Vent: backup battery on a 2-story install let go at 3am

I was on a commercial job in Tulsa last Tuesday finishing a panel swap when the customer called at 3am saying the alarm was screaming. Got there and the old sealed lead acid swelled up hard enough to crack the case and short the keypad bus. Central station got the open zone but the panel locked itself into trouble mode, so I had to pull the whole board and wire a temp keypad before sunrise. Replaced it with a lithium drop-in and added a low voltage cutoff relay, but has anyone else seen these fail after just 5 years in a garage with no climate control?

2 comments

2 Comments

caleb_stone24d ago

Garage in Tulsa with no climate control, yeah that kills them fast. I pulled one last month that only lasted 3 years, same setup. The heat just cooks the plates. That lithium swap is smart but watch the cold side now, they get grumpy under 40 degrees.

thomas27523d ago

You ever see a battery swell up like a balloon? My buddy had the same setup in his garage outside Phoenix, no AC at all. He swapped in a lithium pack last summer and thought he was done with it. Come December, that thing would barely crank on a cold morning, he had to put a little heating pad under it just to get it going. The heat was fine, but the cold side was a whole new headache for him. He finally just moved the whole charger setup inside the house, said it wasnt worth the hassle of fighting the weather both ways.

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