dean1484
dean1484 MegaDork
3/31/23 8:51 a.m.

I have an IR camera that we use at the office.  I am looking for a lightweight battery to replace the SLA battery it currently uses.

The batteries we currently are 5ah and 7ah.  They have served fine in terms of providing enough power but they are heavy to carry around when you are scanning a large commercial roof.  The current batch of batteries has failed and will not hold a charge anymore so I am wanting to upgrade the batteries and I will assume I will be upgrading my charger/chargers as well.  

I am looking for something in the 10ah (maybe 2 5ah) or even bigger and stepping up to something in the 20ah range.  but at that point, I think size would become an issue

Fast-charge would also be a bonus as there have been times when people forget to put the batteries on charge and someone else goes out to the field (forgets to check the state of charge) and has dead batteries.  Something that would get to 80% charge in 20-30 min would be a huge bonus

Any suggestions out there?  

I have been looking at LiFePO4 Deep Cycle Battery's and found these.  They are about 1/3 the weight according to their little charts.

From Here >>  On Amazon

Does anyone have any suggestions or recommendations?

Karacticus
Karacticus SuperDork
3/31/23 9:27 a.m.

Looking the other direction, the Milwaukee M12 batteries come in at up to a 5 Ah capacity and the weigh all of a pound. And quick charging them isn't really a problem. 

dean1484
dean1484 MegaDork
3/31/23 10:28 a.m.

In reply to Karacticus :

Ohhhh now that is a really good idea!!!!

ProDarwin
ProDarwin MegaDork
3/31/23 10:50 a.m.

Yup M12 would be a fantastic solution for this.  Easy button from a charging standpoint and battery replacement standpoint.  Any hardware store will have them, they charge super fast, etc.  Only thing you need to do is adapt to your interface.

the_machina
the_machina Reader
3/31/23 10:58 a.m.

Similar to the M12 battery option, it wouldn't take much to put a step down converter on an 18v battery, if you guys already use some sort of 18v battery ecosystem.

 

Does the truck have a bunch of 20v dewalt tools? Put together a dewalt battery recepticle and an 18->12v step down regulator. Then when the battery runs dead they just swap it for another one just like every other power tool on the truck.

Similar for ryobi, or milwaulkee, etc. If you already use a ton of 12v tools at work, then even easier.

Karacticus
Karacticus SuperDork
3/31/23 10:58 a.m.

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