Journey with Confidence RV GPS App RV Trip Planner RV LIFE Campground Reviews RV Maintenance Take a Speed Test Free 7 Day Trial ×


Reply
 
Thread Tools Display Modes
 
Old 12-01-2019, 02:06 PM   #1
Bus Crazy
 
somewhereinusa's Avatar
 
Join Date: Nov 2010
Location: Andrews,Indiana
Posts: 2,430
Year: 1991
Coachwork: Bluebird
Chassis: AARE
Engine: 3116 Cat 250hp
Rated Cap: Just the two of us.
LiFePo protection

Since the lithium batteries I'm using (Valence) don't have any protection built in (only cell balancing), I've designed a protection system. It will totally disconnect the battery bank from everything if things go awry. It will also turn on a compartment cooling fan or turn on a heat pad if called for.
I have it bread boarded and the code written. For you coders out there mine is probably a bit clunky but, it works. Not really necessary but nice for a bit of bling I'm working on a screen to see what temps and voltages are.


somewhereinusa is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 12-07-2019, 10:14 PM   #2
Bus Crazy
 
TheHubbardBus's Avatar
 
Join Date: Apr 2019
Location: SW USA
Posts: 2,064
Year: 2003
Coachwork: IC / Amtran
Chassis: CE300
Engine: International T444e
Rated Cap: 23
That's cool as hell. Great project!


Now I'm going to get out of here quick before I get the urge to start asking questions. I've already got enough to learn as it is.
__________________
Go away. 'Baitin.

Our Build: Mr. Beefy
TheHubbardBus is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 12-08-2019, 08:43 AM   #3
Bus Geek
 
brokedown's Avatar
 
Join Date: Dec 2016
Location: Weeki Wachee, FL
Posts: 3,056
Year: 1997
Coachwork: Bluebird
Chassis: TC2000 FE
Engine: Cummins 5.9
Rated Cap: 72
I looked into used Valance batteries but unfortunately I heard about them through the same place as most others, Youtube videos. The price on them has nearly doubled since then so my plans are back to lead acid...
__________________
Keep up with us and our build!
Follow us on Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, and Twitter
brokedown is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 12-08-2019, 09:43 AM   #4
Bus Geek
 
Join Date: May 2009
Location: Columbus Ohio
Posts: 18,707
Year: 1991
Coachwork: Carpenter
Chassis: International 3800
Engine: DTA360 / MT643
Rated Cap: 7 Row Handicap
this is wickedly cool!! is the nano R3 a better choice than an arduino? I know the arduino has huge community support and the R3 looks compatible.. I have been using zbasic.net chips for many years but of course I have to build about everything I use for them.. although some things like relay boards are pretty standard bit-banged interfaces so can work..



im glad to see you run your DS1820s on 3 wires instead of 2.. I hate parasitic power mode on those.. i always got wonky readings...



does the R3 have built in A2D / D2A?
-Christopher
cadillackid is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 12-08-2019, 11:46 AM   #5
Bus Crazy
 
somewhereinusa's Avatar
 
Join Date: Nov 2010
Location: Andrews,Indiana
Posts: 2,430
Year: 1991
Coachwork: Bluebird
Chassis: AARE
Engine: 3116 Cat 250hp
Rated Cap: Just the two of us.
Quote:
Originally Posted by cadillackid View Post
is the nano R3 a better choice than an arduino?
-Christopher
The nano is an Arduino with a bit less memory and a lot smaller. The nano doesn't have a power receptacle. Basically anything the Uno can do the nano can do if it has enough memory. It has all the same IO pins.

Quote:
im glad to see you run your DS1820s on 3 wires instead of 2.. I hate parasitic power mode on those.. i always got wonky readings...
I like that you can run a whole string of them and only take up one input pin.

Quote:
does the R3 have built in A2D / D2A?
Not sure what that means,

I've already made a few changes. I don't like those voltage divider sensors, readings aren't close enough. I've got a sensor coming that will do three sources and only use two analog pins. Hope it's more accurate.
somewhereinusa is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 12-08-2019, 12:21 PM   #6
Bus Geek
 
brokedown's Avatar
 
Join Date: Dec 2016
Location: Weeki Wachee, FL
Posts: 3,056
Year: 1997
Coachwork: Bluebird
Chassis: TC2000 FE
Engine: Cummins 5.9
Rated Cap: 72
Have you looked at the DIYBMS project? They're using arduino + esp8266 and have quite a lot of features including data logging outputs for multiple collectors.
__________________
Keep up with us and our build!
Follow us on Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, and Twitter
brokedown is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 12-08-2019, 01:03 PM   #7
Bus Crazy
 
somewhereinusa's Avatar
 
Join Date: Nov 2010
Location: Andrews,Indiana
Posts: 2,430
Year: 1991
Coachwork: Bluebird
Chassis: AARE
Engine: 3116 Cat 250hp
Rated Cap: Just the two of us.
Quote:
Originally Posted by brokedown View Post
Have you looked at the DIYBMS project? They're using arduino + esp8266 and have quite a lot of features including data logging outputs for multiple collectors.
Haven't seen it. Do you have a link?
somewhereinusa is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 12-08-2019, 01:54 PM   #8
Bus Geek
 
brokedown's Avatar
 
Join Date: Dec 2016
Location: Weeki Wachee, FL
Posts: 3,056
Year: 1997
Coachwork: Bluebird
Chassis: TC2000 FE
Engine: Cummins 5.9
Rated Cap: 72
https://github.com/stuartpittaway/diyBMSv4

They have a pretty good size open source community and this is the 4th major revision of the platform.
__________________
Keep up with us and our build!
Follow us on Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, and Twitter
brokedown is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 12-08-2019, 04:31 PM   #9
Bus Crazy
 
somewhereinusa's Avatar
 
Join Date: Nov 2010
Location: Andrews,Indiana
Posts: 2,430
Year: 1991
Coachwork: Bluebird
Chassis: AARE
Engine: 3116 Cat 250hp
Rated Cap: Just the two of us.
Quote:
Originally Posted by brokedown View Post
Have you looked at the DIYBMS project? They're using arduino + esp8266 and have quite a lot of features including data logging outputs for multiple collectors.
I took a quick look, interesting stuff and a bit over my pay grade.

What I'm building isn't really a bms. I guess it's more of a catastrophe\environment control.

The Valence batteries already have a built in bms that will do cell balancing in each individual 12V module/battery. The Valence system uses something similar to what I'm building only it uses the data, sent over a CAN bus, that reads each "cell" inside of the battery to turn things on and off.

Using conservative temp and voltage figures and taking my measurements externally I can totally disconnect my battery bank from everything else to prevent damage from things like being charged when below freezing and over and under volts.

I can also turn on a compartment cooling fan or a heating pad to warm if necessary.

I can see the data from the internal bms using the Valence software but, I can't really do anything with it. If I could "read" the data from the CAN bus I could probably use the internal sensors. That too is above my pay grade.
somewhereinusa is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 12-08-2019, 07:18 PM   #10
Bus Crazy
 
kazetsukai's Avatar
 
Join Date: May 2017
Location: Athens, TN
Posts: 1,574
Year: 1999
Coachwork: Amtran
Chassis: International RE
Engine: International T444e
Rated Cap: 76
Quote:
Originally Posted by somewhereinusa View Post
Using conservative temp and voltage figures and taking my measurements externally I can totally disconnect my battery bank from everything else to prevent damage from things like being charged when below freezing and over and under volts.

I can also turn on a compartment cooling fan or a heating pad to warm if necessary.
Sounds alot like what I'm looking at doing. I'm using RC balancers on Tesla packs and I have an Arduino MEGA setup for automating my lighting. I've been interested in maintaining pack temperatures through automation fans, a heating pad, or water heating/cooling.



What is your main challenge, code? Architecture? Hardware?
kazetsukai is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 12-08-2019, 07:36 PM   #11
Bus Crazy
 
somewhereinusa's Avatar
 
Join Date: Nov 2010
Location: Andrews,Indiana
Posts: 2,430
Year: 1991
Coachwork: Bluebird
Chassis: AARE
Engine: 3116 Cat 250hp
Rated Cap: Just the two of us.
Quote:
What is your main challenge, code? Architecture? Hardware
My main problem is always coding. Building and planning is the easy part. I have the code for this working but, probably really badly formed. I'm thinking of adding data logging to see what triggered an event.
somewhereinusa is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 12-08-2019, 10:41 PM   #12
Bus Crazy
 
kazetsukai's Avatar
 
Join Date: May 2017
Location: Athens, TN
Posts: 1,574
Year: 1999
Coachwork: Amtran
Chassis: International RE
Engine: International T444e
Rated Cap: 76
Quote:
Originally Posted by somewhereinusa View Post
My main problem is always coding. Building and planning is the easy part. I have the code for this working but, probably really badly formed. I'm thinking of adding data logging to see what triggered an event.

If you use GitHub, you could start a code review on your branch. Pretty sure there's a few folks around here that'd be willing to add their .2c, myself included.
kazetsukai is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 12-09-2019, 04:01 PM   #13
Bus Nut
 
dzl_'s Avatar
 
Join Date: Jul 2019
Location: California, Bay Area
Posts: 896
Quote:
Originally Posted by somewhereinusa View Post
Since the lithium batteries I'm using (Valence) don't have any protection built in (only cell balancing), I've designed a protection system. It will totally disconnect the battery bank from everything if things go awry. It will also turn on a compartment cooling fan or turn on a heat pad if called for.
I have it bread boarded and the code written. For you coders out there mine is probably a bit clunky but, it works. Not really necessary but nice for a bit of bling I'm working on a screen to see what temps and voltages are.

I love projects like this, and I always admire the people brave enough to undertake them! When I get around to the specifics of my electrical system I'll have to come back and reread this thread.
dzl_ is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 12-10-2019, 07:29 AM   #14
Bus Crazy
 
somewhereinusa's Avatar
 
Join Date: Nov 2010
Location: Andrews,Indiana
Posts: 2,430
Year: 1991
Coachwork: Bluebird
Chassis: AARE
Engine: 3116 Cat 250hp
Rated Cap: Just the two of us.
Quote:
Originally Posted by kazetsukai View Post
If you use GitHub, you could start a code review on your branch. Pretty sure there's a few folks around here that'd be willing to add their .2c, myself included.
I hope I did it right. Here's a link to my project on Github.

https://github.com/somewhereinusa/li...attery-protect
somewhereinusa is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 12-10-2019, 02:49 PM   #15
Bus Crazy
 
kazetsukai's Avatar
 
Join Date: May 2017
Location: Athens, TN
Posts: 1,574
Year: 1999
Coachwork: Amtran
Chassis: International RE
Engine: International T444e
Rated Cap: 76
Quote:
Originally Posted by somewhereinusa View Post
I hope I did it right. Here's a link to my project on Github.

https://github.com/somewhereinusa/li...attery-protect
Awesome. I'll use a PR to give feedback, hopefully tonight.



To be fair, here's my Arduino code for scrutiny:
https://github.com/kazetsukaimiko/au...n/cpp/main.cpp


Again, none of my actual business logic runs on the arduino, that's in Java-land. The above is just communication code.
kazetsukai is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 12-15-2019, 10:55 AM   #16
Bus Nut
 
Join Date: Apr 2018
Posts: 421
That's awesome. Do you have a screen hooked up to it, or a video of it in action?


How did you determine what temperature/voltage to turn the fans on? I'm asking because I want to do the same thing for my electrical compartment ventilation fans, as they can be a little loud, and due to the cramped space the inverter/charger's airflow sucks. So I figured if I could have the vent fans turn on with the inverter fans, that would be best, but I didn't want to disassemble the inverter to connect a relay to the fan, so here I am trying to figure out other methods of automatically turning on the vents.
TheArgobus is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 12-15-2019, 02:18 PM   #17
Bus Crazy
 
somewhereinusa's Avatar
 
Join Date: Nov 2010
Location: Andrews,Indiana
Posts: 2,430
Year: 1991
Coachwork: Bluebird
Chassis: AARE
Engine: 3116 Cat 250hp
Rated Cap: Just the two of us.
Quote:
Originally Posted by TheArgobus View Post
That's awesome. Do you have a screen hooked up to it, or a video of it in action?

How did you determine what temperature/voltage to turn the fans on?
There is a screen hooked to it. I started to make a video but, there was a glitch in my code and haven't gotten to it again since that was fixed. Now I'm working on final wiring and it's apart again.

If you just want to turn on one or two fans I would use one or two of these.
https://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_fro...ure+controller

I use them for lots of things. If the relay included won't carry enough current you can use one of these to control a bigger relay. I think for the turn on temp I set mine at about 10° lower than whatever the inverter/charger fans are set at.
somewhereinusa is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 12-16-2019, 09:26 AM   #18
Bus Crazy
 
kazetsukai's Avatar
 
Join Date: May 2017
Location: Athens, TN
Posts: 1,574
Year: 1999
Coachwork: Amtran
Chassis: International RE
Engine: International T444e
Rated Cap: 76
Quote:
Originally Posted by somewhereinusa View Post
There is a screen hooked to it. I started to make a video but, there was a glitch in my code and haven't gotten to it again since that was fixed. Now I'm working on final wiring and it's apart again.
I was curious about this as well. Hoping you might upload a picture of the TFT you were using. The API for it was nice and clean, and would probably help me a lot if I ever needed to debug some of my arduino code.



I'm currently fighting a race condition in my code and I can't use Serial to do debugging due to how the code works (Serial is used for communication already, and the bug is in that communication code).



Second, if you're able to send pictures do please send a few of your overall setup once its back together.
kazetsukai is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 12-16-2019, 10:28 AM   #19
Bus Crazy
 
somewhereinusa's Avatar
 
Join Date: Nov 2010
Location: Andrews,Indiana
Posts: 2,430
Year: 1991
Coachwork: Bluebird
Chassis: AARE
Engine: 3116 Cat 250hp
Rated Cap: Just the two of us.
Quote:
Originally Posted by kazetsukai View Post
I was curious about this as well. Hoping you might upload a picture of the TFT you were using. The API for it was nice and clean, and would probably help me a lot if I ever needed to debug some of my arduino code.


Second, if you're able to send pictures do please send a few of your overall setup once its back together.
I'll get pictures as soon as I can.
The tft I am using is this. I'm not using the touch screen part. At least not yet. I may go to the 7 inch screen.

https://www.adafruit.com/product/1591

You also need this for Arduino to be able to run it.

https://www.adafruit.com/product/1590

I'm looking into replacing the relay board and the 3 cube relays with MOSFETs. Does anyone know it I can use one with a 5v gate voltage to control another MOSFET that will handle say, 30A at 12V?
somewhereinusa is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 12-17-2019, 11:05 AM   #20
Bus Nut
 
Join Date: Apr 2018
Posts: 421
Quote:
Originally Posted by somewhereinusa View Post
I think for the turn on temp I set mine at about 10° lower than whatever the inverter/charger fans are set at.

That's a very clever, simple and low tech solution. Nice.
TheArgobus is offline   Reply With Quote
Reply

Thread Tools
Display Modes

Posting Rules
You may not post new threads
You may not post replies
You may not post attachments
You may not edit your posts

BB code is On
Smilies are On
[IMG] code is On
HTML code is Off
Trackbacks are Off
Pingbacks are Off
Refbacks are Off


» Featured Campgrounds

Reviews provided by

Powered by vBadvanced CMPS v3.2.3

All times are GMT -5. The time now is 05:46 AM.


Powered by vBulletin® Version 3.8.8 Beta 4
Copyright ©2000 - 2024, vBulletin Solutions, Inc.