Will the cold winter Shorten the life?

I just bought a brand new rectangler soft pack from Luna. I got a 52 volt 13.5 ah battery stepping up from a 1.5 year old daily driven 48 volt 11.5 ah battery. The battery trips are getting shorter as I am getting about 8-10 miles before the battery hits 50%. I want more top speed and more distance than I am getting now. It is very cold right now in Michigan so I am getting voltage sag, and reduced mileage as a result as expected. Does the extreme cold shorten the total charging cycles, or should I just wait a couple of months to install the brand new battery? The 48 volt battery should be fine if the cold will hurt the new battery. I always keep the bike in the house and never charge the battery below 50 degrees Fahrenheit. My controller is a 6fet PowerVeloCity. The rear hubmotor has a 10" tire. The motor is rated at 48volt 800w DD motor. Any advice would be greatly appreciated

Run it, that's what you got it for! If you mean will your new battery be permanently harmed by using it in cold weather, don't think so. A bit less range maybe then in warmer climes, but that will happen whether it's new or used.

I’d run the new one too, you’ll enjoy some extra power and you seem to know how you should take care of it well.

Your range might return when the weather warms up too. Keeping the battery warm helps a lot.

If you can keep the pack above Freezing (and way above freezing when charging) and within the recommended 20% to 80% (or 100% if charging is finished right before the ride) then you'll be fine. If you can't do ALL of the above, though, store the new pack at about 50-60% and wait for Spring.

Battery internal resistance goes way up in cold weather. You will get reduced performance and reduced range but unless you do something to damage the battery like charging it when it's too cold, the performance and range should recover when it gets warmer. Keeping your battery warm helps a lot if you can do that. I fly RC models and I keep my batteries warm when I fly in cold weather. I now live in Arizona so I don't see what most consider cold weather anymore.

Charging a battery when cold will damage battery! (70-75ºF deemed optimal for charging)
Running a cold battery definitely degrades performance but there seems to be no evidence that it is damaging.
I still run a 2014 homebuilt battery with thousands and thousands of miles on it, but only during the hot Summer months, supplies good capacity with limited "sag" - Winter performance is poor to pitiful.

Best recommendation is to charge battery in warm location and return to bike "hot off the charger" ... for best possible performance. (even 50ºF does provide a marked output performance decrease, compared to 70ºF) - (80-90ºF provides an additional output performance increase, but that is a whole nother can of worms)
Put charger on timer, so that it begins charging overnight, after recovering warmth.

Cold weather reduces range.

I found some interesting info
https://endless-sphere.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=14&t=35668&p=518642&hilit=cold+weather#p518632

https://endless-sphere.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=14&t=35668&p=518642&hilit=cold+weather#p518691

double my usual capacity when I'll be parking in cold temps. Seems to be working and I only recharge indoors

Click to expand...

Charging when the battery is cold, brings up issues, as net stated.

https://endless-sphere.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=14&t=35668&p=518642&hilit=cold+weather#p520052

All batteries, including A123, lead, NiCd etc have badly diminished performance in cold weather.

Some cells have internal resistance go up by 10x at 0degC.


It's a very noticeable performance hit to have a freezing cold pack. All the EV mfg's have to deal with this issue, and none of the solutions are cheap or easy.


Your options are either to heat it before using, or start with the best you can get and deal with it in it's reduced performance state. For example, my nano-tech pack at 0degC will still outperform a room temperature A123 pack of similar size by a healthy margin. So, while the freezing does hurt my packs performance, it's still good enough to get the job done.

Click to expand...

I take my lead from the guru's and heating the battery is an option, or bringing your battery in with you, which is what I will be doing with my new 25R pack.

Basically the internal resistance increases, many times fold, and you hit your LVC on the controller faster because of the voltage sag. You could use NiChrome wire from Fasttech, Gearbest, DX and have a little battery warmer, or have removable pack. Some dude at a Value Village, perhaps you are reading this now, had an insulation bag over his ebike. I took a picture of his bike.

Thanks so much for your opinions. My older 48v 11.5ah battery has a 30 Amp BMS. The new 52v 13.5ah battery comes with a 50 Amp BMS inside. Does the 50 Amp BMS allow for more phase amps even in the Winter? I have a Bluetooth programmable PowerVeloCity 6FET controller.

Talon said:

Thanks so much for your opinions. My older 48v 11.5ah battery has a 30 Amp BMS. The new 52v 13.5ah battery comes with a 50 Amp BMS inside. Does the 50 Amp BMS allow for more phase amps even in the Winter? I have a Bluetooth programmable PowerVeloCity 6FET controller.

Click to expand...

Yes, that is battery amps, controller has a set phase amp setting in it, whether you can change it or not.
In your case, 50A BMS would allow 50A from the battery, meaning the phase amps are near 100A.
If you look at Kelly Controllers, their controllers are listed in Phase Amps, in that case the customer has to realize that, and just half it. Normally its not like that.

Where I live it,s cold. I only ride my BBSHD equipped fat bike in temps of minus 20 C or warmer. The cold weather does affect the range. What I,ve done is make a cover from a piece of 3/8" blue foam used for sleeping mats. It,s duct taped to the bike and has a small flap at the top so the charge port can be accessed that has a bit of velcro to keep it closed. When some friends and I go for a Wed evening singletrack ride I activate a chemical hand warmer pad and slip it between the pad and battery. The battery is a 11.6 amp hour and I,ve been using it for 3 years. It is good for about 25km,s on the cold rides but it should be noted that since I,m riding groomed singletrack trails that are quite twisty the bike is always in 1st or 2nd gear and only on level 1 excepr for hills where level 2 is briefly used.

Extreme Cold or Hot always have bad affect on battery especially li-ion. So sure it will shorten range.

When it gets warmer you will see your range go back to normal unless you totally destroy chemistry of battery cells. In that case RIP

I think I damaged my Panasonic PF cells a lot with winter. I had it on BBS02 and used to leave bike out in about freezing temepreatures so battey was freezing cold. I noticed huge voltage sag when I demanded 500+ W. Range was allmost half. I rode like that ~10 times. I also charged it when it was cold. Battery is after 200~ cycles and 2 years age in bad shape. I can only provide around 500W without huge sag (54V->44V). Capacity is still decent when pushed to around 200W, but only 70% of original.

So ~600+ EUR went down the drain I had to buy new battery. Now I know about cold and cycle life so will take good care.