Ordered my Flexopower Lithium444

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1Louder

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I look forward to your review. 40ah lithium should be equal to a AGM Battery twice the size. Keep a solar panel on it all day and it should keep a fridge happy all night.
 
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madcratebuilder

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Gosh, I kinda wish I had seen this last fall. I have a 12V lithium jumper pack and I also have several 24v lithium powered tools and needed a pure sine wave to run the charger. I've got a 400 watt inverter, it was fairly cheap but this is a much more versital item.
 
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For 349.00 I had to get it after the reviews I read:

The review on Expedition Portal for Flexopower says it powers the fridge for 2 days and charges in 6 hours.

Guy on Jeep Expiditions said The Flexopower battery pack powered my 12V refrigerator for 2 days & 45 minutes before the voltage dropped too low to keep it running and the low voltage cut off setting on the refrigerator turned it off. That's good enough for me, it's very rare for me to need two days of battery power, usually need it just for overnight use. I think this Flexopower unit is well worth the $349.00 I paid.
 
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1Louder said:
I look forward to your review. 40ah lithium should be equal to a AGM Battery twice the size. Keep a solar panel on it all day and it should keep a fridge happy all night.
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Is this because the LiPo can be discharged to 20% as opposed to the AGM only being able to be discharged to 50%?
 
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Buddabuda said:
Is this because the LiPo can be discharged to 20% as opposed to the AGM only being able to be discharged to 50%?
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IGNORE what I posted. Listen to old_man he is a subject matter expert.
 
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stickel

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Interesting. I've been casually looking around for a power pack like this (so many out there and they're all a pretty penny). Any idea which solar panels would work well with this unit (I'm a fan of the flexible, easy to store kind)?
 
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stickel said:
Interesting. I've been casually looking around for a power pack like this (so many out there and they're all a pretty penny). Any idea which solar panels would work well with this unit (I'm a fan of the flexible, easy to store kind)?
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Any, but the larger and more efficient you get the less time it will take to recharge. 100watt or greater is what I would use. 200 watt would be even better.
 
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stickel said:
Interesting. I've been casually looking around for a power pack like this (so many out there and they're all a pretty penny). Any idea which solar panels would work well with this unit (I'm a fan of the flexible, easy to store kind)?
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Flexopower themselves makes flexible solar panels. Very durable as well. Check this out.
 
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1Louder said:
Yep. Lithium should be able to go to 0% unless this is a subset of what is like in our phones, etc these days.
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Where did you get this info? Not to be contentious, but AH rating is AH rating. Discharging a lithium battery too far can cause issues. Trust me, I design battery solutions for military and space. The battery should shut down to prevent discharging too far, since this can be dangerous, as in it may catch fire and explode when you recharge. That is why every battery pack carries an onboard computer that monitors the charge state and is supposed to shut down if it is charged too fast, overcharged too far or discharged too far.

I will look into these battery packs and get back with further "FACTS"

Back with facts... This unit will give you that number of AHs before protecting itself. 40AH is not that much capacity and is based upon the battery voltage, not 120V. So it will not give you 40 amps at 120v for an hour.

If you read the fine print, it is 444 watt hours. If your cooler pulls a constant 3 amps at 12 volts you should be able to run for approximately 444/(3x12)= 12.3 hours under ideal conditions. Now you have to figure in the duty cycle of the fridge, in other words how much of the time is it actually "on". If it is actually providing cooling one third of the time, then you should be able to run around 37 hours if running from the 12v outlet. If running from the 120v volt outlet, it will be less due to the losses in the conversion process. I would estimate the losses to be around 20% for a well designed inverter, with 90% being exceptional.

While it is a very nice, small, and handy unit, it is not the answer to everybody's needs. For what it costs, if you have the space, you could put an additional dual deep cycle battery setup in your rig and have several times more capacity, and add an inverter for the 120v.
 
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old_man said:
Where did you get this info? Not to be contentious, but AH rating is AH rating. Discharging a lithium battery too far can cause issues.
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The internet. Wrong info, ok. Thanks for the dissertation. You don't need to type things in CAPS. You know more about the subject fantastic. I'll unfollow this thread as to not cause any more harm on the "facts".
 
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"While it is a very nice, small, and handy unit, it is not the answer to everybody's needs. For what it costs, if you have the space, you could put an additional dual deep cycle battery setup in your rig and have several times more capacity, and add an inverter for the 120v. "

No way your gonna come close to under 400 bucks with another battery and all..........Unless you know of a deal I missed?

Actual live test powered a fridge 3.5 days if I remember the posting/review.

Appreciate your help guys

Jim

PS just seen that the unit also has a built in MPPT Controller, another plus......
 
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Jim SoG said:
"While it is a very nice, small, and handy unit, it is not the answer to everybody's needs. For what it costs, if you have the space, you could put an additional dual deep cycle battery setup in your rig and have several times more capacity, and add an inverter for the 120v. "

No way your gonna come close to under 400 bucks with another battery and all..........Unless you know of a deal I missed?

Actual live test powered a fridge 3.5 days if I remember the posting/review.

Appreciate your help guys

Jim

PS just seen that the unit also has a built in MPPT Controller, another plus......
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Your results show that the unit is running a lot smaller duty cycle. That is great. The more you open it, the harder it will have to work. The better insulated it is the less it will have to work. That is why is pays to get an insulating blanket for your fridge. I included the "dissertation" so others might be able to look at this commonly asked question. The math isn't hard, but every need comes with a different set of numbers to feed into the equation.

Personally, I like the unit and would like to have one, but I can't justify the expense for what I get.

Around here, I can normally score a group 34 deep cycle battery for less than $150 each (x2). I can score a decent inverter for less than a hundred. So that works out to $400. Yes, it takes more space, weights more and you would have to fab a mounting and wire it up. For me, those are things I like to do.
 
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I ran mine down to zip (Plugged in lmap with 3 bulbs, 2.5 days) and charged it up, now sitting to test how much drops with no use.....
 
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