AGM vs Lithium Batteries | Van Conversion UK
Hi Everyone! Today I’m going to be talking a bit about AGM vs lithium batteries for your van conversion, the batteries we use in our van, why we love them, how the type of battery you choose could effect you and discount codes for the best lithium batteries.
When we first built our van we had a very limited budget, we actually managed to do our entire conversion for just under 3K. Because of our tight budget we had to choose AGM batteries. I am not a tech-y person, so I’m going to explain everything I know about batteries in the most simple way (the only way I know how).
AGM batteries are big, heavy and you can only run them down to 50%. We had two 130ah batteries so a total of 260ah. Only being able to run them down to 50% meant that we completely ran out of power quite a few times, and often had to be very careful with our usage/ prioritise what we wanted to charge.
They served us well for the time we had them but the stress of knowing we had work to do on our laptops and potentially no power to charge them was really getting to us.
Fast forward to May 2022. We had the opportunity to upgrade our batteries to lithium, we knew that this upgrade would be a complete game changer for us since we we were about to head off for our 12 month long Europe road trip.
Since I’ve mentioned a few things about AGM batteries, here are a few things you should know about Lithium batteries and why they are superior to AGM. Lithium batteries out live AGM batteries by far, as Jake likes to say.. “buy nice or buy twice”. You can also forget the 50% rule with lithium, woohoo. Lithium batteries charge faster, they hold their charge and since using them for the last few months, these things are really noticeable.
The batteries we now have are from Off Grid Van Life. We had the absolute pleasure of hanging out with Nigel and Roger for the morning, who are wholesome people with plenty of adventurous stories to tell.
They are a small family run business and the most helpful people you’ll meet. Click here to find out how their business came to be, it had me very inspired.
Now we have a 300Ah lithium battery. In terms of capacity, it is the equivalent of about 5 Lead Acid batteries, so is a beefy set up in such a small and light battery! It has a Battery Management System (BMS) built into the battery which protects the battery from over charging or discharging below safe levels and also has low temperature protection, which protects the battery from being charged below 0 degrees Celsius (which can damage Lithium batteries). The BMS also has bluetooth, so you can download an app to be able to see the State Of Charge of the battery and monitor things from your phone.
We’ve had these batteries now for a couple of months and the best thing is, I haven’t even had to think about electricity, because I know we always have it. I didn’t think changing from AGM to Lithium would make such a difference.
If you’re after a battery that has been built by a UK company and is stocked in the UK, (to avoid having to wait for weeks for your battery to arrive from abroad) then this is perfect for you. All of their OPS range of batteries come with a 3 year warranty and will be supported by our UK company!
Use the code: “sheisthelostgirl10” for a 10% discount here.
