[RESOLVED] Hmm, how annoyed should I be with a remanufactured powerwall?

[niveknow]

I had considered something like that, and if that was the only option they gave me as a resolution I probably would have gone for it. But it wouldn’t have been my first choice.

The big issue I see is the battery longevity. If the batteries in the refurbished unit were, say, 2 years old, then at the end of the 10 year warranty they would be 12 years old and the batteries in my other powerwalls would have been 10 years old. At that point that extra 2 years would probably be pretty significant.

Good point. I wonder how the gateway works when it tries to manage filling a mixed battery situation where one may be newer/more efficient. I imagine it would be transparent to us as a user.

I have 2 PW coming in.. and really expecting the technology to significantly improve over the next few years. i.e. battery day and new battery tech that would drive the price down significantly. Something hopefully 2-3 yrs out that will allow me to add to my 2 PW around the corner. Imagine adding a 27 kWh powerwall that cost $3-4k. =) I'm hoping it'll come in a similar form factor that allows us to stack elegantly to our existing PWs.

 

[BrettS]

Good point. I wonder how the gateway works when it tries to manage filling a mixed battery situation where one may be newer/more efficient. I imagine it would be transparent to us as a user.

I believe that it does internally balance the powerwalls. Right after they replaced my remanufactured powerwall I noticed that the fan on the new powerwall was running much faster than the other ones. I’ve noticed that the fans tend to increase in speed when they are charging at a high rate, but normally they all increase at about the same time. However, it occurred to me that my existing powerwalls were at a pretty high state of charge at the time they did the swap and the new one probably was not. So I believe that the system was probably charging the new powerwall at a higher rate to allow it to catch up with the other three.

Of course this is all speculation, but I did notice that since that time the fans on all four powerwalls tend to speed up and slow down at the same time now.