Which Battery to Buy?

[EricH]

Originally Posted by AdamHeard

LiFePO4 also doesn't need balancing, and technically could be charged with an SLA charger (it is suboptimal). Reasonable priced non-balancing LiFePO4 chargers exist too.

Correct me if I'm wrong here, but if I recall correctly, LiFePO4 batteries tend to have their own internal balancing circuits (or maybe it's just the brand I'm familiar with that has 'em).

I'd actually go so far as to say that some types of LiFePO4 batteries would be just about a drop-in replacement for SLAs in FRC robots, if their cost came down a bit. I've worked on a non-FRC robot that, for redundancy purposes, ran two LiFePO4 12V batteries, just about the same size as the current SLAs, on two separate circuits, driving RS-775s and linear actuators. Never had an issue with the batteries. Not sure if they got charged much during competition at all.