Why does your UPS need a gigabit connection? Or are you talking about the passthrough/surge protection?
It all depends on what problem you’re trying to solve.
If you’re trying to solve battery degradation over time, consider using hydrogen fuel cells rather than chemical batteries. They don’t degrade, but have the disadvantage that they can’t be recharged from mains power. So they’re best suited for first-world countries where brown/blackouts are rare.
They’re also great for the environment as their only waste products are a bit of heat and pure water. And while you may be concerned about hydrogen blowing up ala Hindenberg, that actually isn’t a real concern with modern containment.
If you’re trying to make a cheaper UPS, I don’t think you’re going to succeed. Manufacturers have been optimizing for cost for many years now. Even supplying a little shell for a car battery is unlikely to beat APC’s prices.
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Maybe it would be better if you guys just made a supercapacitor retrofit kit for an existing UPS? Would be a more DIY solution but I know I have plenty of access to old UPSes with bad batteries from school/work. It’s just not economical to replace the batteries once the UPS is a certain age since the batteries have such a short life, but if you could make a 10-year battery like you’re talking about then that could breathe some new life into old UPSes.
Yes lol, that is what I meant.
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This looks cool. Those caps are HUGE.
Also cool. I like how easily he connects all of the batteries.
Someone also talked about just modding an existing supply to run off caps.
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Yeah that sucks that it cuts it down to 10/100.
Is it fiber all the way into your house? If that’s the case, just put whatever box the ISP provided you on a surge protector and you should be good. No surges coming in over fiber.
Is this true? Wow, okay, already done so I think I’m good. Thanks for this insight, I didn’t think so but wasn’t sure.
Kinda hard to conduct electricity over a glass fiber. Sure with enough voltage anything is possible but I would expect it would be easier to blow past your surge protector than to come in over the fiber.
Fiber = light
But often “fiber” isn’t fiber all the way to your house, so you’ll have to check. If the last mile or whatever is wired, then you’ll want to surge protect the line.
I think I was a bit lost because its all the way to my house, but I wasn’t sure if the converter box is an issue/worry, along with the obvious part of the router. I’m still learning this end of things.
That makes much more sense than a dumb charging trickling current into batteries when not needed.
Considering raspberry pie costs devices should be tackling all issues at once and not be stupid chargers. Im not saying connect them to the internet…Fuck that…But make the devices understand the way the batteries work and cycles them smart not non stop. Still never connected to the internet ever.
Yes, that ties into the Eric Raymond link. Rather than trying to reinvent the UPS with k-rad new technology, instead build an open platform with a light open-source firmware and software stack, then people can either roll their own or purchase pre-built from any number of OEMs following the “Open UPS Spec 1.0”. And then you have the community/board decide what spec 2.0 should look like, and your eyes are open to innovation. I think that makes a lot of sense.
Go ahead and open up a new topic with some pictures of what you’re working with if you want some more assistance.
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That capacitor video gave me an idea:
x100 of these:
https://eu.mouser.com/ProductDetail/Nichicon/JJD0E408MSEG?qs=sGAEpiMZZMsCu9HefNWqpvZlKmtZr9KSvm0zABeQkcw%3D
= 250 volts (EU voltage) with 400 kilofarads thats 347 WHs!!!
Fill my basement with 250 volt blocks of supercaps in series and go off the grid HAHAHAH
But of its 27,000 euros of capacitors per block.
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Nichicons are nice.
It kind of why I respect tesla power wall and solar. If ramped up it would decentralize power. This is a derail so I will stop. I would like a great UPS for my PC gear then my home.
instead of redesigning the guts of a UPS redesign the body to make way for easy swap battery and easy to use cell health checking hardware. use ardunio/ pi for monitoring it has enough power and can do the job at a low cost. have it pipe battery health to a LCD or LED array to indicate battery status so no questions on what does this flashing light mean. as for the guts find a OEM that uses pure sinwave tech and adapt the connectors for quick change and you have a PSU that is better than 90% of the cheep rubbish from bargain bin stores.
also adding in a way for battery’s to disconnect from the charging circuit would not be a bad idea as well and allow for cycling of the battery’s. rechargeable battery’s need to be cycled every now and again or they start to fail in one way or another. ( anecdotal evidence not a battery designer so grain of salt is needed)
super capacitors with battery assist is also worth a look into but i dont have high hopes for a cheep solution with this method as it would require a lot more circuitry and complexity but allow for a cleaner power delivery. if we could intergrate a PSU and a UPS together (long ass cables needed i know) then we could reduce some of the complexity but increase the cost of production as we now need a lot of copper wire .
All I ever wanted in a UPS was not to overpay for something I can rack mount.