heating circuit is 30 watts when in use... I believe it turns on at 40 deg...
https://battlebornbatteries.com/prod...d-battery-kit/

Both manufacturers still have the BMS cold weather shutoff if needed.

Cheers!

[Ccrew]

Originally Posted by pasayten

Renogy just came out with a heated model also... Currently $899 with a new year sale code "happynewyear10" of 10% off so $810...

Not new, I've had 4 of the self heating Renogy for 6 months now. Worth the $ to me, they've worked flawlessly.

[Old_Stevenick]

Took my two Ampere Time batteries out of the garage, put them in the camper, and they didn't even need to be charged. No trickle charge, no mid winter charge, no back breaking carrying them.

Just looked, they're $399 now. Love them.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0...e?ie=UTF8&th=1

[BigBobIa]

Trying to wrap my mind around the lithium options. We wintered in Arizona a few months ago. Had a few nights in the 20’s. But had shore power.

New camper now. We have no solar but a residential 120v fridge on inverter.

What I would like is a couple 100ah batteries with Bluetooth and internal heaters. So they can always charge when 120v power is on and I can monitor them.

But do I need heated batteries? We don’t Boondock for more than one or two nights. So the batteries are charged when we unplug and hit the road. Truck maintains the charge till we get to Walmart/BassPro whatever. Gets cold while parked. So next day truck runs the fridge through the inverter till we get to shore power. Eventually temp rises and batteries start recharging from truck/generator/shore power.

What am I missing? I realize this would not work in Iowa or north on I-80 in January, but I don’t plan to be anywhere that cold! Worst case is an electric heater on shore/generator power to warm the batteries so they can recharge.

[pasayten]

At only $70 difference between a Battleborn heated versus non-heated battery, I would go heated and not worry about logistics... BTW, how many watts or amps is the refer and how many amps is your truck providing?

[Rocketsled]

Originally Posted by Old_Stevenick

Took my two Ampere Time batteries out of the garage, put them in the camper, and they didn't even need to be charged. No trickle charge, no mid winter charge, no back breaking carrying them.

Just looked, they're $399 now. Love them.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0...e?ie=UTF8&th=1

This brand intrigues me, the things holding me back are relatively trivial: finding a battery box that would hold two on the tongue of the trailer…also, would I get two of these or one 200ah battery…1 would be simpler, but you lose redundancy if one were to fail, you’re out of luck.