Desulfator
Battery Desulfator Errata
In my battery desulfator article on page 84 of HP77, the value for C2 should have been 0.0022 ìF, not 0.022 ìF. My mistake.
I have put up a Web page that will give more details to help you build and use the desulfator circuit. I will place updates there, and will add a guestbook soon to allow comments and questions to be posted. I encourage a group effort in this, since I don't have all the answers.
Thanks.
Alastair Couper kalepa@shaka.com http://shaka.com/~kalepa/desulf.htm
84 Home Power #77 June / July 2000
Homebrew
Lead-Acid
Battery
Desulfator
Alastair Couper ©2000 Alastair Couper
It was twenty years ago that I left my on-grid home, and my job as an electronics engineer, to begin life on an alternative energy oriented organic farm. In the intervening years, I have installed, maintained, and experimented with numerous RE systems in my area.
What I have come to understand from this experience is that off-grid life tends to become very much focused on the battery bank and its fate.
All power sources and loads breathe through this crucial pathway. Batteries are heavy, toxic, inefficient, andto the amazement of manyelectrically very fragile. Weak or failing batteries are a very likely cause of breakdown, especially in smaller solar-electric systems. Most newcomers to renewable energy are quite familiar with using water tanks or gas tanks, and naturally use this familiarity in trying to understand their battery banks. Everyone knows that a bigger water tank is better than a small one. Unfortunately, batteries are not like tanks, and the result is trouble.
It is definitely not true that a big battery bank is necessarily better than a small one. An oversized battery bank can be almost impossible to charge properly. Without a minimum daily exercise regimen, it can become the equivalent of a couch potato. The main culprit is sulfation, which is a gradual crystallization of the battery's plate
In my battery desulfator article on page 84 of HP77, the value for C2 should have been 0.0022 ìF, not 0.022 ìF. My mistake.
I have put up a Web page that will give more details to help you build and use the desulfator circuit. I will place updates there, and will add a guestbook soon to allow comments and questions to be posted. I encourage a group effort in this, since I don't have all the answers.
Thanks.
Alastair Couper kalepa@shaka.com http://shaka.com/~kalepa/desulf.htm
84 Home Power #77 June / July 2000
Homebrew
Lead-Acid
Battery
Desulfator
Alastair Couper ©2000 Alastair Couper
It was twenty years ago that I left my on-grid home, and my job as an electronics engineer, to begin life on an alternative energy oriented organic farm. In the intervening years, I have installed, maintained, and experimented with numerous RE systems in my area.
What I have come to understand from this experience is that off-grid life tends to become very much focused on the battery bank and its fate.
All power sources and loads breathe through this crucial pathway. Batteries are heavy, toxic, inefficient, andto the amazement of manyelectrically very fragile. Weak or failing batteries are a very likely cause of breakdown, especially in smaller solar-electric systems. Most newcomers to renewable energy are quite familiar with using water tanks or gas tanks, and naturally use this familiarity in trying to understand their battery banks. Everyone knows that a bigger water tank is better than a small one. Unfortunately, batteries are not like tanks, and the result is trouble.
It is definitely not true that a big battery bank is necessarily better than a small one. An oversized battery bank can be almost impossible to charge properly. Without a minimum daily exercise regimen, it can become the equivalent of a couch potato. The main culprit is sulfation, which is a gradual crystallization of the battery's plate