Can someone please clarify best practice for battery recharge. I have Bosch a 400Wh Battery and over winter when not in use I kept it indoors at about 60% charge. Recently I've been doing short daily rides only burning about 15%. Should I always top it back up to 100% before next day or let it go down lower before recharge to 100%. Thanks.

If only doing short rides and using only 15% no harm in leaving it as is and going for another short ride before fully charging again.

If only doing short rides and using only 15% no harm in leaving it as is and going for another short ride before fully charging again.

Thanks, but is it OK to say do 4 days at 15% each then when it's then down to 40% fully recharge i.e is there a minimum that is good practice not to go below. This assumes I know my rides are only gonna take 15% cus I'm sticking to a similar route each day.

I have a 500 Wh Bosch battery.

If I know I'm going to be using it regularly, (every day at the moment), I charge to 100%, then just ride until it's down to between 20 and 30%, then fully charge again.

If It's not going to be used for a long time, I store it between 30 and 60%.

I have a 500 Wh Bosch battery.

If I know I'm going to be using it regularly, (every day at the moment), I charge to 100%, then just ride until it's down to between 20 and 30%, then fully charge again.

If It's not going to be used for a long time, I store it between 30 and 60%.

Thanks

Thanks, but is it OK to say do 4 days at 15% each then when it's then down to 40% fully recharge i.e is there a minimum that is good practice not to go below. This assumes I know my rides are only gonna take 15% cus I'm sticking to a similar route each day.

 

Yes no real issue with doing so for short runs.

Minimum value is 32v/33v about 10/15% and a get home value in low pas if needed, I usually cease discharge at about 35v so about 30%.

I have a 500 Wh Bosch battery.

If I know I'm going to be using it regularly, (every day at the moment), I charge to 100%, then just ride until it's down to between 20 and 30%, then fully charge again.

If It's not going to be used for a long time, I store it between 30 and 60%.

I have a 500Wh Bosch battery but the only indication of state of charge is 5 led’s. That’s 20% between each led, so how do you know it’s at 30%?

Do some batteries have built in voltmeters or do people carry one on rides.

Nealh, how do you know when you are down to 35v on a ride?

I have a 500Wh Bosch battery but the only indication of state of charge is 5 led’s. That’s 20% between each led, so how do you know it’s at 30%?

Do some batteries have built in voltmeters or do people carry one on rides.

Nealh, how do you know when you are down to 35v on a ride?

 

Either I use an lcd3 with voltage reading or on my home built packs I wire in a separate meter on the exterior of the pack, the addition of a volt meter is easy and even a locked in system should be possible.

On my commute/town bike I know the voltage quite accurately by mileage or by the lcd battery bar, the lcd2 is quite basic with no thrills.

 

The Swizzbee has no oem display led or lcd so I have wired in a Coulombe meter to the battery box and added the watt meter lcd to the stem, this givse me the info supplied of wh, ah, current, voltage etc etc.

Edited April 9, 20206 yr by Nealh

I have a 500Wh Bosch battery but the only indication of state of charge is 5 led’s. That’s 20% between each led, so how do you know it’s at 30%?

Do some batteries have built in voltmeters or do people carry one on rides.

Nealh, how do you know when you are down to 35v on a ride?

I have the Kiox display, shows battery in actual percentage.

I have a 500Wh Bosch battery but the only indication of state of charge is 5 led’s. That’s 20% between each led, so how do you know it’s at 30%?

Do some batteries have built in voltmeters or do people carry one on rides.

Nealh, how do you know when you are down to 35v on a ride?

Having your own volt meter is not a requirement, but a damn good idea.

Reasonably accurate ones are under 20 UK pounds on ebay.

Obviously, check its accuracy against a known good one if possible.

On my bikes, I generally ride till the BMS cuts off power, unless I was going for a very long ride and then I recharged with probably up to 20% of capacity remaining.

It was for two reasons:- 1) laziness 2) saving on charges, as all battery chemistries have a limited number of charges they can accept before the battery starts to age.

One should only charge when needed.

Also, not ignore the battery for long periods, as they self discharge slowly....

Never leave a battery on charge once full charge has been achieved.

Andy

Edited April 10, 20206 yr by Andy-Mat

I read somewhere , can't remember where, that checking a Bosch or Yamaha battery with a voltmeter can cause problems afterwards, could this be correct?

Dave.

I read somewhere , can't remember where, that checking a Bosch or Yamaha battery with a voltmeter can cause problems afterwards, could this be correct?

Dave.

I have never had a Yamaha Battery, and I will never ever buy anything from Bosch.....so I cannot say either way. But someone here will know I am sure.

Andy

RE Yamaha Battery pedelec member chris_n commented

"

Whatever you do even if someone suggests otherwise do not go trying to do capacity tests with external loads and do not go sticking multimeters into battery terminals. If you try to do a load test you will kill the battery, if you go sticking a multimeter on it you will not get correct readings unless it is connected to the bike and turned on.

My advice is to go back to the dealer, no one in the UK that I know of is repairing these batteries. "

 

https://www.pedelecs.co.uk/forum/threads/haibike-2018-sduro-hardseven-1-0-problem.33301/#post-473225

 

Also with a lithium battery partial charges back to full are not harmful and it is better not to deeply discharge the battery too often if possible.

 

My Yamaha 400Wh battery is entering its 6th year and is performing seemingly exactly as it did when new. It has covered 11,900 miles.

 

I use my bike to commute to work and back.

 

I store my battery indoors at about 65% charged and charge it back to full prior to my off road 12/14 mile ride to work. I charge it back to full while at work after having used 25% to 30% of its capacity. I ride it 10 miles home on the road using higher assist levels to average around 20mph for the 10 mile journey. I then store the battery in the house at the above mentioned 60%/65% charge level.

 

I only charge it back to full when I next use the bike. This gap could be only until the next day or as much as six weeks.

 

Used in this way my 400Wh Yamaha battery seems to be lasting extremely well.

Edited April 10, 20206 yr by georgehenry

I read somewhere , can't remember where, that checking a Bosch or Yamaha battery with a voltmeter can cause problems afterwards, could this be correct?

Dave.

I can actually believe it of a Bosch, as it apparently has these "communications" between different components that someone else here wrote about, and disrupting the comms apparently can cause parts to go into a "sleep mode"... but I have no idea about the Yamaha batteries myself....

I hope this helps.

Andy

Having your own volt meter is not a requirement, but a damn good idea.

Reasonably accurate ones are under 20 UK pounds on ebay.

Obviously, check its accuracy against a known good one if possible.

On my bikes, I generally ride till the BMS cuts off power, unless I was going for a very long ride and then I recharged with probably up to 20% of capacity remaining.

It was for two reasons:- 1) laziness 2) saving on charges, as all battery chemistries have a limited number of charges they can accept before the battery starts to age.

One should only charge when needed.

Also, not ignore the battery for long periods, as they self discharge slowly....

Never leave a battery on charge once full charge has been achieved.

Andy

So just to clarify, whether you recharge a battery from say 80% or from BMS cut off (as you said) does that then class as a full recharge i.e if say the battery is capable of 3000 recharges, would either situation be one less recharge off the total?

So just to clarify, whether you recharge a battery from say 80% or from BMS cut off (as you said) does that then class as a full recharge i.e if say the battery is capable of 3000 recharges, would either situation be one less recharge off the total?

 

A partial charge doesn't count as one cyclic charge, it needs to be 100%, so 60% & 40% charge counts as one full cyclic charge and so on, etc, etc.

So just to clarify, whether you recharge a battery from say 80% or from BMS cut off (as you said) does that then class as a full recharge i.e if say the battery is capable of 3000 recharges, would either situation be one less recharge off the total?

Basically yes.

IMHO it does not matter how "long" or how much "capacity" is added, a charge is a charge. Whether seconds or hours. Some battery manufacturers mention this deep in their literature, but not all of them do this.

Battery manufacturers appear to want to try and get the guarantee finished, before anything nasty happens to the battery.

But maybe I am simply getting cynical in my old age!

I do believe sincerely, that this is what destructs batteries.

In articular, leaving them for long periods on the charger for no reason. As this apparently forms as a lot of tiny charges, especially with the cheaper chargers, IMHO.

A good charger (which I do not possess!), is one that not only stops charging, but also removes the mains connection, and the DC output connection as well, and needs a button resetting to reconnect and charge again..

Hopefully that makes sense to all here.

Regards

Andy

A partial charge doesn't count as one cyclic charge, it needs to be 100%, so 60% & 40% charge counts as one full cyclic charge and so on, etc, etc.

I tend to disagree on that point.

Andy

I agree with Nealth and disagree with Andy-Mat on this as my own battery has spent its whole life being partially charged back to full and as I said is has now entered its 6th year of service working like it did when it was new after covering 11,900 miles.

I agree with Nealth and disagree with Andy-Mat on this as my own battery has spent its whole life being partially charged back to full and as I said is has now entered its 6th year of service working like it did when it was new after covering 11,900 miles.

How depleted was the battery generally, when you carried out a fresh charge?

How do you treat the battery when charging if I may ask, as that IMHO is the most important part.

I myself have a modified 24 hour timer to switch the mains off when I myself judge it to be fully charged, time wise. That way I cannot forget it.

My last e-bike I bought secondhand, probably about a year old, treated the battery the same and I gave it away after 6 years of usage, with no noticeable loss of capacity, though I did not do any testing in that area. If there was any loss, it had been gradual and not noticeable to me...I rode about 20,000 KMS on that bike....

I mostly did empty to (or close to) full charges....

Not leaving the battery on the charger after its full, is my personal thought that appears to be the single best practice to give the best long term life of the battery.

I will start planning the build of a charger this year to my own spec, to see if that helps in any way at all...Thats the type of project I love, especially the planning.

regards

Andy

Hi Andy-Mat

 

I copy what I said above.

 

"My Yamaha 400Wh battery is entering its 6th year and is performing seemingly exactly as it did when new. It has covered 11,900 miles or 19,151km.

 

I use my bike to commute to work and back.

 

I store my battery indoors at about 65% charged and charge it back to full prior to my off road 12/14 mile ride to work. I charge it back to full while at work after having used 25% to 30% of its capacity. I ride it 10 miles home on the road using higher assist levels to average around 20mph for the 10 mile journey. I then store the battery in the house at the above mentioned 60%/65% charge level.

 

I only charge it back to full when I next use the bike. The time gap between charges could be only until the next day or as much as six weeks after bringing the battery into the house.

 

Used in this way my 400Wh Yamaha battery seems to be lasting extremely well."

 

So I charge my Yamaha battery from about 65% to full 100% as close to when I depart for work as I can. I do not use a timer plug with my Yamaha battery and Yamaha Charger and it would seem likely that the charger completely stops charging once it has completed charging and balancing the battery.

 

(I do have a Chinese derived rear hub electric bike with a generic Chinese charger probably similar to your own and also like you I use a timer plug with this charger that allows me to set a time limit for how long the charger is connected to the mains supply with 6 choices, 15min, 30min, 1hr, 2hrs, 4hrs and 8hrs.)

 

When I get to work I have generally used about 25% to 30% of the 400Wh Yamaha batteries capacity. Before I start work I plug my battery into the charger and switch it on to charge.

 

I will usually be away from the battery for between 6 and 9 hours while I am working. The battery will have become fully charged within a couple of hours. So my Yamaha battery and charger remain attached and switched on at the mains for probably between 4 and 7 hours before I can unplug it.

 

As my battery has worked so well, and for so long, I believe that the Yamaha system is well designed and the battery of high quality.

 

I use higher assistance levels to travel home on a 10 mile undulating B road route where I average 20mph and complete the journey in 30 minutes plus and occasionally minus a bit. My battery will normally have about 65% of its capacity remaining. I store my battery in the house and only charge it again as close to when I will be departing to ride to work as possible.

 

So as you can see I do a few things that you believe to be detrimental to the longevity of an electric bike battery and which judged by the continuing excellent performance of my Yamaha battery have not been detrimental to mine.

 

1. For the whole of my batteries life I have been only partially discharging the battery before charging it back to full.

 

2. My battery has spent a large proportion of its life connected to a switched on Yamaha charger after it has finished charging the battery to full.

 

However I think we both agree that it is not a good idea to leave these batteries fully charged too long before you use them.

 

If you have found no issues using your own battery until it is empty before re charging it, I might be wrong to worry too much about deeply discharging my battery.

 

I think we can both agree that it is certainly a good idea to look after these expensive batteries as well as possible.

Edited April 11, 20206 yr by georgehenry

Hi Andy-Mat

 

I copy what I said above.

 

"My Yamaha 400Wh battery is entering its 6th year and is performing seemingly exactly as it did when new. It has covered 11,900 miles or 19,151km.

 

I use my bike to commute to work and back.

 

I store my battery indoors at about 65% charged and charge it back to full prior to my off road 12/14 mile ride to work. I charge it back to full while at work after having used 25% to 30% of its capacity. I ride it 10 miles home on the road using higher assist levels to average around 20mph for the 10 mile journey. I then store the battery in the house at the above mentioned 60%/65% charge level.

 

I only charge it back to full when I next use the bike. The time gap between charges could be only until the next day or as much as six weeks after bringing the battery into the house.

 

Used in this way my 400Wh Yamaha battery seems to be lasting extremely well."

 

So I charge my Yamaha battery from about 65% to full 100% as close to when I depart for work as I can. I do not use a timer plug with my Yamaha battery and Yamaha Charger and it would seem likely that the charger completely stops charging once it has completed charging and balancing the battery.

 

(I do have a Chinese derived rear hub electric bike with a generic Chinese charger probably similar to your own and also like you I use a timer plug with this charger that allows me to set a time limit for how long the charger is connected to the mains supply with 6 choices, 15min, 30min, 1hr, 2hrs, 4hrs and 8hrs.)

 

When I get to work I have generally used about 25% to 30% of the 400Wh Yamaha batteries capacity. Before I start work I plug my battery into the charger and switch it on to charge.

 

I will usually be away from the battery for between 6 and 9 hours while I am working. The battery will have become fully charged within a couple of hours. So my Yamaha battery and charger remain attached and switched on at the mains for probably between 4 and 7 hours before I can unplug it.

 

As my battery has worked so well, and for so long, I believe that the Yamaha system is well designed and the battery of high quality.

 

I use higher assistance levels to travel home on a 10 mile undulating B road route where I average 20mph and complete the journey in 30 minutes plus and occasionally minus a bit. My battery will normally have about 65% of it capacity remaining. I store my battery in the house and only charge it again as close to when I will be departing to ride to work as possible.

 

So as you can see I do a few things that you believe to be detrimental to the longevity of an electric bike battery and which judged by the continuing excellent performance of my Yamaha battery have not been detrimental to mine.

 

1. For the whole of my batteries life I have been only partially discharging the battery before charging it back to full.

 

2. My battery has spent a large proportion of it life connected to a switched on Yamaha charger after it has finished charging the battery to full.

 

However I think we both agree that it is not a good idea to leave these batteries fully charged too long before you use them.

 

If you have found no issues using your own battery until it is empty before re charging it, I might be wrong to worry too much about deeply discharging my battery.

 

I think we can both agree that it is certainly a good idea to look after these expensive batteries as well as possible.

Good post.

Do you happen to know which cells are installed in the battery?

I am unsure as to whether Yamaha make their own cells, or buy in...

My batteries, 3 for my current bike (one on loan to use and keep active with), and the one for my previous bike were/are all Panasonic batteries, which I am really happy with.

I keep getting told here that other manufacturers are better, but never see any positive proof, but I know that Panasonic really do put their money where their mouth is!

Regards for a great Easter.

Andy

So just to clarify, whether you recharge a battery from say 80% or from BMS cut off (as you said) does that then class as a full recharge i.e if say the battery is capable of 3000 recharges, would either situation be one less recharge off the total?

Bosch explicitly state A charge cycle refers to the full recharging of a battery in a single charging session or several partial charging sessions.

https://www.bosch-ebike.com/en/products/batteries/

 

Of course, there may be people on this forum who say that because Bosch state it, it must be wrong. They may even go so far as to say that Bosch say it in order to increase sales of their (inflated price) batteries.

Of course, there may be people on this forum who say that because Bosch state it, it must be wrong. They may even go so far as to say that Bosch say it in order to increase sales of their (inflated price) batteries.

These same people may also say the world is flat and 5g masts are the cause of the pandemic....

Good post.

Do you happen to know which cells are installed in the battery?

I am unsure as to whether Yamaha make their own cells, or buy in...

My batteries, 3 for my current bike (one on loan to use and keep active with), and the one for my previous bike were/are all Panasonic batteries, which I am really happy with.

I keep getting told here that other manufacturers are better, but never see any positive proof, but I know that Panasonic really do put their money where their mouth is!

Regards for a great Easter.

Andy

I should have said Panasonic "CELLS"! My bad...

Andy