Battery failures...any rhyme or reason?

[Prince Valiant]

Is there any pattern of behaviours that tend to result in a shortened battery life in the insights?

A searched didn't reveal what I was looking for.

But basically, does someone who makes nothing but short city trips with many discharge cycles, with frequent parking of the vehicle at part-capacity cause shorter battery life? Or is it the guy who is frequently on the hwy, rarely discharging, frequently indicating full charge likely to have the longer life?

Or is it that there seems to be no pattern that seems to predict or indicate the relative length of the battery life?

Thanks for any input!

Chris
2001 5 speed, AC. 64.5avg, best tank 74.5, best trip 96.0 mpg (35 miles)

[Willie Williford]

No.

No

Yes

Willie

[b1shmu63]

There are many reasons for battery failure: overcharging, sitting idle, dendrite formation, corrosion, vibration, manufacturing defects, bad seals, high temperatures, high rate of charge or discharge, freezing. Not all modes of failure are applicable to all chemistries, or to the same degree. In a complex system such as found in hybrids, failure of peripheral electronics, connectors, sensors and poor programing will also have an influence. There are other possible factors including quality control and production defects that would be the responsibility of the original battery manufacturer. Batteries for hybrids will improve with time. There are currently about 200 million individual cells in the over one million hybrids on the road. We are testing these cells in our hybrids in the same way that the internal combustion engine has been tested in the billion or so cars that have been produced in the last 100 years.

Keeping the temperature down in the Insight will help, as will driving moderately, however neither will guaranty long battery life and neither might be the major cause of failure.

On the positive side, the need for battery servicing will eventually create an industry of pack rebuilding, and future replacement cells will likely be an improved design.

[IamIan]

the other thing to keep in mind about battery pack failure.

when connected in series as battery packs individual cells are links in a chain.

The whole battery is only as strong as its weakest link.

the insight has 120 cell / link chain... that is only as strong as the weakest cell / link in that battery pack.

you could have 1 cell go bad... and get a code of death... when you only need to replace the 1 bad cell.

but as it stands today no testing of individual cells is done... so the whole battery pack of 120 cells is replaced.... as posted... this might improve with time.

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Also , without getting technical batteries like to be treated just like you and I do... they like very similar temperatures ... not too hot and not too cold.... our bodies do not like being exercised too hard all at once , neither do batteries... our bodies do not like it when you try to refuel / eat too fast, batteries don't like it either.... depending on how we treat our bodies they last us longer or shorter amounts of time , same thing with batteries.

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If you wanted to record every variable about every cell in the battery pack over the entire life of the batteries you could probably know / predict very accurately when each cell will fail and which ones.... but that would cost more than a new battery.