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[Specter]

Ride the bike a mile or so and the range will readjust itself again.  Ive learned not to pay attention it.  I look at, ok how many miles do I have to get home?  How many of those miles do I have the potential to go fast?  Fast- 1 percent every 0.5 to 0.75 miles, normal 1 mile to a percent, slow 2 miles - 1  percent.

People tend to not understand the word 'Estimated' in the 'Range' and always gripe that it's never accurate.  Well it IS accurate, your DRIVING is not consistent so it's YOUR fault it's off

Aaron

[Valen]

I used to have like 97% so i thought 3% isn't a big deal but it's a bit more complex because 1% is not equal to 1 cell.  For exemple, a Tesla 85 Kw Battery have 7104 cells, so our 21.5 Energica should have around 1700 cells so 3% is around 50 cells that need balancing.

In one hour, those cells will not be able to be balanced (they told me that it could take a few days pluging/unplugging to balance my battery back from 97% to 100%). So if i don't force myself to do it correctly once, the balancing will slowly get worse. The more i wait, the more cells will need balance and the more time it ll take.

To be honest, i'm not a balancing addict also, i was just pointing out that i was thinking that i was balancing my battery correctly and i was wrong because i wasn't aware of this "cut off after 1h" thing.

So if you plan/wish to balance it to 100% you have to reach 100% on the dashboard otherwise the balancing isn't perfect.

[wadejesu]

So how many unplug/plug cycles should it take to get the balance complete and 100% SOC, I think I'm up to 6 times in 2 days still not there yet.

[Specter]

I was under the impression that if you left your bike plugged in and on the charger, once hit it's 100 percent it shuts off, but turns itself back on by it's own every few hours to check on things to see how the battery is doing?  If this is so, then it should start a recharge on it's own when it does that check and not have to be manually restarted.

Balancing should have a bit of a passive component to it as well, so even without juice going in, the cells should dribble between themselves to balance at whatever voltage they all finally equal out and fall down to.  At this point the next turn on should just top them all off.

If you got low cells and high cells, it is going to turn off every time once the highest cell hits it's programmed max voltage, no matter what the low cells is at.  So with this, giving it a bit of time to settle out between charge / balancing cycles would probably work a lot better for you than immediately turning it back on.  You'll just tap the high one at peak and shut down again before any real power shifting can occur.

Aaron

[PWM]

Energica should have around 1700 cells so 3% is around 50 cells that need balancing.

Nossir...the 21.5kw pack uses pouch cells...too bad Energica doesn't share specifics...there's about 180 cells total (2P90S) split into (4) 45-cell modules as best as my math shows and deductive reasoning is based on patent info from drawing submitted on the first generation pack.

The weakest cell hits the terminal voltage first and initiates the balance phase - the time it takes for pack to adjust 1% is long time because all cells have to discharge for the healthiest bunch to come up to max capacity, so there's a time-out.

Me thinks a short discharge cycle is required to get pack back up to 100% say ride it to 95% and make sure you see 4amps displayed when it gets back on charger to effectively rebalance...again, if 0-amps is the last phase it's been before the charger shuts down and that phase lasts for an hour then how can one ever expect 100% charge on their bike.

Charge cycle on mine stops at 98% and dated firmware makes no adjustments to what is being displayed.

[jotjotde]

So how many unplug/plug cycles should it take to get the balance complete and 100% SOC, I think I'm up to 6 times in 2 days still not there yet.

May I add that the temperatures can also play a role. When I charge immediately coming home (battery and ambiance warm) and look at the charged bike in the (cool) morning, there are often 2-3% missing from the level it should have charged to.
Recently I had 82% displayed after overnight charging to 80%. This morning I got 78% instead of 80%. In winter I once had 95% instead of 100%.

When I have a long tour planned the next day, I start charging in the evening aiming for 100% and set the Amps low enough that the charge is just complete when I wake up in the morning (allowing for 1.5h balancing). In my view that should somewhat compensate for an overnight temperature change.

Just my 50 cents...

[Valen]

I shared more or less all your opinions before discussing until the techs from Energica explained to me how their bike behave and shown me a deep analysis of my battery life stating that my last full balance was in july 2022. Then they told me that i need to plug/unplug/resume again and again and that my battery will only be fully balanced when 100% will show. It's not dealer "bullshits" those guys are working at the factory so i assume they know their bike better than anyone.

To be honest, i think it's a bad design decision to made the bike start balancing so "late" in the charging process when you implement a cut off after 1h without juice.

All in all it's not a big deal, but i just wanted to point out that sometimes we may think we balanced the bike properly but it's not always true

[ultrarnr]

jotjotde, I also plug in as soon as I get home from work (30 miles) and have never had it not be at 100% in the morning. Even when the battery temp was showing yellow when I got home. I think everyone's Energica is unique when it comes to software glitches and bugs. At least it seems like that.

[jotjotde]

ultrarnr, reading this you might be right. Maybe Energica is fitting every bike with it's own personality 
Then I am glad my Italian lady is not too quirky. Surely because I buy her a lot of nice things 

[wadejesu]

So, After 6 tries of unplug/plug still only managed 99%, rode bike down to 80%, Specter was right bike showed 82 mile range at 99% after 6th charge but then after 3 miles of riding it went to 120. anyway after 40 mile ride back down to 80%, back on the charger and finally got, " CHARGE COMPLETE 100% "
Energica garage video says to balance every 30 days, manual says every 15 days, I'm going to rebalance to 100% every week, 7 days.

[Specter]

Honestly, the balancing should depend on how you ride, how much.  I tend to balance every 4th or 5th recharge, unless I know im going to need the miles the next day, then ill let  it top off, but otherwise, i throw 4 to 8 kw into the bike and tickle the batteries up every day with my solar when there is room for it.

When my bike is balancing the current WILL come down from 14 Amp down to ive seen it as low as 2 or 3 amps balancing.

there are balancing circuits that can sit on a bank all the time, and they are passive.  Every time a battery starts getting lower, they start at like 5 mVolt difference between cells and start trickling power from the higher cells to the lower ones.  Charging, sitting, it don't matter, they work constantly, they are 'live' in the circuit.   Once the batteries are balanced, their idle current suck is like 10 mA or something tiny like that so really are an insignificant load on the battery overall.  Not sure why these are not used in there, so the balancing is really kind of a thing that happens and no brainer.

Aaron

[Stonewolf]

Huh, mine has been stopping at 98 or 99 for some time now, I should maybe try plugging it back in after a full charge next time.

It's not like I've gone 3000 miles without an AC charge or brought it down to -5% at any point or anything >.>

[Specter]

Stone are you charging with 240 vac or 115?

Try swapping them once to see how it works for you.  IF you have 115 available, I hear that overseas they don't do the goofy split phase shit us yanks do ! 

Otherwise a 240 charge should work.    Instead of 80 percent,try starting at 85  or 90 percent, that way it throws a little juice into them and goes immediately into balance mode, and gives you a bit more of that 'hour' claimed.... balancing.

Honestly though my bike starts balancing whenever .  today it started at 86 percent, and keeps the charge current at full bore until it gets up into the high 90's then trickles it down, then it hits 100 percent, the bike pauses, the 100 percent charge screen comes on and the charger shuts off.

Not  sure what causes the batteries to unbalance as much as they can, though TBH I was running stupid on the interstate today.  WOT for about 4 miles straight, so im sure that had an affect on the balance as the batteries went to yellow and I was pulling some KW.  I was also sitting straight up on the bike like a dogs dick sticking out so im sure that pulled an extra 10 kw of energy

I should try that,  throw it on the charger right after a run like that and see when it starts balancing, and letting it set overnight and the batteries settle down and see how it reacts.

Given it's passive cooling I would be willing to put money on it and say the calls in the center of the battery pack are toasty, because they have to dissipate the heat thru the rest of them essentially, while the cells on the edges / outside are cooler because they have the case and airflow on it as a heat sink.  Even if there are partitions in the pack to sink the batteries, it still has to carry that heat out of there, and unfortunately, one of the properties I have discovered working with Alumninum is,  it's GREAT for picking up heat, shitty for getting rid of it for some reason.  Brass / Copper are 10 X better,but expensive so I don't see them using that.

Given this, general chemistry, the hotter cells will have a higher voltage.  That's the way it is.  I would love to know the C rate a wot is pulling on them and the w/hr rating of each cell and it's C-rating each cell as per manu specs.

anyways... charging back up now after todays run.

Aaron

[weck]

So how many unplug/plug cycles should it take to get the balance complete and 100% SOC, I think I'm up to 6 times in 2 days still not there yet.

May I add that the temperatures can also play a role. When I charge immediately coming home (battery and ambiance warm) and look at the charged bike in the (cool) morning, there are often 2-3% missing from the level it should have charged to.
Recently I had 82% displayed after overnight charging to 80%. This morning I got 78% instead of 80%. In winter I once had 95% instead of 100%.

When I have a long tour planned the next day, I start charging in the evening aiming for 100% and set the Amps low enough that the charge is just complete when I wake up in the morning (allowing for 1.5h balancing). In my view that should somewhat compensate for an overnight temperature change.

Just my 50 cents...

I've noticed the same on my Experia.  Charge when cool (overnight) , you get a couple more percent, and vice versa.  I do the same thing you do when I need range, start the charge late at night so it finishes right before dawn.  After doing this, I've sometimes gone as far as 10 miles at urban speeds before it comes off 100%.  The battery has some significant headspace in it; I think charging when cool lets the bike just slightly get into that unused capacity.

[Stonewolf]

Stone are you charging with 240 vac or 115?

Try swapping them once to see how it works for you.  IF you have 115 available, I hear that overseas they don't do the goofy split phase shit us yanks do ! 

Otherwise a 240 charge should work.    Instead of 80 percent,try starting at 85  or 90 percent, that way it throws a little juice into them and goes immediately into balance mode, and gives you a bit more of that 'hour' claimed.... balancing.

We only have 240 here, it'll go up to 99 and then sit there drawing "0" kW for a good while, it's sitting on 20ish atm and I plan on charging it up after the shop run tomorrow so I can try for a 400 mile ride on Saturday, if I plug it back in in the morning while I have breakfast I can see if it is actually prematurely stopping.

I've not noticed any range loss (actually, I've not noticed any range loss *at all* which gives me the impression their 80% at 1000 cycles figure is very pessimistic).