Need some help with new Lithium battery.....

[AlabamaSpothunter]

Hey folks, I bought a new Li Time 12v 100ah trolling motor battery along with a 10a Lithium battery charger.

 

When the battery arrived it said it was charged to a state of 50%, and when I measured it on the ohm meter it read 13.2 volts.

 

Last night I hooked it up to the charger, and it charged over the course of about 6 hours when it cut off.   This morning I checked the volts again, and to my surprise it was now at 13.07 volts.    

 

So then I think maybe the charger wasn't good so I went to autozone just now and bought another charger.    This one seems to be working just fine, and after a minute or two went to the 'fully charged' mode.     Again it read 13.07 volts.

 

Is this battery defective, the battery owners manual says it will read greater than 13.33 volts when fully charged.   

[TnRiver46]

I’d try running it for a few hours and see what she reads 

[AlabamaSpothunter]

2 hours ago, TnRiver46 said:

I’d try running it for a few hours and see what she reads 

Pretty interesting results and you might just be right.......just got back home from running this battery for about 1.5hrs straight.   

 

Just now checked the voltage, and now it's showing 13.41 volts.    The manual said anything north of 13.33v is fully charged, so either this new Lithium battery is incredibly powerful, and I barely used any of its capacity, or something is still a bit wonky.   

 

Hopefully it's all good.    Appreciate the reply friend!  

[TnRiver46]

Anytime, I have no lithium experience but that’s def a full voltage reading from any battery I’ve ever had (except a crank battery while it’s running ) 

 

you could probably set the trolling motor bedside and use it as a fan all night like the guy in the old deep cycle commercial 😂 

 

I’ve talked to guys that fish long days 2-3 times without charging and their lithium’s are still peppy 

[padlin]

I just checked my battery sitting on a shelf, charged a month ago but unused since, 13.4v. How much you used depends on the motor and how much throttle you gave it. My 55 lb uses almost nothing when trolling, at least on my little plastic boat. 90 min at full throttle should use somewhere around 75%.
 

Unlike a lead acid battery, a lithium won’t slow down as the battery depletes, it’ll just stop. From what I’ve been told that’s somewhere around 20%.

[AlabamaSpothunter]

1 minute ago, padlin said:

I just checked my battery sitting on a shelf, charged a month ago but unused since, 13.4v. How much you used depends on the motor and how much throttle you gave it. My 55 lb uses almost nothing when trolling, at least on my little plastic boat. 90 min at full throttle should use somewhere around 75%.
 

Unlike a lead acid battery, a lithium won’t slow down as the battery depletes, it’ll just stop. From what I’ve been told that’s somewhere around 80%.

Yeah I was using a 55lb thrust motor as well, just running on speed 3 and 4.  

 

I assume based on you guy's replies that I must of hardly used any of the capacity earlier.    

 

I'm paranoid after buying 4 lead acid batteries....all of which only made it less than a year.    I'm hoping to at least get a couple of years out of this battery.   One thing I know is that I'm never buying lead acid again for this usage.     

 

Thanks for the reply!  

[Tennessee Boy]

How good is your voltage meter?

[casts_by_fly]

Yeah, unless you were making long runs between spots (like 30 minutes straight) then you barely touched the capacity on that battery. Just using the trolling motor as a trolling motor and not a transit motor takes negligible amperage. I bet you used maybe 8-10 ah tops which is under 10% of the capacity. 

[AlabamaSpothunter]

10 minutes ago, Tennessee Boy said:

How good is your voltage meter?

It's a Kobalt DT-926 digital multimeter.  I'm not an electrician by any means, but I'd assume it's pretty quality based on all the other Kobalt products I own.    

Kobalt Digital Display Specialty Meter 10 Amp 50-1000v in the Specialty Meters department at Lowes.com

 

My biggest question I have is it normal to get a brand new battery, charge it up fully......it only read 13.07, but then use it some and now it reads like a perfectly healthy battery.   Is this just a initial break in deal?  

[Tennessee Boy]

1 hour ago, AlabamaSpothunter said:

My biggest question I have is it normal to get a brand new battery, charge it up fully......it only read 13.07, but then use it some and now it reads like a perfectly healthy battery.

I wouldn’t call anything you’ve described as normal but it sounds like it’s working now.  Hopefully it keeps working for you.

[Junger]

Did you read it under load? Lithium batteries have battery management systems which control the voltage the battery puts out. They can go into "sleep mode" after fully charging. My generic no name batteries charge up to ~14.6v, then rest at ~13.6v. If you did, and you just got the battery, I'd return it for one of their models that has bluetooth, then there's no guessing what's going on with your battery.

[AlabamaSpothunter]

No, the manual referred to taking a reading at 'resting voltage', or when the battery has been disconnected from a charger or load for 3 hours.  

 

I got that same 13.07 reading before bed last night, and then when I woke up this morning.  

 

In regard to the bluetooth models, I really thought about getting one of those, but I really didn't want anymore extra tech and liked their specific trolling motor battery.  

 

I hooked it back up to the new charger that has a volt read out screen, and charge percentage....it also showed 13.4, and a 95% charge.   I'm charging it again fully to see what it'll read with another full charge on it.  

[AlabamaSpothunter]

Well this battery is turning into a real headache.

 

After fully charging again last night, it read 13.54v.    

 

This morning when checking the resting voltage it read 13.21v which is below the threshold for a fully charged battery according to their manual.   

 

Guess this battery is defective.   Dang. 

[casts_by_fly]

39 minutes ago, AlabamaSpothunter said:

Well this battery is turning into a real headache.

 

After fully charging again last night, it read 13.54v.    

 

This morning when checking the resting voltage it read 13.21v which is below the threshold for a fully charged battery according to their manual.   

 

Guess this battery is defective.   Dang. 

 

I would get in touch with litime before making any conclusions.  They could have some BMS programming that is restricting the voltage after a period of non-use to prevent leakage.  Then when you start using it it 'wakes up' to the standard voltage.

[AlabamaSpothunter]

33 minutes ago, casts_by_fly said:

 

I would get in touch with litime before making any conclusions.  They could have some BMS programming that is restricting the voltage after a period of non-use to prevent leakage.  Then when you start using it it 'wakes up' to the standard voltage.

Thanks, I've been in contact with them but it's a slow process since they're in China and I can't do it over the phone.    

 

Gambling on Chinese products is always a fun time 🙃

[TnRiver46]

1 hour ago, AlabamaSpothunter said:

Well this battery is turning into a real headache.

 

After fully charging again last night, it read 13.54v.    

 

This morning when checking the resting voltage it read 13.21v which is below the threshold for a fully charged battery according to their manual.   

 

Guess this battery is defective.   Dang. 

My headaches are when the battery reads 9v not 13 😂