Pylontech Batteries

[DavB275]

Interested if anyone has any real life experience of installing/using these, especially off grid. Considering replacing my existing FLA battery bank, but undecided which way to go.

[Joeboy]

I think there are at least 5 of us here who have Pylontechs(could be more, I lost my list)! No complaints that I remember on them. 48V ststem, nice and simple, I run US2000b's mostly. Always worth hunting around as prices vary quite a bit, not sure there will be or is an Evergreen ripple? Some run with a bms, some without.

There are also US2000c's out which discharge to 95% but they are quite pricey what with being new. The b's will discharge to 90%. The bigger the bank the less stress on the stack overall.

Zero maintenance and no gassing off so opens up further siting options.

3 years in and my stack of 6 has a SOH of 97%, set to discharge 90% SOC. You can set this lower and extend stack life, i'll just see how it plays out.

[nowty]

@DaveB275, shame the old forum is dead and buried as there were many threads with so much info on such things. There were some die hard FLA fans with decades of experience with them who were suspicious or dismissive of lithium technology, especially 5 or more years ago. But I think the tide is or has changed somewhat. Especially with the evidence now from the use of them in electric cars.

I am one of the few who have had both types of technology and for me there is no contest.

I am ongrid, but did use a second offgrid system with FLA (forklift cells) for 6 years, then I integrated some growatt lithium cells to work in parallel with the lead acid. Long story but in the end it became evident that lithium was just so much better in so many ways (apart from cost). More efficient, longer life, no noxious explosive gasses, no need to top up with water, can leave for months at any SOC, accepts massive amounts of amps practically to full, no need for long absorption charge or any need for EQ charging.

I have roughly three 20kWh battery banks in parallel. Two are re-used growatt lithium which I re-engineered and cost similar to FLA but has been a lot of work to achieve my final working configuration. A summary of the work can be found here,
viewtopic.php?f=15&t=67

But the other bank is 8 x 2.4kWh Pylontech batteries.



They have been in use for about 4.5 years, not much to say about them other than they just work without any maintenance and are still as good as new.

If you want to go down the lithium path, you have two choices,

1) Build up your own pack with new cells, the price has now dropped to the point of being able to buy new cells at roughly £150 per kWh, but extra costs for cell balancers, etc so you will end up with circa £200 per kWh.

2) Buy something like Pylontechs for about £250 per kWh, but everything works out of the box with a 10 year warranty and being modular, if you have a failure, you just swap the failed unit out.

So, unless you like playing and tinkering with stuff, the Pylontech batteries are a no brainer. The only limitation is the 25mm cable size so is limited to about 100 Amps, unless you parallel up several banks like I do and run a larger cable to the inverter.

[Stinsy]

When looking at batteries I found this study very informative:

https://batterytestcentre.com.au/wp-con ... ch2021.pdf

They compare various batteries by cycling them 24/7/365. The Pylontechs compare favourably to other batteries on reliability and capacity retained after thousands of cycles.

[DavB275]

Thanks everyone for the replies. That's exactly what I hoped for - real life experience.

I'm very tempted to make the switch to lithium, but my only problem is my entire system is 24V, and finding 24V Pylontech units in the UK is like looking for unicorn poo. They seem to be more common in Spain and Italy, but of course then there's import duty etc.

[nowty]

Thanks everyone for the replies. That's exactly what I hoped for - real life experience.

I'm very tempted to make the switch to lithium, but my only problem is my entire system is 24V, and finding 24V Pylontech units in the UK is like looking for unicorn poo. They seem to be more common in Spain and Italy, but of course then there's import duty etc.

I feel some Déjà vu here, I think we had almost the same chat on one of the other forums, whether it was the n one or the a one, I cannot remember. But yes, good to re-visit the argument and yes 24v ones exist in other countries in Europe, but never seen them available in the UK.

[Tinbum]

Oh!!
I've just taken the plunge and ordered 15 US3000C, delivery won't be until the end of September, just ready for winter and hopefully a smart meter by then.

[Stinsy]

I assume you mean US3000C ?

That would make a tasty battery array! What inverter are you using with them?

[Joeboy]

15!!! What, like 10+5 type 15? Bloody hell, well done!

[Tinbum]

I assume you mean US3000C ?

That would make a tasty battery array! What inverter are you using with them?

Yes sorry, corrected.

My old faithful SMA Sunny Island 5048s. As we are 3 phase I will do 3 banks of 5 and then paralleled up.