On Wed, 01 Feb 2006 11:32:43 -0500, Jeff wrote:

Glenn Ashmore wrote:
I was talking to an engineer with a local school bus manufacturer yesterday
about Rutu's progress. I mentioned that I was leaning towards a high
capacity Group 31 battery to use for the starter bank. More than the 4JH4
needs but would give me a lot of reserve. He replied that was a bad idea
on a sailboat. Seems that they no longer equip their school busses with 925
CCA Group 31's because they have a very high self discharge rate. They are
great for regular highway use but school busses like sailboats spend a lot
of time with the engine off. The 620 to 700 CCA batteries hold their charge
much better and will last a lot longer in that type service.

Just another tidbit to store away for future use.

I've used AGM's for my starting batteries. The self discharge is very
low, and the cost isn't that high.

I've got a Harley Davidson AGM battery I use for the running lights on
my Zodiac. I charge it from the magneto in an old Honda four-stroke. I
didn't use it all summer (it last took a charge in July) and has lived
in a frozen garage. I was pleasantly surprised to read it gave 12.3
volts the other day. So I gave it an hour on a trickle charger and the
next day it read 12.6.

Good little battery and a nice introduction for me to the type.

R.

On Wed, 01 Feb 2006 21:50:56 -0500, Larry wrote:

Wayne.B wrote in
:

Sam's Club, usually about $55 each here in FL where there are a lot of
golf carts. It's about the cheapest way to get to 440 amp-hours that
I know of.



OH, the shame of it all....If they find out at the yacht club you're usin'
Wally World batteries...oh, I shudder at the ugly image my mind just
flashed me....(c;

Make sure they're in a hidden battery box! Download the Surette logo from
some website and print out a little picture of it. Stick it on the side of
the battery box out where yachties can see it. You'll be the envy of the
whole dock!

Geez, we'll have to change them out in the middle of the night over at the
gas dock so noone see use......how awful....(c;

You crack me up, Larry. But in a good way, unlike JAXAsshole, who I
assumed finally vanished up his own.

R.

Sounds like I got something wrong. Please explain.

As I understand it, metal physically moves from the plates into
solution as the batteries discharge and back as they charge. Since it
doesn't redeposit perfectly, the plates become lumpy. The greater the
discharge, the greater this effect. Lower clearance between the
plates make the battery less tolerant.

Batteries are far from the center of my expertise so I'm not
embarrassed to be wrong. What am I missing here?

--

Roger Long



"Larry" wrote in message
...
"Roger Long" wrote in news:wRbEf.1929$5Q3.852
@twister.nyroc.rr.com:

deep charging cycles more likely to cause plates to touch.



I can tell this is gonna be a LONG thread....(c;

Larry wrote:
snip when placed in a fine yacht like a Bayliner or Sea Ray....

fine yachts indeed!
Recently I found out that there are actually 3 types of yachts cruising
the Great Lakes. Sitting in the cockpit of our sailboat soaking up some
sun and suds the following enlightening exhange was overheard on ch. 68
in the Killarney Channel.

"Sportsman's, Sportsman's, Sportsman's, this is the Lotsa Lettuce, Lotsa
Lettuce, Lotsa Lettuce over..."

"Lotsa Lettuce...this is Sportsman's good day sir"

"Ah yeah we've got a reservation and blah blah blah"

"Roger that sir, please say your length and type."

and in the stentorial tones summoned only by the likes of proprietors of
only the finest of fine yachts and perhaps Ted Baxter we heard in response

"Roger that, ahem, we're a 53 foot -insert dramatic pause here- Searay"

Well you can imagine what a revelation this was for us. As I was in the
middle of a rather largish gulp of the golden brew, my sinuses were
treated to an involuntary high-pressure beer rinse as the import of this
pronouncement washed over me. 3 types??!? Sail, power....and Searay?
My God! who knew???

rhys wrote in news:9963u19tfs9s30m7gbi1jl6m81v755cfa4@
4ax.com:

You crack me up, Larry. But in a good way, unlike JAXAsshole, who I
assumed finally vanished up his own.



My sarcasm WAS intended to be funny. I always get sarcastic when I see
people throwing money at some common item like a lead-acid battery that
hasn't really changed in 50 years, even if you roll the plates up around
gauze soaked in acid....just because someone is better at marketing....

prodigal1 wrote in :

"Roger that, ahem, we're a 53 foot -insert dramatic pause here- Searay"



Hmm...maybe he was trying to warn the dockhands that he was driving a big
boat made of putty so they'd be very careful not to bump it into the dock,
which may destroy it, unlike real fiberglass boats.

http://yachtsurvey.com/Fiberglass_Boats.htm

I can understand his wanting to warn them he was driving a Sea Bayliner....
(c;

"Roger Long" wrote in news:ZTlEf.6124$bU6.389
@twister.nyroc.rr.com:

As I understand it, metal physically moves from the plates into
solution as the batteries discharge and back as they charge. Since it
doesn't redeposit perfectly, the plates become lumpy. The greater the
discharge, the greater this effect. Lower clearance between the
plates make the battery less tolerant.

The plates never move...er, ah...we hope! They certainly don't want to
touch each other or the battery EXPLODES, almost instantly. Lead acid
batteries are very dangerous beasts. Boiling acid from the immense
current passing through the acid, turns to steam very quickly and just
blows the case apart, spreading acid steam throughout the boat and
corroding even the spoons inside the drawers in the galley. Seen that.

The chemistry isn't rocket science. The soft lead is eaten away and
converted into lead sulphate, in solution we hope in the electrolyte.
These ions are fairly stable in the electrolyte so we can recover them
later during charging. The conversion releases an amazing amount of
electrons at a little over 2V potential very quickly, making it a great
starting battery where we need lots of current for a short time. By
applying an external potential force, the charger, we can reverse this
chemical reaction, electrically, and recover most, but not all, of the
ions. Some ions attached themselves to each other forming a crystal of
lead sulphate which is VERY stable and, now a solid, falls out of the
electrolyte into a special cavity under the plates, out of the way. In
AGM batteries, this isn't possible, so I suppose tiny areas of the huge
surface area of the wrapped up plates simply become inert.

The plates are held apart, because lead is so soft, by insulating
separators that are a grid of several materials acid doesn't attack.
This holds the plates firmly for moving vehicles. AGM batteries are held
in place by the guaze, which performs the same exact function...allow the
acid soaked up in the gauze to attack the plates, while holding the
plates apart to prevent shorting. AGM isn't as magic as its marketing
hype. It's still a 50-year-old lead-acid battery manufactured in a
different way to reduce maintenance and volume and production costs.

Batteries are far from the center of my expertise so I'm not
embarrassed to be wrong. What am I missing here?


Don't be embarrassed at all, Roger. The combined knowledge of hulls of
everyone else on this forum is probably less than 5% of your knowledge of
the subject. We all have our specialties in modern society. You make
the hulls more efficient and faster and let us argue over the
batteries...(c;

This argument over ancient battery technology will soon be moot. Toshiba
has used nanotube technology to invent a new Lithium-Ion battery that
charges from dead to 80% of its capacity in SIXTY SECONDS and a full 100%
charge in less than 3 minutes....while amazingly losing less than 1% of
its original capacity (AH rating) in 1000 charge-discharge cycles. This
technology may make hybrid and electric cars a reality in our lifetimes.
We've never been able to charge any battery fast enough. This battery
has solved the problem. You press on the dynamic braking pedal and the
big traction motors driving the wheels charge the hell out of the new
batteries in the trunk, recovering most of the energy wasted in brake
pads on your car so we can use it again and again to drive the car.
Electric cars will plug into huge conductors at charging stations to
charge at hundreds of amperes while you're inside buying a drink and
paying the attendant for the power....in less than 3 minutes.

Instead of running the diesel for hours to recharge the house batteries
from 1% of its wasted power just waiting for lead and acid to replate the
lead plates, the new battery will charge at the full output hp the diesel
can produce, the new battery now waiting for the engine, not the other
way around. Diesel-electric propulsion will also use the prop's traction
motors as generators to recharge the batteries with every available hp
under sail....

http://www.physorg.com/news3539.html

http://freeenergynews.com/Directory/Battery/index.html

MIT is working on a nanotube supercapacitor to store energy instantly.
They think possibilities of 100kW/kg is possible, three times what the
batteries can store in the same load! Here's the link:
http://lees.mit.edu/lees/projects/cn...ap_project.htm
Its life will be over 300,000 cycles....never needing replacement??
A better pdf is from the website:
http://lees.mit.edu/lees/posters/RU13_signorelli.pdf
This nanotube capacitor isn't chemical AT ALL...No chemical reaction
takes place....purely electrical in nature, storing the charging
electrons over a massive nanotube surface area in a very tiny space.

Fuji and Mitsubishi are already in full research:
http://www.worldchanging.com/archives/003339.html
You plug it in for 5 minutes, it runs 75 miles at 50. They're working to
expand this to 124 miles, soon. All in 5 minutes charging....at great
power.

Harry Krause wrote:


Didn't Bayliner make a sailboat at one point? A small daysailer?

Bayliner Marine made a series of boats called Buccaneers that ranged
from 18 feet to 33 feet. This was their foray into sail when fuel
prices skyrocketed in the early 70s. They were designed by some very
reputable designers including Doug Peterson and Bill Garden. They were
built to a price point and suffered from Bayliners reputation but they
were and still are a deal for liveaboards and coastal cruising. The
boats tend to have very generous amount of room inside.

http://www.geocities.com/buccaneersa...s/history.html

Gaz

On Thu, 02 Feb 2006 09:40:26 -0500, Larry wrote:

"Roger Long" wrote in news:ZTlEf.6124$bU6.389
:


Instead of running the diesel for hours to recharge the house batteries
from 1% of its wasted power just waiting for lead and acid to replate the
lead plates, the new battery will charge at the full output hp the diesel
can produce, the new battery now waiting for the engine, not the other
way around. Diesel-electric propulsion will also use the prop's traction
motors as generators to recharge the batteries with every available hp
under sail....

Now you're talking! A genset and a modded Solomon, with these nanotube
babies instead of 14 house batteries and another ton of lead and acid
to haul around.

Larry, do you know if all that microscopic surface area equals a high
mass and/or density? Not that it's likely to be an issue: if these
lithium/nanotube batteries have the same weight and dimensions as
lead-acid, the ability to rapidly charge alone would find them a ready
market.

R.

If you think Rolls and Surette are expensive, just think what 1,000 AH of
lithium-ion batteries is going to cost! :-)

--
Glenn Ashmore

I'm building a 45' cutter in strip/composite. Watch my progress (or lack
there of) at: http://www.rutuonline.com
Shameless Commercial Division: http://www.spade-anchor-us.com

"rhys" wrote in message
...
On Thu, 02 Feb 2006 09:40:26 -0500, Larry wrote:

"Roger Long" wrote in news:ZTlEf.6124$bU6.389
:


Instead of running the diesel for hours to recharge the house batteries
from 1% of its wasted power just waiting for lead and acid to replate the
lead plates, the new battery will charge at the full output hp the diesel
can produce, the new battery now waiting for the engine, not the other
way around. Diesel-electric propulsion will also use the prop's traction
motors as generators to recharge the batteries with every available hp
under sail....

Now you're talking! A genset and a modded Solomon, with these nanotube
babies instead of 14 house batteries and another ton of lead and acid
to haul around.

Larry, do you know if all that microscopic surface area equals a high
mass and/or density? Not that it's likely to be an issue: if these
lithium/nanotube batteries have the same weight and dimensions as
lead-acid, the ability to rapidly charge alone would find them a ready
market.

R.