question

electricjimbob avatar image
electricjimbob asked

Do you need a BMS for a single Lithium Smart battery?

Fair warning: I'm a pure novice, zero practical experience.

I'll just be having one battery, my needs are modest and the single 12.8V/160Ah should easily cover them.

I think I should be able to use it without a BMS since it has it's own internal BMS.

The data sheet and manual are making me doubt that but that might be because they're written as if you'd never use a single battery. There isn't an installation guide for just using a single battery it's all multi-battery situations where you'd need a BMS to balance the different batteries with one another.

Have I got this right or do you need an external BMS with a single Victron Lithium Smart battery?

Lithium Battery
2 |3000

Up to 8 attachments (including images) can be used with a maximum of 190.8 MiB each and 286.6 MiB total.

3 Answers
Paul B avatar image
Paul B answered ·

These batteries have built in Cell balancing, but do require also there to be an external BMS, to control the chargers and loads:

https://www.victronenergy.com/batteries/lithium-battery-12-8v

2 |3000

Up to 8 attachments (including images) can be used with a maximum of 190.8 MiB each and 286.6 MiB total.

electricjimbob avatar image
electricjimbob answered ·

Well damn. Which new model has the full function BMS in built?

4 comments
2 |3000

Up to 8 attachments (including images) can be used with a maximum of 190.8 MiB each and 286.6 MiB total.

mvader (Victron Energy) avatar image mvader (Victron Energy) ♦♦ commented ·

SuperPacks have all built-in; no thing external required.

Smart Lithiums have something built-in, but still -always- require an external BMS as well.

0 Likes 0 ·
electricjimbob avatar image
electricjimbob answered ·

Cool.

I probably can't wait for them to be available near me (Australia). So I'll have to go with all the bits and bobs instead. Darn.

2 |3000

Up to 8 attachments (including images) can be used with a maximum of 190.8 MiB each and 286.6 MiB total.

Related Resources

Additional resources still need to be added for this topic