E – 1826 Storage Batteries Maintenance and Principles

Batteries are the backup power source for millions of consumer, business, medical, military, and industrial equipments worldwide. The critical applications such as computers, servers, instruments, telecommunications or life saving equipments require 100% redundancy in every aspect to ensure high degree of reliability and operation. Although the power supply is available from commercial power supply sources, any malfunction and interruption of the utility power can be detrimental to the critical operations of the facility. Consistent and reliable performance of batteries is thus critical to smooth functioning of modern equipments.

In the United States battery replacement is a 17 billion dollar market. Around 75% of these “starting”, “power”, “stand-by”, “industrial”, “marine” and all types of lead-acid batteries have stopped working prematurely, due to inadequate maintenance, while the remaining 25% is due to mechanical failures. The number one cause of reduced lifespan and output capacity is attributed to “over sulfation” caused due to crystallization when a battery cell is under charged and overheat resulting from over charging. Ongoing maintenance of batteries is thus very important.

This course provides basic engineering guidance in operation, maintenance, diagnostics, and testing of Lead – acid and Ni-Cad batteries down to individual battery cell level. The course materials are based entirely on the Unified States Department of the Interior, Facilities Instructions, Standards, and Techniques Volume 3-6 “Storage Battery Maintenance and Principles” published by the Unites States Department of the Interior, Bureau of Reclamation.