Micro-wind energy

Seems a bad idea to me.
As Dan suggested, there is no need for all this with good batteries.
A couple of Tenergy or K2 12V 10A/H LiFePO4 would be the best solution. You can do 1000k with a VGA moving map display and transponder (plus the usual assortment of crap) running from pre-flight to flight download. The batteries will still be above 12V afterwards.
Besides the aerodynamic drag and storage problems, what time and money are involved to replace the canopy after a bad deployment or retrieval of one of those generators? It will happen sooner or later.
With that consideration, even phosphate batteries are cheap.
Jim

My concern with the LiFeP04 batteries concerns my hangar arrangement. Two
of my three batteries require tools or removal of the tail to get them out
of the glider so my glider stays connected to "smart" chargers continuously.
At present, I'm not comfortable with leaving a lithium battery connected all
the time. Is it safe as with the AGM batteries?


"JS" wrote in message
...
Seems a bad idea to me.
As Dan suggested, there is no need for all this with good batteries.
A couple of Tenergy or K2 12V 10A/H LiFePO4 would be the best solution. You
can do 1000k with a VGA moving map display and transponder (plus the usual
assortment of crap) running from pre-flight to flight download. The
batteries will still be above 12V afterwards.
Besides the aerodynamic drag and storage problems, what time and money are
involved to replace the canopy after a bad deployment or retrieval of one of
those generators? It will happen sooner or later.
With that consideration, even phosphate batteries are cheap.
Jim

Well ... it is not safe to leave any battery on continuous charge inside the glider. All it takes is for the charging circuit in the smart charger to fail and pump too much into the battery and then boom!

However, as long as one believes in the charger, then yes, it is safe to leave the LiFePo4 batteries on their smart charger. The K2 batteries have a Battery Management System (BMS) built into the battery case, so this also helps to regulate the charge.

With both the smart charger and the BMS looking out for the battery it should be safer than the single redundancy of the lead-acid charger.

Another option is to buy a $10 plug-in timer and run the charger through the timer and set it to charge for a limited time period each day. We do this with our tow plane batteries through out the winter to keep them topped-up while the runway is under feet of snow.