WEBVTT

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[Music]

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hi folks Dave here today I have on my

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workbench the watt cycle 12 volts 300 a

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mini battery now just to be clear watt

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cycle sent this battery to me for a

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review I did not pay for it it looks

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pretty large but for a 300 aamp battery

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it looks a bit on the small side and

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indeed it is smaller than you would

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expect and that's why they're calling it

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a mini battery so what I'm going to do

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is put this battery through its Paces

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I'm going to put it on my other

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workbench and I'm I'm going to attach it

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to a dedicated charge controller and

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solar panels and really put this battery

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through its paces and see what it can do

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the only way to determine if it really

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has 300 ampir in it is to do a real test

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a deep cycle now this type of battery

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has its own integrated BMS and it's a

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virtually plug-and-play part of an off

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electrical grid solar power system this

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battery has over 3 kwatt hours of

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storage in it let's take a look at the

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label there's the model number 3.8 KW

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hours 3.84 k hours so you could say it

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has 3 to 3 and 1 12 Kow hours in it with

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a reserve let's take a look at the watt

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cycle website they have a whole line of

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12vt batteries and as you can see the

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12vt 300 a mini is their new product

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they also have various other sizes as

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well now let's take a look at the 200 a

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battery you can see this is the 200 a

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version and it's 21x 8.2x 8.5 in this

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particular one is not listed as a mini

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size it has a 200 amp BMS but just note

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the size 21 by 8.2x 8 .5 in and 45.2 lb

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we go to shop 12vt batteries and 300 amp

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mini it says it's nearly 12 lbs lighter

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than a three pack of 12vt 100 amps 42%

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smaller than a three pack of 12v 100 a

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batteries and I believe that because

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I've had two of the watt cycle 12v 100

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aamp batteries on my bench before anyway

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it's 15.12 x 7.64 x 10.4 in and 5732 lb

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now interestingly if we take the

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dimensions of the battery and Cube

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them you get a number like this 1,159

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cubic in if I take the 200 a battery and

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I had 1/3 to it it would be 1,951 cubic

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in but this 300 aamp battery is 1,159

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cubic in so I'm just doing some rough

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numbers to see um what is the size

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comparison it's a little bit hard to do

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that when the battery's on the workbench

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to get an idea you can tell it's small

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but it's hard to tell how much smaller

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now I'm using their 200 a battery as a

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comparison because a 300 a battery you

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would think would be 1/3

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bigger so in this case it's not because

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it's a mini battery it is a compact form

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factor they've crammed more power into a

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smaller box anyway let's calculate the

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percentage based on a 1/3 bigger 200

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aamp battery uh non- Min size and I'm

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coming up with about 41% or something

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like that let's just say 40% so really

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that's quite impressive and these are

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just rough numbers so clearly there's

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more power storage in this battery this

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300 ire mini but the size hasn't grown

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to what I would expect it stayed rather

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small and I find that pretty interesting

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other interesting specifications is that

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it uses Automotive gr a life po 4 cells

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I don't tend to rip the battery open to

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see what's in it I'm just going to test

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it from a customer standpoint either it

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works or it doesn't 200 amp BMS ip65

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waterproof rating that's good anyway it

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is allowed to put them in four Series so

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that means 40 volt or up to four in

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parallel that's quite a beefy system now

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here's an interesting size comparison

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they have the 300 aamp Mini battery

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compared to a 12v 300 a AGM and other

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12vt 300 aamp

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batteries and it's amazing uh with

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especially with lead acid this type of

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battery would compare extremely

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favorably to lead acid AGM batteries AGM

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batteries are okay but of course they

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can perform on the level of a lithium

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iron phosphate battery and there's a

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picture looks like they have the

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aluminum Inc cells that are in a

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vertical position able to be charged as

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long as it's above freezing and it can

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discharge down to -4° F I would

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certainly try to keep my batteries

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warmer than that but some people do have

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to put their batteries outdoors and so

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you have to be careful if you're going

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to have the battery in a cold location

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now they're claiming a 10-year lifespan

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and uh that's not a problem with lithium

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iron phosphate as long as you take very

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good care of them here they say 15,000

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Cycles or more and that's 60% depth of

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this chart if you don't run it flat dead

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every single cycle you could certainly

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expect 15,000 Cycles I agree that that's

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very reasonable expectation you might

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even get more but that all depends on

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how you treat them okay that concludes

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this quick look at wat Cycles

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specifications on their website let's

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take a look at the bench test and go

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ahead and finish that up and see how

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this battery performs all right I got

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the battery moved over to the other

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workbench it was quite an effort it's

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pretty heavy but you would expect for

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300 amp hours that there would be

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significant weight increase and I'm

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going to wire in a charge controller

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that's available patch in my solar

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panels and give this thing a complete

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full charge then it will bring over one

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of my inverters it's the same as that

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one right there and I will charge this

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battery up run that inverter and do a

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complete deep cycle test to see what it

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can do here's some of my test gear so I

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need to get all this out and connect it

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to the battery and the charge controller

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and set up the test so I'll go ahead and

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do that now and I'll be right back okay

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I've got my Mak sky blue charge

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controller connected to the battery

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right there it's tapped into my solar

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panels outside the workshop I'll include

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some footage of those solar

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panels there's the battery charging up

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I've got a 150 amp ANL fuse coolum

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counting amp meter 22 amps going in I'm

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waiting for that to charge up 300

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W this is an amp nvt inverter 1200 w low

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frequency piure sine wave inverter and

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I'm going to use this to run the test

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load I'm going to do a full charge on

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this battery and make sure it's 100%

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full and then I'm going to turn off the

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charger and turn the inverter on and

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we'll run the test load so the battery

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is now charging and I will just let it

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sit there until it's 100% charged and

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then I will come back to start the

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discharge test it's going to be a deep

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cycle test to see how much power is

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actually in this battery hopefully 300

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amp hour just like it says just a note

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about the charge rate it's charging at

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about 47 amps so it's going to take a

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good while to fill this battery up as

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it's 300 amp hours all right this

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battery has been completely and fully

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charged it doesn't have any charge

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controller connected I've disconnected

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the charge controller completely and now

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it's just the inverter and this battery

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and I have my meter here to keep track

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of what's going on let's go ahead and

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start up the

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inverter okay the inverter starting up

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I've run an extension cord all the way

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from this inverter over here to I'll

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show you where that's going

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over here I've got my little tiny 500 w

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space heater it's too cold to run air

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conditioning so I'm going to go ahead

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and transition to a space heater and

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this thing will allow me to put either a

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300 or 500 W load on my inverter and on

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the battery I'll just set it to 500 WTS

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and we'll see what happens okay there's

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my heater it's on it's plugged into the

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inverter and it's just now getting

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warmed up this is not a heater that

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modified runoff of DC and like some of

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my videos this is just a plain AC space

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heater and it's pulling about 500 WTS

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let's go take a look at the battery and

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see what that's

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[Music]

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doing okay so we're doing about 37% load

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on this inverter 120

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volts and according to the battery

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monitor we're pushing 42 amps at 566

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watt so the next step is to Simply let

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this test run to completion and what I

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want to see is 300 amps in the battery

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maybe it has a little more maybe it has

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a little less who knows

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when you buy a battery that's 300 amp

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200 amp or whatever it is you want to

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make sure it actually has that in it and

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this kind of test is the way to see what

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their true capacity is okay here's the

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status of the test 13.1 volts it hasn't

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been running that long 570 wat 6 hours

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and 20 minutes is what is

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estimated and this number here can

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change it depends so 6 hours and 19 or

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20 minutes 275 amp hour so 25 amp hour

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has already been consumed and it's

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holding about 13.1 volts which is pretty

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normal all right here's a little midterm

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update here actually it's past the

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halfway point 36% according to the

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calculations on this amp meter 12.9 Volt

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or 12.89 volts and it should have about

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100 amp hour left depending on the

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capacity the actual capacity the heater

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has raised the temperature in this shop

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significantly it's quite a large space

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to heat definitely made a difference in

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here it's amazing that heater has been

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running off that battery still has not

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run it down okay here's the end of the

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test the battery just barely has 300 amp

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hour in it so I'm going to go ahead and

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shut off my inverter and I don't like

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running these lithium iron phosphate

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batteries down flat dead but I had to do

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that on this one in order to get the

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rated capacity and it had a little bit

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more power in it but I'm not willing to

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run it that hard just to get another

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half an amp hour or another 1 amp hour

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out of it I don't see the point anyway

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the battery pretty much has the capacity

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printed on the label and I don't need to

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test that again because uh it requires

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running it down to almost dead it's

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recovering now was down a little bit

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below 11 volts okay so how long did it

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run the heater the answer is it ran that

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heater for over 6 and 1/2 hours straight

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it heated the room up in here a little

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bit too much but I let the test keep

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running because I needed to finish it

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according to my amp meter the heater was

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consuming 575 Watts but that's not the

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whole story this inverter is wasting

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about 20% of the power that having been

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said with a space heater attached to an

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inverter like this if the inverter is

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located in the same room that you're

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heating you still win because that 575

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watts is coming from the battery and

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it's still going to manifest his heat

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because the power this inverter wastes

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will manifest as heat and the rest of

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the heat will be put out by the space

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heater may seem kind of strange but

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about 20% of the heat that I got in my

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building today came from this inverter

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and that's why inverters you know they

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they waste power if you're trying to

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make heat I guess it's okay it's not

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very efficient though so it makes more

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sense to use a 12vs DC heater instead

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it's more efficient or you could use a

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direct PV DC powered space heater

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running straight off the solar panels

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and that would be the most efficient

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because you wouldn't have to cycle a

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battery and you wouldn't need an

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inverter and I've built several of those

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heaters I have about a dozen of them if

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you want to see how to build one the

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links are in the description so here's

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what I think after several days testing

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this watt cycle 300 a mini battery

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remember I don't get paid commissions

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for sales of this battery my wish is to

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test it and inform you of my personal

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opinions and experience simply put this

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battery met my expectations of a modern

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deep cycle lithium iron phosphate

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battery it uses the latest technology

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and manages to cram more capacity into a

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smaller space based on its perform

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performance over the past few days I can

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recommend it a long-term durability test

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is now in progress but that will take

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time if you wish to purchase this

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battery there are links and discount

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information in the description thanks to

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wat cycle for providing a sample battery

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for this test and thanks for watching my

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review I hope to see you next time all

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related video and playlist links are

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posted in the description down below

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thanks for watching and hope to see you

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next time