Car Battery
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Starting a car uses hundreds of amperes for a few seconds. While this is demanding, it doesn't drain the battery more than a few percent. Regular car batteries can be damaged by discharging them more than sixty percent, and should not be used in a deep-cycle application.
- my original idea was to buy some cheap batteries at Walmart and use those to run a car, after doing some research it looks like that is a bad idea and actually costs more in the long run because the batteries will not last very long, some people that have used regular car batteries say they may not last 6 months.
Reserve Capacity
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Car batteries are rated by reserve capacity, or how long they can maintain a 25-amp load before losing significant voltage. Typical car batteries are rated for 90 to 120 minutes, and some deep-cycle batteries can go more than 400 minutes.
Battery Chemistry
A deep cycle and car battery both use the same chemistry utilizing lead and acid to make electricity. The difference is that the car bat wants to give a big surge, then when started, the alternator gives the power to the car and it is usually never discharged more than 20 percent. It does this by using thin lead cells creating more surface area of lead.
One person said they put regular car batteries in the electric vehicle and never discharged them more than 25% and they only lasted 3 months. They cost you a little less than a third but this means that they would only last 9 months with 3 sets of them. The deep discharge batteries they used lasted over 3 years. so even though your paying 3 times a much it's a better deal in the long run.
Both car batteries and deep cycle batteries are lead-acid batteries that use exactly the same chemistry for their operation (see How Batteries Work for more information). The difference is in the way that the batteries optimize their design:
- A car's battery is designed to provide a very large amount of current for a short period of time. This surge of current is needed to turn the engine over during starting. Once the engine starts, the alternator provides all the power that the car needs, so a car battery may go through its entire life without ever being drained more than 20 percent of its total capacity. Used in this way, a car battery can last a number of years. To achieve a large amount of current, a car battery uses thin plates in order to increase its surface area.
- A deep cycle battery is designed to provide a steady amount of current over a long period of time. A deep cycle battery can provide a surge when needed, but nothing like the surge a car battery can. A deep cycle battery is also designed to be deeply discharged over and over again (something that would ruin a car battery very quickly). To accomplish this, a deep cycle battery uses thicker plates.
A car battery typically has two ratings:
- CCA (Cold Cranking Amps) - The number of amps that the battery can produce at 32 degrees F (0 degrees C) for 30 seconds
- RC (Reserve Capacity) - The number of minutes that the battery can deliver 25 amps while keeping its voltage above 10.5 volts
Typically, a deep cycle battery will have two or three times the RC of a car battery, but will deliver one-half or three-quarters the CCAs. In addition, a deep cycle battery can withstand several hundred total discharge/recharge cycles, while a car battery is not designed to be totally discharged.
This morning I stopped by the library at Fair Oaks and Madison Ave, they have 2 parking spaces for electric cars with chargers and cables. The charging box says it is from http://www.clippercreek.com/ and that it puts out 30 amps.(maybe?)
looked around their website, and they do have a couple manuals which is really the least they could do. No information about what kind of charging stations are out there, no information on what I need to hook up to their equipment, and no information on where I can buy a plug that will match their fancy plug. So I have a lot more work to do.
It's not easy to get information on electric car chargers, I have found a couple sites that have some information.
Lithium Batteries
Lithium LiFePO4 are the newest batteries out that can power a car for the least cost per mile. They cost more than lead acid batteries, but they deliver a lot more power and they last much longer.
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