The new battery passed the 80% discharge test, phwew what a relief! That's the problem with ordering from China, you can't afford to ship them back if they're bad.
I learned something new and I'm glad I discovered in the garage and not in the field. Don't run the battery down so low that the battery meter alarm opens the relay to the charger. I'm going to print out the following and stick it on the battery:
If Low discharge or SOC alarms activate: The relay to the charger is opened. When the now unconnected charger is plugged into shore power, the charger output voltage goes to 14.7V and it's locked out on high voltage. No power to the battery. Perform the following steps:
- Unplug charger
- Edit relay alarm values till reconnect points clear voltage and SOC alarms.
- Wait 1 minute for relay to closes back in (or edit delay to 0).
- Plug in charger.
I also learned that I forgot to connect the battery meter alarm relay to the battery load disconnect.While it would disconnect on low voltage on its own, I'd like it to disconnect on 20% charge level so I need to connect it to the alarm relay.
The cells where within 0.001V of each other at 80% discharge, despite the midpoint deviation of 0.4% reported by the battery meter. We'll see what happens to the cell voltages at 100% charged. But so far everything looks good, I think these are good cells.
Bruce