Cheap Lithium Batteries -- How to Avoid Buying The Wrong Battery

[SolarPoweredRV]

Recently, I posted two threads about bad "Cheap" Lithium batteries. One was about the lowest priced 100ah Lithium battery I could find on Amazon and the other was about a Lithium battery that was manufactured to defraud you of your money.

The first battery was simply built from poor quality components and had honest specifications that would let you know the battery will not perform very well for you in your RV (see "... When is Too Cheap" linked below).

The other battery was designed to be fraudulent from the get go. This battery was marketed as a 300 amp hour, 24 volt battery, when, in fact, it was built using cells capable of producing only 60 amp hours. I became aware of this "Cheap" battery through a YouTube video (see "Cheap Lithium Battery Warning" linked below).

To avoid purchasing the first battery, you could have looked at the specifications and compared them to similar batteries to determine that battery would not work well in an RV, specifically, the discharge rate was only 25 amps whereas, most 100ah batteries have a discharge rate of 100 amps. If you had purchased this battery, you would have had a battery not fit for use in an RV, but, you would not have been defrauded in the purchase because the battery actually meets specifications.

To avoid purchasing the second (fraudulent) battery, you would have had to search YouTube for a battery tear down on that specific battery (or that battery brand), and, having not found one, simply not purchased the battery.

Another way to possibly have determined that the battery was bad, might have been to compare the weight to other batteries with the same voltage and amp hours as the fraudulent battery. The weight would have been about 2/3 less weight than similar batteries. Comparing weight is no guarantee, however, it might have given you a clue that there was an issue with that battery. I recommend comparing weight between batteries because the fraudsters might not have thought to falsify the weight of their fraudulent battery because shipping weights need to be accurate (I know it is a small detail, but it might have been a clue). To be fair, I never saw the marketing information on this fraudulent battery, but, I did see (via video) the writing on the battery itself claiming to be 24v, 300ah, when, in fact, the battery was made from only 60ah cells.

In conclusion: I recommend taking the extra step of viewing a video review/tear down of any prospective battery you might be considering for purchase. If you can't find a video review maybe move onto the next battery that has a favorable review video.

By-the-way, YouTubbers "Lithium Solar" and "DIY with Will Prowse" have a lot of battery tear down videos available for these Lithium (LiFePo4) batteries.

Here are the links to the two postings:

Can-a-Lithium-Battery-Be-Too-Cheap?

Cheap-Lithium-Battery-Warning-PFDD-Brand-Do-Not-Buy-PFDD-Brand

[Soundsailor]

Thanks for your work on this @SolarPoweredRV. LiFePo4 batteries can add a lot to the RV experience, however, that won't happen if you end up with a battery that was fraudulently marketed.