Victron damaged lithium battery

DIY
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1

Good morning,

The system is a full Victron 24V installation with:

2x 12V Lithium Smart Batteries (connected in series)
Smart BMS v2
Multiplus 24/3000/70
MPPT, Orion DC-DC, and other components, all managed by the BMS
One of the batteries is dead (below 1V) and does not appear in the app. The other one is fully charged. Both batteries are the same model, have the same age, and almost identical serial numbers. Before connecting them in series, they were fully charged and balanced. This was done more than 1.5 years ago. Since then, charging has been managed by two Orion units, a solar MPPT, and the Multiplus.

At some point, the whole system shut down. After investigating for over a week, I found that the green jumper on the BMS (which I was not using for a remote switch) was not properly tightened from the factory. This caused random system shutdowns. After fixing it, the system worked fine until today, when this battery failure occurred.

What could be the cause of this battery failure? I have been using the default Victron lithium profile for all components, and the setup was plug & play. The BMS manages all charge disconnections (MPPT, Orion, etc.), and there is also a Battery Protect in the system.

The Lithium Smart Batteries are supposed to have integrated cell balancing, and the BMS should have detected that one of the batteries was failing. Instead, it continued to allow charging.

I am aware of the microcontroller power-cycle procedure, but I no longer trust this battery, so I will send it back under warranty. Same for the BMS…

Also, I was unaware that a failing battery could make a strange noise—see video here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nQ97iWI3WUM.

Thanks in advance for your help!

3

Are this Victron batteries? Otherwise: why do you blame Victron for an obvious error of the BMS?

5

Now wait a minute and think about why I first asked whether this was a Victron battery.

7

No battery balancer required if the battery gets fully charged regularly.
Assuming that there is no 12v load directly connecting to 1 battery.

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9

For those who were wondering what the wheel of death that the OP has nailed to their wall.
It is a Texdev TEXU400 circular bus/fuse/isolator.

I scanned the QR code in the video. :wink:

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10

Haven’t you been warned about 1 word answers?

12

Perhaps you could reassure us that there were no loads directly connected to the battery .Especially no loads connected to a single 12v battery.

Also when was the last time the batteries were fully charged and Victron Connect reported the batteries as balanced.

13

Perhaps you could use a sentence to ask the OP?
That would be more helpful.

15

Given that I watched the video, I’m aware the OP has Victron SLB batteries and a VE Bus V2 BMS.

More help. Less snark pls.

17

Isn’t my post completely self-explaining? Please tell me which part you don’t understand, and I will certainly help you.

19

Yes LBS is related to victron batteries like the title of this thread

20

Five days ago, I received information that the other battery was fully charged and balanced. This one (which is dead) was supposed to have the same status.

21

The system is a 24V system so everyting is connected to the neg of the first battery and the plus of the second battery

23

I don’t understand why do you need a balancer ? Can you please explain

25

Maybe that would apply to different batteries, but these two are exactly the same.

27

Like specified in the first post, all the settings used are the default lithium setting that are for the victron lithium batteries. This is the idea, to have all the setup from Victron and everythings is ready to go !

28

Where in the manual of the Victron Smart Lithium batteries do you find that?

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29

OK, I understand that you have difficulties with reading. Indeed the OP only says “Victron system”. The other terms “Victron BMS” and “Victron Smart batteries” are an invention by you.

BTW: I too have a “Victron system”, but my battery is not from Victron.

32

It’s ok that you have your own opinion about using balancers or not but please don’t say that Victron “strongly recommends” it, if that’s not the case.

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34

Hi @NVs,

If the battery has failed, then you should contact your supplier to discuss if it is covered under warranty.

Do you have a system wiring diagram?

It’s really hard to say what the cause of the failure is without being on site to thoroughly inspect the installation, and seeing the battery itself. Going under 1V it could even be some mechanical failure internally and now some bad connection.

I agree that it’s strange that the BMS did not signal the fault as the battery voltage dropped. You said

It is normal and expected that it continued to allow charging, what should have been stopped was discharging.

It is not clear from your video and description exactly how the discharge control circuit is wired, that may be where the fault is? Not necessarily, but definitely somewhere I would look first when troubleshooting to make sure it doesn’t just happen again with a replacement.

It’s also important that the correct profile is set on the MultiPlus. Lots of parts that need to be done correctly for these systems. There are some good trainings here for our lithium batteries, I don’t consider them for DIY beginners without training - Victron Energy - Victron Professional

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