Car batteries

9th August 2004, 15:46

Hi all

Little of track here...

Im currently building a remote control lawnmower, not a battlebot, though using much of the same tech, bosch 750s) etc.

Since there will be little roughing and no tilting to speak of, how would using car batteries work; can they stand the discharge needed ( prolonged tapping of fairly high rate but few high amp surges) ?

Looking into car batteries since these are fairly cheap + can hold a lot of ahs + dont have much weight and size restriction in my application.

regards

**ewan** · 9th August 2004, 16:18

Car batteries would be fine, as long as you can fit the weight/size within your design. What kind of size are you thinking of building to? Around the size of a push-along lawn mower or a large ride on mower?

Regards, Ewan
http://www.micro-maul.co.ukhttp://www.micro-maul.co.uk

9th August 2004, 17:04

Thanks for the response, the lawn mower will be little bigger than a push along, a lot heavier, have a powered reel in front and use tank style steering...when it finally gets done someday.

Mostly for fun though, cant really envision cutting the lawn week after week by RC but had a spare bosch 750 from a dead batteri LM and needed a project..

regards

**ewan** · 9th August 2004, 17:20

hehe, I know how you feel

**roger_plant** · 10th August 2004, 08:11

Car batteries are not very good for full discharge use.
Used like this they will die after about 60 complete charge-discharge cycles.

Batteries that are designed for traction use, like the ones we use for robots and golf buggies, will last for up to 2000 charge-discharge cycles.
Even the cheaper ones will last 200 cycles, which makes them cheaper than car batteries if used more than 60 times.

Car batteries are good for one thing only, starting cars which uses a lot of current and normally only about 5% of their discharge capacity.