Building a perfect travel-safe battery

One of the most exciting parts of electric skateboarding is traveling with your board, so for this scenario I’m looking to build travel-size batteries.

According to most airlines you need to follow these rules:

http://www.delta.com/content/www/en_US/traveling-with-us/baggage/before-your-trip/restricted-items.html

  1. Battery must be removed from e-board
  2. e-Board can fly on carry-on or checked baggage but without the battery
  3. Battery must travel on carry-on luggage
  4. Battery leads must be covered in tape
  5. Should not exceed 160 watt/hour

According to FAA you need to follow these rules:

  • FAA works closely with FAA, so they follow the same rules

https://www.faa.gov/about/initiatives/hazmat_safety/more_info/?hazmat=7

  1. You can carry up to 2 spare batteries between 101-160 watt/hour
  2. Battery terminals (usually the ends) must be protected from short circuit
  3. Batteries must be carried on carry-on baggage

For a 160 watt/hr battery on 10S (37V) this is the closest option I coul find

One 10S1P pack made of HO HOHM Grown 26650 4307mAh Flat Top Battery 37V * 4307mAh / 1000 = 159.359 watt/hr

  • Just below the maximum regulation of 160 watt/hr
  • I’m concerned about battery sag
  • The max continuous discharge for this battery is 23A (11.5A for each VESC on a dual setup)

What would you guys suggest?

Supposedly, you can bring as many 99Wh batteries as you like

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I am doing 3 4s3p batteries connected with xt60 series connectors that I will detach for planes.

From what I have read, this is true.

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According to the this FAA statement and if the battery capacity is between 101-160 watt/hr you can only carry two

“There is a limit of two spare batteries per person for the larger lithium ion batteries described above (101-160 watt hours per battery).”

Hey @ZAchNYC what battery brand are you going to use? If you are using Samsung 25R they have 2500mAh, so each 4s3p should have 111 W/Hr , you have room for more capacity to reach the 160w/Hr limit

What motor KV does you board has?

I am very rarely traveling alone so I can have the people I’m traveling with take one of the packs and I should be fine. I am using Samsung 25r batteries, and my motor kv is 192. If and when I am traveling alone, I can just bring two of the packs and leave the other and the other series connector and I will be fine as well.

I recently carried our Jed Board from Singapore to Sydney and back. I removed both battery packs which are well over 200wh each. I carried the batteries in my carry on inside Kevlar bags. Nobody flinched at either Sydney or Singapore airports.

According to @chaka on this post, for that motor and a smooth running, you should be using a 42V 10S battery.

8570 RPM/50v = 170kv - 12s ---------------/42v = 200kv - 10s ---------------/33v = 260kv - 8s ---------------/25v = 340kv - 6s

I wonder how would this motor run on a 8s3p setup?

@chaka stated that it was a “rough guide”, and on the same post, @chaka also said that at 12s it could be pushed up to 200kv “but the top end would feel weak”, which I am not worried about as I don’t plan to be doing anything above 25mph.

I don’t know how the motor would fare with that battery, but I am still pretty new to all of this, so I wouldn’t be the one to ask. I would just search through the forum for builds with that setup and see how it worked for others.

A123 26650 is probably the perfect battery for travelling. You could build a 12S1P that would be exactly 99wh.

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Someone needs to make a pack like this

It has dual voltage…think gets around the airplane issue by a switch that mechanically separates the battery inside the pack.

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The barking Spider!! :joy: :joy: :mask:

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I made a design yesterday and I think I came up with the perfect idea.

I’ll build four 10s1p individual batteries connected in parallel, each battery should have 92.5 watt/hr (travel safe)

As the board I’m building is a Loaded Vanguard, I might be having issues with flex as the battery would be longer than expected, so I will do 4 different enclosures, one for each 10s1p pack, that’ll be mounted next to each but individually bolted to the board to allow flexiness, but connected by 12AWG silicone flex cable and Xt60 plugs.

Do you guys think this would work?

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So you end up with a 10s4p board. Sounds like a Winner!!

Bonus you can have as many batteries as you want since under the 99w/hr limit.

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Check out the last ~10 posts on this thread on a travel safe 12s3p battery.

Would be a single enclosure.

I’ve been meaning to ask, for the loop keys between the batteries, should I connect them with xt90s’s? Also, wouldn’t the wires on the batteries need to stay connected to the same connector? If so, couldn’t/wouldn’t the TSA see it as one battery as I’m sure it isn’t their field of expertise?

You could do each battery with its own XT90 and then make a loop key from 2 XT90s but that’s expensive…

Is it possible to make it with xt60’s? I already have a bunch