how to wire ks2 battery with 8 pin ampseal socket for solar & chicken coup

[yarikoptic]

Hi, I am new here and do not have an RV yet. But it seems this might be the best forum to seek guidance on batteries from an RV!

I have adopted two KS2 corp ( KSLFP2400-12-002H and KSLFP2400-12-001G) 12V Lithium Batteries. I am trying to figure out how to potentially deploy at least one of them for the chicken coop, but due to internal controller, yet to figure out "how". Built-in heating and controller are very appealing since I live in VT and it is "fresh" here. The idea is to power coup's automatic door, potentially some water heater and may be some lights.

Could anyone point me to the harness/device/pinout/whatever about that 8pin round controller/monitor interface I see on its face?
What charge controller could understand such separate charge/discharge connection to the battery? Any other way to monitor that battery state etc? I have tried some battery charge/diagnosis controllers off amazon, but they do not sense battery unless I open them up and connect directly to the cells, and I have not managed to search up **anything** on this 8-pin connector/controller besides some harness.

Thank you in advance for any guidance!

 

[booster]

First, I would try to find out how good the batteries are in terms of capacity, but you need to get them to run first. I don't know where you got them, but they weren't a great setup by all I have heard. Many failed ones have been replaced with other systems do to cost and complexity.

Most of them, I think, used separate charge in and charge out positive connections with relay inside to do switching between them. The controls I can't speak for as they were not normal lithium setups in the vans. The control may be all inside the units and may not be. If you have no output anywhere they are probably locked out because of an issue like low charger, temp, or failed battery.

Depending on how much heat it will take to stay warm overnight in the coop, you might use all the power built up during the day so probably will not have nearly as much left as you may hope.

Hopefully, somebody still around here that did swaps or rebuilds of the Roadtrek systems can help, but they may be more trouble than they are worth or may not be good anyway.

Might just be best to open them up and check the battery itself and the individual cell voltages. The cells individually, or the battery itself, can be charged with a $30 cheap 10 amp power supply from Amazon to test for failed or weak cells or whole battery. The battery and cells would need to be totally disconnected to do them individually.

 

[yarikoptic]

Might just be best to open them up and check the battery itself and the individual cell voltages. The cells individually, or the battery itself, can be charged with a $30 cheap 10 amp power supply from Amazon to test for failed or weak cells or whole battery. The battery and cells would need to be totally disconnected to do them individually.

that's exactly what I did on one of them (on entire battery chain IIRC) and it all looked kosher or at least I was happy that such a cheap charger/tester was happy with them (just connecting on outside charge connections didn't lead to any detection by any of those 2 devices I tried).

 

[booster]

For a good 12v battery it should go up to 14.6v and 29.2v for a 24v which is what the modules are I think.

Fully charged the individual cells should be at 3.650v and even within about .030v to show they are equally balanced. Balance if hugely important for lithium batteries.

You can measure the voltage of each cell pretty accurately without disconnecting them and if they are not matching take them out and charge them with a regulated power supple as I mentioned to see if they can gotten equal at 3.65v. Use a 10 regulated power supply set to .3.65v and about 5 amps to slowly bring them up until they are taking no more the about 1 amp of less.

 

[yarikoptic]

Thank you @booster , I will follow your instructions and do those checks. The question remains though on how to interface that battery for monitoring etc, since I think that built-in control board etc should all work but i would need to interface it to be able to use such a fancy battery.

 

[booster]

Thank you @booster , I will follow your instructions and do those checks. The question remains though on how to interface that battery for monitoring etc, since I think that built-in control board etc should all work but i would need to interface it to be able to use such a fancy battery.

That is where it may get hard as the Roadtrek system was very weirdly done and they don't give out any wiring information for them externally for connections. They have/had a separate panel to turn on the modules individually that would probably hook up to the multiwire plug that you are having trouble identifying. The separate charge and discharge connections might require the same way being done. They are known to have safety shutdowns in the BMS but not all seem to be commonly known and you have to find and learn what the Roadtrek procedure is to get them out of shutdown.

KS2 may be willing to tell you how old the batteries are based on the model numbers and from that you could, hopefully, determine if they are fairly current or older. The older models had a horribly high parasitic drain in turned on and would kill themselves in less than 2 days with no load, IIRC. They later got it reduced but it was still high compared to modern drop in style batteries.

Do you have any history on these batteries? So many of these have been failing and replaced with other brands of batteries and charging that there may be a lot of worn out or nearly worn out used ones out in the market. Ebay is full of "reconditioned" or "used" lithium batteries of all brands and now we are finding out that lithium batteries may have a limited amount of time in years before they fail with 7-9 years being most common statement, so it is certainly buyer beware. Bad lithium batteries can be a hazard do to overheating and potential fire issues so important IMO to make sure they are good and hold cell balance in use.

 

[yarikoptic]

not much history , nope... load will be minimal really. may be I should really look into testing internal battery units and seeing what heating pads they have to discern what voltage etc, and then wiring some external charge/use controller with usb and/or 12v happen those heating pads on that voltage.

 

[booster]

I you have it open, you can get the system voltage by looking at the wiring and number of cells in series.

All the lithium LiFePo4 batteries will have and max charging of 3.65v per cell. If they are good they should settle at about 3.33v per cell. I think the Roadtreks ran 24v systems in pretty much all the lithiums so you should have strings of 8 lithium cells. Charge voltage of 29.2v for a complete string and should settle at 26.64v for an 8 battery string.

But, for a lithium battery of no known history and unknown status, as I have said several times, you should be testing and charging the cells individually with a current and voltage controlled power supply that is readily available for not much cost.

Where did you get them?

 

[yarikoptic]

Found an image from Oct when I did get it open! attaching even though not clear if it is just measuring 14.2V or charging -- 4 cells, so 3.55V per cell. Got from some neighbors I don't know personally, but I guess I could drop them an email with specific questions if would be of help ;-)

 

[booster]

Yeah, with the charger on it you can't really tell much. I couldn't find a manual for that charger, but did look at the literature and a close up of the controls and display descriptions on the unit.

That charger a fully automatic large number of "stages" so without a detailed description of how it works and what the displays mean is difficult. The light up areas above the main display may indicate you are in float or whatever the last stage is, but it might also be in recover which would make it hold a fixed voltage even without a battery in the circuit. The fact you show zero amps may mean it is in recover mode which makes it so it will always read a fixed voltage and not battery voltage.

The better the multimeter you have the more you may learn along the way as lithium voltages don't change a lot from rested full to 50% SOC. In the above 13.4v there is little to no extra capacity in the battery when not in charge but the voltage changes more quickly with charge or discharge.

Time to repeat the test as it is set up, I think, but check the voltage of the battery, and of the individual cells, with a meter first. You shouldn't need to take off the bus bars AFAIK, to do that. That information will tell you best where you are at. Unplug and then plug in charger after the battery is connected to it and nothing else like you show.

You should show some amps to the battery along with whatever you get volts. If not, the battery may be too dead to charge so you could try the "recover" or "activate" mode. If you get no charging, take the charger off and test the voltage again.

 

[D&C ERV2]

Those are Calb 200AH cells and you can read voltage across the cells for cell voltage or battery voltage at the end of the series. The 8 pin is worthless and using the battery with the current controls is not a good idea. I took 2 of these apart and found 1 dead cell so I rebuilt 1 with the Calb cells and the other with 280Ah REPT. By replacing the BMS and rewiring I have been using the old cells for 1.5 years and still going strong and I have 3 extra cells to repair any failed cells in the future.

 

[yarikoptic]

Thank you @booster and @D&C ERV2 , got busy with other "endeavors" (like e.g. a brand new mykrok ). @D&C ERV2 - did you wire up for heating pads kicking in etc? (I thought those battery units have them under... didn't check)

 

[D&C ERV2]

I did install heating pads between the cells. You can see pics of my battery builds in Photos KS2 Battery Rebuild.