Charging a lithium vehicle battery:

[speeder]

Quick question; can I use my regular battery charger on a lithium battery? It’s in an RV and they are the cabin batteries.

I have the newest Schumacher charger, I’ll post photos of the batteries and charger. Thanks!

[speeder]

[greglepore]

In a pinch, it should work. The dragonfly batteries have internal battery management to balance the cells and protection for overheat etc. Ideally, you'd use a specific lipo charger but you should be ok.

[Rusty Heap]

why not just use a lipo charger, they need the special charger and I wouldn't do what you're thinking of doing.

[island911]

(generally) Every battery will perform best (long life) if the rate of charge is controlled with respect the amount of existing charge and size of battery. Most chargers react to internal resistance, some also respond to temperature. Some also track how many charge cycles and how deep.. Anyway, you get the idea. It's all how precise you want the charging to be.

[speeder]

Thanks for the responses. They are the cabin batteries on a Class C RV and they are expensive, so I sure don't want to screw them up. I might just pull it outside tomorrow and let the solar panels do their thing.

What is a lipo charger and where do I get one?

[red-beard]

Lithium Iron Phosphate is much more tolerant to chargers than Li-Ion. It has to do with the chemistry. The BMS will prevent over charging.

BUT....

The big difference is the LiFePo4 battery does not need a float charge. Unless the battery is one with Bluetooth internal, no float charge should be kept on the battery. Power-Sonic batteries have a bluetooth module where you can see state of charge for each battery. DragonFly/BattleBorn

If you have a three stage charger, program the charging voltage to 14.7VDC and the float to 13.8 VDC if you cannot turn the float off.

https://www.power-sonic.com/blog/how-to-charge-lithium-iron-phosphate-lifepo4-batteries/

One thing, if you are using an inverter with the batteries, the BMS can activate when turning on the inverter. This was common with the Outback GS8048A inverter. Battleborn makes a special device which limits the current for a short period. I solved it with "starting circuit" with a 8 ohm 1000 Watt resistor. Basically, you have a switch for normal operation, but a push button with the 8 ohm to get the inverter to start. They are about $40 vs $400 for the thing that Battleborn supplies.

[Tim Hancock]

I do not have lipo batteries in my coach, but I simply plug my coach in when parked and the internal charging system takes care of charging the batteries. I assume this rv has something similar. Just plug it in and it should charge itself.

[greglepore]

Originally Posted by speeder

Thanks for the responses. They are the cabin batteries on a Class C RV and they are expensive, so I sure don't want to screw them up. I might just pull it outside tomorrow and let the solar panels do their thing.

What is a lipo charger and where do I get one?

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07MCTXFC7/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&th=1

20 bucks. I use it on the lipo battery in my 911, its been great. Also use it on lead acid batteries in moto and on cars that aren't used much.

[Shaun @ Tru6]

My new Noco charger tender allows you to select lithium as well as AGM, etc. So it's either marketing or could be each battery takes a charge a little differently.