P3000 code with new NexPower V2.5 battery

i have seen others temporarily banned as well. i'm surprised i haven't been, if not permanently

 

Humm... Mudder and Bisco both are Prii less...

 

I feel there were some kickbacks offered at some point and people have emotions tied to stuff like that. Again, huge assumption here but it's absolutely not unfounded. I also want to say that I think Nexpower DOES make some good stuff, but this stuff with the lithium batteries was just horrendously overstepping their technical skills.

I've told others involved in this situation that I do electrical PCB design, but I'm not qualified at ALL to do high-voltage designs/manufacturing. I know my limits, I know the risks of taking unverified actions/decisions/design choices with high voltage, and I choose to avoid those projects (over 50v DC/AC) because it's simply NOT worth the risk to me/others. I have NO IDEA what made the owner think they could just skip entire engineering fields/classes/principles and make a battery system that has very little semblance to the original (computer-controlled/charged) pack. I bought this pack BEFORE I got into batteries/BMS/Lithiums, or else I would have avoided the pack entirely (the only batteries that would work well in this situation ARE NI-MH and Sodium, which is new)

I cannot imagine Jack (if that's the owners name) didn't profit on the LARGEST PRIUS DISCUSSION FORUM advertising/allowing him to openly speak about his products on here. I again WOULD NOT even care if it wasn't for the MASSIVE FIRE RISK these batteries cause. I mean even inhaling that shit is massively toxic.

Even if I fixed this battery, I'd stilll sniff constantly while driving, hoping my 2500 battery isn't going to kill me in 5-10 years from cancer/sickness.

 

Not kickbacks - it's called commissions and three of the loudest voices on the subject are or were on the payroll.

One of them sells other drop shipped accessories and frequently "forgets" to respond to status requests or ship after payment. Often stalling until the credit card chargeback window has closed. This guy has been booted from other forums.

 

I’m glad more people are now talking about their project lithium pack failures.

How many failed packs will it take until site admins put a stop to the affiliate links/astroturfing/advertising from the people who pushed these packs and promises not only years ago, but now with the ‘rebrand’?

If anyone’s interested in reading yet another account of a lithium pack failure and the disappointing response from Nexpower here’s my post from a while back:

Project Lithium Failure after 2 years. | PriusChat

 

Yeah all I'm gonna say without going too into detail is it's pretty obvious at this point there's some collusion going on (or at worst just some dodging the facts/avoiding the truth and quieting critics). Frankly, I wouldn't care if it wasn't for the huge fire/safety risk the "now discontinued" batteries pose to unaware drivers.

How do I justifiably sell my car while at the same time avoid selling someone else a fire risk/passing the safety issue down? There's just no real solution aside from "Buy the warranty or risk it".

It's unacceptable and I'm amazed anyone would support that stuff.

 

No recall, either. Not even on the Signal Soother. Wild.

Noticeably absent lately is Team Jack members brigading threads like these. I suppose they're hoping we safety advocates will tire ourselves out. They call us trolls, but we raise our valid safety concerns in good faith.

 

Again I respect the hesitancy for someone to agree with or take criticism from a competitor, I really do as a business owner. The fact still stands though that if we are strictly speaking about the V2 and V2.5 battery blade systems from Nexpower, these are inherently unsafe, should have been absolutely recalled fully, and are a huge liability to have on the road in any manner. You don't need to be a competitor to see the flaws. I saw your video (which was long but well-explained) and your prognosis is pretty much spot-on with what another electrical engineer said after inspecting the setup from my vehicle.

In fact, at one point the electrical engineer saw the BMS leads for the V2 and 2.5 plus the kapton tape shielding, and assumed I had personally modified the blades due to the amateur setup. After telling him these were stock/as-sent by nexpower, he replied confusingly "ok you bought this from where? from someone's garage workshop?". He hadn't even seen the video from you and shockingly commented on how thick the gauge was (much like you did in your video). The fact they didn't even use proper heatshrink/shielding is.............insane. Really confusing.

I don't care if they have "discontinued this line of products/battery technology". I'm concerned about my situation (and others) that are now stuck with a dangerous, overpriced battery that had hazardous design by an amateur electrical engineer. I find it even funnier someone recently tried to defend the whole situation while also straight-up saying "Jack offered for me to be a BETA TESTER for the new Sodium batteries" while also downplaying this issue (V2 and 2.5s). Glad YOU got your issue/fire hazard solved! I'd probably be happy too if I got my broken 2500$ 15000 mile less than 2 year old battery replaced as well.

All I'm saying is if Jack actually Recalled the batteries (or hell, just at least LET PEOPLE EXCHANGE THEM FOR A REASONABLE PRICE), I wouldn't be nearly as mad and frankly would understand a LOT more about the situation. For now though, it's just shady business practices (especially with the astroturfing going on..............the referral link stuff is just beyond unreal).

 

I agree with your statement in general. However:
-While we work in the same market segment, we don't presently offer any overlapping products.
-I do not presently compete with NexPower, but this will likely change soon.
-NexPower and I initially considered working together to improve their V2.5 product, in which case I would never have become a competitor. This relationship soured after I privately shared strong safety concerns with Jack.

I agree with your statement in full.

I agree my videos are too long... they're unpolished by a marketing team and intended for a (patient) technical audience. I would spend more time condensing/editing/scripting these videos if the subject matter was my own product. Maybe I'll summarize my findings on every NexPower product I've reviewed so far at the beginning of my upcoming NexPower V3GT review. That way a newcomer only needs to watch that one video to get up to speed.

That was my general conclusion, too.
IIRC, in one of my videos I referred to NexPower's V2.x construction quality as "DIY electric bicycle battery". Notes:
-I wasn't the first engineer to criticize NexPower's designs.
-I suspect almost every electrical engineer would arrive at the same feedback I provided.
-I am just a messenger.

I agree if by 'thick' you mean 'thin'.

I have not yet found any proof that anyone at NexPower has an electrical engineering degree from an accredited univerity. Surely if that were the case I would have heard from them by now. The closest claim I've found is a carefully worded sentence that might make you think Jack is an engineer, but I'll let you decide for yourself:

Source
People have asked Jack several times if he's an engineer. I've never seen his public affirmation (please post link if I missed it).

Team Jack is quick to claim I don't have an engineering degree either... anyone doubting my credentials should write the Vanderbilt University Registrar (Johnathan Sullivan BSEE 2008). Have fun.

Related: I still haven't pinned down when exactly NexPower started beta testing sodium packs:
-In NexPower's sodium reveal reveal, Jack claimed sodium packs had been beta tested during the 2023/2024 winter, so maybe 2023NOV?
-My estimate is that beta testing actually began 2024FEB at the earliest. This is important because it means beta testers weren't actually testing for the entire cold season.
-In a flyer recently sent to numerous repair shops, NexPower claims:

I interpret 'years' (plural) as "at least two years", which would imply that NexPower's beta testers have had sodium packs since 2023MAY, which I know is incorrect.

The astroturfing (I call it 'Team Jack') and referral zealots are insane to me, too. My initial goal was to have a civil technical discussion about the safety issues. My first attempt was in private with Jack, who ignored my concers... so then I raised my concerns publicly.

 

I said this in some of the previous threads, but I'll say it again, I think if you're going to make a video you should put the needed time and effort in, irrespective of whether the product is or isn't your product. The time and effort should go in because the video is your video and because you respect your audience.

It was drilled into me in school that a rough guideline for any presentation you want to put before people is to put in about 100✕ the time that you will be asking from the audience. If a one-hour video ends up taking a hundred hours for script writing and editing, prep, shooting, and post, that means you're doing it about right.

I admit I often skimp on that ratio in things like PriusChat posts: it's not like my every post here that takes 1 minute to read took me 100 minutes to write. (But some of them did!) And I find the 100✕ rule of thumb never seems to be too far off when I'm preparing any other kind of thing, be it video, audio, or just written.

If I asked the local pastor here how long he spends writing and polishing his 20 minute message each week and he told me about 33 hours, I wouldn't be too surprised.

The videos you've put up on this topic before just scream that not enough time and effort went in. They manage to turn even a "(patient) technical audience"—even a sympathetic and largely persuaded one—into an exasperated one. And that, I'm afraid, makes them less effective than you would like them to be.

You might think of the length of the video (or whatever) as an intermediate factor that cancels, something like y in x / y · y / z where you achieve x persuasion of your audience with y minutes of video, and the y minutes of video take you z minutes to make. While it may be seem that you can economize by increasing y / z, it's a false economy if that tanks x / y.