Scottish Elises

I see the Elise cup comes with an Odyssey lithium ion battery as part of the weight saving measures. How reliable is this in day to day use compared to a normal battery, and is it a viable option for say my S1?

Cheers

James

I will be looking for a new battery for my S1 soon and I hate wrestling the 063 battery into the front.

Yeah likewise. Think I'll check with Craig when I pick up my car

I've spoken to Craig about lightweight batteries and he advised against on reliability. I'm still tempted though!

Yeah likewise! I think the new Elise comes with an isolator of some description, wondered if that was to kill the battery on demand to keep it charged? I'll chat with Craig when my car is ready

I'm not that fussed about weight, I just hate having to squeeze the b'stard in the hole. Normally I cut tge bottom lip off an 063 but it's still a nightmare.

I had a slightly smaller one installed for years but can't remember the brand / model ref, sadly

Been looking into this again. Despite hearing they are troublesome, I think I may still give it a go.

I’ve been looking at the Super-B ones, where I think the 15P one may fit the bill, if I understand the spec correctly:

http://www.super-b.com/en/automotive/sl ... b12v15p-ec
Or
http://www.super-b.com/en/automotive/sl ... b12v15p-sc

Those two look the same spec as far as I can tell, just the different form factor. Not sure which would be easiest to fit and secure.

Anyone looked at options?

Be really careful with using a normal charger on these little batteries. I killed a couple of oddessey batteries using a dumb charger rather than a bike conditioner.

Not sure about the lightweight Odyssey ones (which are *not* lithium), but for lithium you def need a specialised charger or you'll trash them.

I contacted Super-B on compatibility and pros/cons for their lithium, but got very confused feedback (they were unclear on charge current spec and what this meant), so won't be going with them.

I've ordered a Varley Li-16 after speaking to them (very helpful). They recommend their own charger, but I've order an Optimate lithium charger, which seems to be equivalent, but comes with a leave-on eyelet connector.

Got the Varley bracket, but think I'll still have to fabricate something to fit that, but I have some ideas!

Will let you know how I get on...

Lightweight battery in a S2 / S3 Toyota would make some sense as the battery is in the rear and relatively high.

Battery in the S1 (and VX220) is in the front and located about as low as you can get, so other than saving a few kilos in total vehicle mass, there seemed little benefit (and perhaps some negative in increase front / rear wedge) in a lighter battery IMO..

Battery now fitted and even stayed in place through the SLS final!

Here's what I built, which is basically a custom laser-cut baseplate for the Varley battery cage. It bolts to one of the pre-existing battery fittings, then pushing up against the other on the inside of the wheel arch.

https://www.flickr.com/photos/robert_an ... 3386716588

I found it difficult to get a good freeware CAD package, but eventually came across LibreCAD, which is more than capable for stuff like this and I would recommend:

https://librecad.org/

Loads of places seem to do laser cutting online now, but I found LaserMaster to be fine and were excellent in terms of customer service:

https://www.lasermaster.co.uk

If anyone is doing similar and wants a copy of the .dfx CAD file, let me know.

Top mod and info

Thanks! If I was doing it again, I'd used a slightly heavier gauge aluminium so the bolts could be countersunk, but it's fine with some padding underneath. Actually, seeing how easy it is to get stuff fabricated online these days, might have been better to ignore the manufacturer's bracket and build the whole thing; could have used both pre-existing fitting points to make it more secure with a bit more ingenuity!

Let us know how you get on with it day to day, particularly starting after some days without use