Ford Transit Diesel

You're the forklift guy right? Do you have any leads on old batteries that may not be good enough for forklift use but are still hold voltage and can be used under more "gentle" conditions?

 

Sure, the reality is I don't know how good they are....I presume you are wanting to use them for solar storage?

I get paid .38 a pound for scrap industrial batteries, at least when I last cashed them in 6 months ago. For our purposes a charged cell is considered good until it hits 1.7 Volts. We charge up a battery and then put it on a load bank and make cell voltage measurements every hour. A new battery will last 6 hours. Good/reconditioned batteries will last 4 hours. Once they start lasting under 4 hours we look at scrapping them.

So I don't know if something that dies after 2 or 3.5 hours would be good for your situation or not?

 

What's your discharge rate during the test?

I'd be interested in grabbing it from you for scrap price + a bit extra for your trouble if the battery "numbers" work for me.

What they weight anyway? Is the weight inclusive with the steel enclosure the are in?

What

 

If you're talking about electric forklift batteries, they are heavy as hell. The electrics I've driven all used the battery as the counterweight, but I can't remember how much they actually weighed.

Edit to add - the electrics I've driven were all stand-up, narrow-aisle lifts.

 

So yes the batteries typically weigh 2000 to 3000lbs. You are correct they also act as the counterweight of the forklift. The discharge rate is calculated on the cell size.

When we do a discharge, it is an entire battery of 12-24 cells. Usually discharge somewhere between 100-150 amps, as I recall. The loadbank is on the other end of the building, but I can go look later if you need to know.

 

I just needed to figure out amp draw you're pulling for the test to figure out what I'd be stressing the battery at. So say a 48v 1000amp hour battery that lasts 4 hours at 150amps is plenty good for me. I run a 5kw diesel Genny currently and 90% of the time, see a 10% load while powering the whole house. Only when the water pump and furnace are on at the same time do I see a50% load.

So even a forklift battery that can't pass its stress test due to plate erosion won't be stressed in my application. People say most forklift batteries used as back up due from sulfication and not plate burn through or cell shorting from plate flaking.

 

Where are you located? Sending one of these would be expensive. I maybe able to find one close to you at some forklift company? You could also call local battery places and see if they would let you buy a used one. A new 600 amp hour battery is around 3K and a new 1000 is over 6K. I've seen $10k batteries.

So, the discharge rate is whatever the AH rating of the batter is / by 6. So a 600AH battery is discharged at 100 amps and a 1000AH is 166 amps.

 

No no, better question is, where are YOU located. If youre east coast, New York, PA, etc, I'd drive down and pick it up.

I have no intention of buying a new one. That's lotto money.

I'm in south Ontario.

 

S. Cal

 

Well shit. Lol.

 

You sure about that? Pretty sure mine has sliders on both sides

 

There is only one roof height on the connects but two lengths. Mine is the long wheel base.

 

Using the Transit name on both full size and mini/mid size vans was a dumbass move on Ford's part.

 

Soooo, that's a "no?"

 

What!!!! I was 9,000 over 1 time (long story) and they only fined me $600..... Glad I live where I do.....

 

You're talking about 17 year old vehicles?

The company I work for has a fleet of E350's and they're pretty good vehicles. The oldest one is probably a 2011 with 250k miles so they get driven. They haul a lot that these little vans can not. Semi truck parts like transmissions, rear ends, axles, pallets of brake drums, etc.

 

Well......actually I will go do that....sorry, been actually dealing with work and stuff, plus I spent the weekend taking my kid to the track.

 

Don't apologize to me, it's nothing serious, as you will see.