Salvaging Lithium Ion Batteries, Part 2: They're Alive! ALLLIIIIIVVVEEE!

in #steemstem7 years ago

I had one of the supposedly dead cells on the charger for three hours today. I eventually got tired of waiting for the little indicator light to change from red to green and just went ahead, testing to see if it had actually accepted the charge. Not before stripping off the ugly purple plastic skins as you can see.

Haha! Success! It's about as charged as I would expect given how long it was charging. I initially got a reading of 5-6 which is when I realized I had the dial set to measure amps, not volts. Derp. Upon correcting this, I got an accurate reading. I then re-tested the other cells and found none were below 2 volts, most in the 2.4-2.5 range.

Just to be sure I wasn't fooling myself again I brought a brand new NCR18650B to act as the control. It tested as I expected it to, confirming the accuracy of the multimeter with the new settings. I'm embarrassed I made such a basic error last time. :/

I was visited by a friendly, curious spider dude! I named him Trevor. Don't worry Trevor, you are safe under my watchful eye. There is no enmity in this house towards the spider kingdom, may our truce forever bless our respective peoples with a peace of plenty.

I only have a two bay 18650 charger at the moment, so it'll take a while to charge the lot of 6 cells, two at a time. After that's done I'll re-test to see where the voltages are and decide what I might be able to use these for after that.

Incidentally the plastic wrap is a normally important insulator. The entire outer shell of each 18650 is the negative terminal, only the small nub at the top is the positive terminal. I stripped the plastic anyway because they're going into a power bank which connects all the negative terminals together anyways and does a good job of contacting only the positive terminal on the top end.

Plus they just look cooler that way, and cool factor is more important than safety. If problems arise though I'll glue the paper insulator rings back to the top, which should help a bit. Until then, if there's a fire it should be safely contained on the bare concrete floor of the garage, unable to spread. Worst case scenario is that I lose both cells and the charger.


Stay Tuned!

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Haha! Success! It's about as charged as I would expect given how long it was charging.
My friend alex this is one of the best moments of life, when you are trying to fix something and you get succeed. I have gone through it numerous times, sometimes by luck and sometimes by hard work. Nice work alex.

Congratulations @alexbeyman, I believe you can handle it. You do have a high skill about electricity. Luckily nothing harmful happened to the experiment.

Oh, my God!!
It was a success, but now my question is, What project do you have in mind for the batteries?

A power bank, probably.

If you try make a BIG solar power bank?

Losing two cells and charger I think is not too harmful for you. The most important thing here is your experimental experience that is amazing @alexbeyman.

Hahah... you're really i techie buddy, Nicolai tesla at that. I saw your post yesterday and believe me i never thought those cells would work. Its amazing

@alexbeyman,
I think I need to re-read your previous article! I have 2 dead laptop batteries on my hand :D Hope they might work again!

Cheers~

Even if they don't, you can use the cells that are still good in a power bank. There are many cheap 18650 based DIY power banks on Amazon, they come without the cells, you just slot them in there and it's good to go.

@alexbeyman,
Seriously I didn't know that! I have a power bank which is not working! That means I can fix that power bank also! Nice tip friend. This is really useful!

Cheers~

Maybe! It depends what is inside the power bank, 18650 cylindrical cells or LiPo pouch style cells. If it uses 18650s then sure, you can find which cell is bad and replace it with one of the good cells from the laptop battery.

@alexbeyman,
I will share you photography of both batteries tomorrow! Then let me know what should I do next!

Cheers~

They are alive doctor! Well done! Now to power the flux capacitor!

Hahaha lol success. Finally you have nailed it. I don't know what you did there well most of the stuff but you sure have made these to work. You are a genius.

Alex - Dead to live, you make it happens... A genius technical mind can do anything...

+W+

you are a genius!! I think how its possible!

Plus they just look cooler that way, and cool factor is more important than safety.

This is true for all kinds of things in life. It's more important to strap a machine gun to the back of a crocodile than it is to not strap a machine gun to the back of a crocodile, for example.

I remember that verse from the Bible

It was certainly one of the more memorable quotes from the bible. Almost as memorable as this particular story from the bible.

What are they gonna do when homosexual dinosaurs come at em though. That's a double threat, they never trained for that shit.

I think we should just get you a factory already, you might just build the next gen irobots

Just wake up, I really miss this one, you are really changing the world through your different technology practice, you never once relent know your efforts to build a greater community.
Uhm, more or less a power bank, I learn something from you today, we should always learn to improvise whenever there is need for that. Success is your watchword brother.

Wow, you are really genious sir.What a success! Keep it up, thanks for sharing.

this is a Good solution for this particular problem, amazingly this brilliant idea, hopefully be the right solution. thanks @alex, you are inspiring extraordinary

Hi Bro @alex
A good start for testing a battery, it seems so serious with this. from yesterday you have tested this batere.saya hope good luck and do not forget to be careful with electricity and make sure the tool you use is safe
good work. success

Hey. If you want some inspiration visit @dmxmaster. He is building a huge powerbank at the moment. Maybe there are some interesting parts you could use too. Like the TP4056 lion charge and discharge controllers which you can get for cheap on ebay...
Have a nice day!

thats really amazing my man. very happy to see your success. this kinds of post will encourage others. very thanks for your post. may god bless you brother @alexbeyman. upvoted and resteemed.

Wow, it turns out for @alexbeyman, cool is more important than safety. Good job @alexbeyman. The look is also artistic.

it is great experiment man @alexbeyman

Wow that's amazing, Techie!
I just hope no problem arises from it.

You are a tenacious and thorough worker. As long as your equipment is complete, there seems to be nothing you can not do. Congrats on this great job @alexbeyman.

Congratulations to @alexbeyman,yor are the success man. I believe you can manage it. There is a high efficiency about your electricity, you will do something extraordinary. I know you. I have a sense of your parents

If I just call the engineer if there is damage, because if I do it myself damaged even worse, even though I've read the user manual...
Thanks @alexbeyman

Great! Doing something like this for the first is a dangerous act but when it goes good you got a motivation for life that nothing is impossible but we have to try first. I hope they are alive but if you lose them don't worry gaining your experience worth this all. Good luck

You are still alive, that means they didn't blow up your house haha! :d
That's not a bad outcome, be careful lmao.

Si espero que tengas suerte con ese banco de energía. Tal vez si ves un capítulo de MacGyver puede que generes algún dispositivo que explote hehehe..

If I hope you have luck with that power bank. Maybe if you see a chapter of MacGyver you may generate some device that exploits hehehe ..

I hope you are lucky in your project and that you do not cause a fire, have a telephone in case you have to call emergency.

Thank you bro, I will try to fix my power bank with ur tip ^^

you remind me of those days where i passed entire days salvaging batteries to use in my projects !!! unfortunately most of the time i ended up throwing them in the trash because they were really really exhausted !! :P Happy to hear someone found some good batteries hehehe !! enjoy them till they work !! I would suggest to use them to make a big docked powerbank, maybe with a solar pannel and put it in a box outside with a usb cable that get into your window and from which you could have continuously power for your 5V devices ( @alexbeyman immagine the power saving you can do)

I was visited by a spider dude too but compared to you... I was scared shitless. And almost ran away the next moment!
Spider dude was kinda confused wtf wrong with that human!

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