Simple and Bulletproof Lithium Upgrade for Cat?

[OceanPlanet]

Originally Posted by Q Xopa

Glad to hear youve had good dealings with Ocean Planet.
My experience is he only seems to be interested to deal with customers who want to spend a lot. Hes not interested in us little guys.
He tried to upsell me on a 350 A small frame alternator in place of my large frame 200 A when I asked about a Serpentine drive kit. The reasons I was given were pretty flimsy. He declined to sell me the drive belt kit because I wasnt interested in his small frame alternator. I wouldnt have minded so much if that had been an upfront condition but this was only mentioned after many back and forth emails and not insignificant time waisted.

Truth is, we've been swamped and sometimes fail to cover all the details on some inquiries, while at the same time trying to not drop the ball on ongoing projects. It's a balancing act and am sorry if you feel like you didn't get a good response.

A better explanation than whatever I gave you is that our custom pulley guy is often running months behind, and has an extra charge for kits when he's not providing an alternator with the kit. The extra charge isn't a big factor on large projects getting the American Power HPI alternators or new lithium batteries.

So I probably jumped to the conclusion that you wouldn't be interested in a pulley kit with the upcharge rather than asking you that specifically. So in my haste, evidently I wrote that we weren't interested in selling the kit only. Apologies. Sometimes these things happen when you're working virtually around the clock...

We will be trying to add more people to our great team, but of course it's a chicken vs the egg thing...need people for revenue and need revenue for people...;-)

[Q Xopa]

Originally Posted by OceanPlanet

Truth is, we've been swamped and sometimes fail to cover all the details on some inquiries, while at the same time trying to not drop the ball on ongoing projects. It's a balancing act and am sorry if you feel like you didn't get a good response.

A better explanation than whatever I gave you is that our custom pulley guy is often running months behind, and has an extra charge for kits when he's not providing an alternator with the kit. The extra charge isn't a big factor on large projects getting the American Power HPI alternators or new lithium batteries.

So I probably jumped to the conclusion that you wouldn't be interested in a pulley kit with the upcharge rather than asking you that specifically. So in my haste, evidently I wrote that we weren't interested in selling the kit only. Apologies. Sometimes these things happen when you're working virtually around the clock...

We will be trying to add more people to our great team, but of course it's a chicken vs the egg thing...need people for revenue and need revenue for people...;-)

Sorry to hear you are so snowed under.

Also congratulations on being so successful. You're obviously doing a lot right serving the needs if many.

Im sure Im not respresentitive of you average customer, in that I knew what I wanted. I simply wanted a Serpintine pulley kit.

However when I enquired I was asked a bunch of questions about the rest of my system. I understand this because Im sure many of your enquiries ask for things someone else has said is good butnot suitable for their application.

[Q Xopa]

Originally Posted by Q Xopa

Sorry to hear you are so snowed under.

Also congratulations on being so successful. You're obviously doing a lot right serving the needs if many.

Im sure Im not respresentitive of you average customer, in that I knew what I wanted. I simply wanted a Serpintine pulley kit.

However when I enquired I was asked a bunch of questions about the rest of my system. I understand this because Im sure many of your enquiries ask for things someone else has said is good butnot suitable for their application.

Oops, hit send accidently.

I understand this so I spent time answering all the questions.

Then came the reply recommending I ditch my Large frame Alts for 350 A small cases, some remote recitifiers etc. I agree with a lot of the recommendations. I have done RRs myself. The parts are readily available at Welding supplies.
Small case Alts, I was not so convinced about. I cant see how they would have worked better than my large cases.

Anyway after all it turned out fine as I bought a pulley kit from someone selling one on here and had the rest done with my local machine shop guy. This ended up around half the cost of your kit. This is more messing around than most people want to be bothered with.

Keep up the good work.

Thanks.

[Seafari]

These guys on Cat Impi have done the change-over to Lithium and produced an excellent video. Part 1 https://youtu.be/lnnagyUNuhM

[CatNewBee]

SV Delos has done a drop-in conversion too,

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GvDCLtN22jY

also the Wynns...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J-kND4PaZm8

Out chasing stars:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jS3v4wA9LNY

Sailing Nandji:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ji1Hfw6dX5Y

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sKSPAeHlZXw

Sailing Uma:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vY_-Wfyx0_A

They all got professional help doing it.

If you not want to meddle with the electric yourself, that may be a way to go.

There are even LiPo DIY conversions for the curious:

Sailing the space between

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9GoSDOM-jVI

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bH9o2PLLpLs

Here a company in Cape Town that builds custom LFP batteries:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rE49I6kesMg

Enjoy watching!

[CatNewBee]

Another Project: Camantoo

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WEs-APG8fVQ

[arsenelupiga]

there is also mine solution inspired by CNB - absolute delight !

I have 360 W solar, 2 alternators and 220 V chargers.

Purchased victron 75/15 x 2 MPPT with bluetooth control. Done swap when old battereis nearly finished ie after 6 years. Added extra 2 K $
and swapped to 400 AH lithium.

Set charging parameters to match manufacturers charging curve for solar. Disconnected from charging domestic batteries both alternators. 220 V has so far not been used and i expect to be used in 1 in a 100 days. I think there is chance for issues with multiple chargers. The way we use boat, we need only solar.

400 AH stores tons of energy and we have average 80 AH drop during night.

So that was great!

Now for unexpected benefits:

we were able to purchase electric outboard, which easily charges overnight. That would not be possible with gel as overnight dent would be around 150 AH which requires 750 AH battery bank which weights a lot and cost even more. I love electric tender. Extra benefit was that we slashed 50 kg from stern - difference in weight of engines, extra fuel, oil, spares. And gain space.

Also now i run windlass from domestic. This opened another unexpected benefit. In appropriate anchorage - when enough space - we anchor with sail only. L400 tacks nicely windward with mainsail only and is controllable event. Before we had to always run engines to supper battery. Same when raising anchor.

And... there is more. As boat stern lost 150 kilos (batteries & outboard) now it sails better. This was definitely proven when we outpaced coastal cruiser cat that obviously thought lagoon will be easy