Nickel strips as fuses?

A lot of people, including myself, have integrated cell level fuses into their battery packs by soldering thin fuse wire between cells and bus bars.

I’m curious to know if anyone has experimented with using thinner strips of nickel as fuses instead as a way to completely remove the need for soldering between cells in a battery pack? My thinking is you could use standard size nickel strips as bus bars on top of the cells and then weld thinner strips between the terminals and the bus bar to act as a fuse for each cell.

EDIT: If anyone has tried this approach, have you come across any information regarding what width/thickness is suitable for different current ratings?

Yes and no, the issue being it won’t fail immediately like a fuse and can degrade over time if used near current limits, meaning it will blow at a lower current with time. Consistency would also be an issue

Do you mind explaining why an appropriately sized nickel strip fuse would be any different to a fuse wire in this respect?

I’m not a particular fan of the fuse wire either for the same reason, atleast the fuse wire that I’ve seen. I originally started my PowerWall with every cell fused, 672 cells in the first module. If you hit currents near it’s limit, the fuse wire increases in resistance considerably

I think fusing at the cell level in some form is very important and does work well when done properly. That’s not the point I’m trying to bring up with this thread though.

I’m just wanting to know what experience people have with using strips for fuses.

So in other words its just a matter of ensuring that the fuses are sized appropriately which is a separate issue. There’s a reason why Tesla does it.

Nothing we do should be compared to how/what Tesla does, we simply can’t replicate what they do, unless your willing to spend. Get custom sheets with integrated fuse wires, etc.

Again, your comment isn’t really relevant to my original post. Thanks though

Yes you can use any electrical material as a fuse :yum:

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