Kweld spot welder

Holy shit that’s a lot! I’m in the 30j ballpark for .20. Removing the nickel deforms the battery…

@Acido you get less heat with the yellow ring terminals compared to xt150? I use those terminals in builds (usually the fuse on the discharge line) but always wondered how much current they can handle. Is it a lot better?

Depends on what size you use, my kcaps are connected to the welder with them and they stay almost cool
the xt150 would get much hotter compared

But if you dont get slowed down because of it no need to touch a thing that works :smiley:

Idk where you guys get your 0.2 nickel that can be welded with 30J lol, even the creator recommends 50J for 0.2 nickel
I get mine from nkon / indian supplier and I dont feel safe under 45J

Also its not nickel if you menage to deform the cell, from my experience nickel is way weaker than that

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I only use 0.15, haven’t gone any thicker yet

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My notes say 18j-35j works, I think I use 25j. My nickel is good! I test each roll I’ve gotten. The boss welder came with some steel strip, so I have a basis for comparison.

Here’s a p-group that a bms killed.

I try to use a fairly light touch. Maybe that’s the difference? Do you push down hard as hell? Either way, 2x joules difference is a lot! Official chart says 50j, but IIRC most people were using less.

Interesting, my notes for .25

20 light pressure ok stick
20 heavy pressure good stick
30 light-p great stick
40 med-p great stick

.30 to knife blade (-p is pressure, 2nd column is milliseconds 3rd is amps):

30 20 1125 light-p ok stick
30 22 1125 heavy-p ok stick
40 25 1145 med-p ok stick
50 34 1130 light-p ok stick
50 35 1130 heavy-p ok stick
60 43 1156 med-p good stick hot
70 50 1150 heavy-p great stick hot

And .30 to a dirty used cell:

50 bad stick
75 ok stick
100 good stick HOT
110 better HOT
120 better still HOT

Thanks for confirming the ring terminal stuff. I’ll feel better about using it in my boards more. I’m always annoyed at how the wiring takes over all the space, and 3 way splices…

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I find more pressure works better with nickel on nickel, moderate pressure for nickel to cell.

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As the welder measures the current by sensing the voltage across the MOSFETs, and their ON state resistance varies significantly over production spread, the absolute measurement accuracy isn’t very good. The bus bar mounting can also affect the reading, accumulating to a theoretical deviation between measured and actual power of +/-40%. Absolute accuracy wasn’t a design goal, repeatability is what counts.

On top of that, a poor calibration will cause the welding algorithm to make false assumptions of the power delivery into the weld spot, and you end up dialing lower or higher Joules to get the expected result. Most important details for good calibration (SHORT step):

  • press the conical areas of the tips together
  • press as hard as possible
  • make sure the surfaces are clean
  • watch that no sparks fly
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weird, i pulled on my cells like a maniac and didn’t menage to deform them haha the nickel would always break first
I think im on the higher pressure side…

Anyways if our welds are strong, no need to mess with them :slight_smile:

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Hey so my notation says HOT for 60j and 70j. This means, the whole cell body would get warm/hot after 1 weld on the negative side. This is why I gave up on .25mm and .30mm.

If you’re welding packs with 60j, maybe I should give it another go lol. I bought 1kg of each…

I pull 0.15mm gently same amount as it takes when striping cable at work and it rips the nickle.

If I pull it medium amount of force as if iv not cut throu enough insulation befor trying to strip the cable, use the same preserve on pulling double layer 0.15 and it bulges out the battry So guess I pull to hard.

Never been able to pull hard or like a manic by putting my foot on it like I do when striping large armoured cable.

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Good news for you guys in Australia and around: Andrew from hiketech.au is starting to sell keenlab products here! https://hiketech.com.au/index.php?route=product/category&path=111

He’s also working on introductory videos, and I’d appreciate if you’d support him by watching and recommending them (given that they are good - haven’t seen them yet :wink:

His YT channel is: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC7MuS242JIeOQYY_8V9U89g

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Excellent! I’m just thinking about upgrading a few things :ok_hand: awesome news, thanks bro

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Seems to be newstime today… more good news, I finally managed to order new/redesigned kCap ultracapacitor modules and have started offering them for pre-order: https://www.keenlab.de/index.php/product/kweld-ultracapacitor-module/ (will also be available from the above US/AU resellers)!

They now feature protection against overcharging (MOSFET switch) and also prevent backfeeding into their supply (by an ideal diode circuit), which now allows the use of any kind of current limited power supply with any voltage between 8.1V and 14V. The product page lists these options in more detail.

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@tatus1969 It’s kinda hard getting ahold of a kit in the US. Your US guy Keith has got it nowhere except on FB and he blocked me on messenger :joy:

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Eu/US Courier :wink:

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I might. If nobody’s got one I’ll just order from kevin and wait for the shipping.

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Ifya do this PM me and we could gang-bang the shipping perhaps!

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I’ll check with him, am not aware of what might have happened in this case.

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Thank you, he got back to me this morning. Hopefully he finishes his web store sometime so it’s a little easier to purchase one.

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I also got a reply and an invoice as well…

thanks for whatever roll you had in making this happen! and a GREAT spot-welder…

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Anyone know how long the 6000mah lipos have been out of stock? Trying to decide if I should keep waiting on them to come back in stock or just get the 5000mah ones since my kweld has just been sitting.

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