Parking Battery-Power Station, 3X capacity and 3X cheaper than dedicated options + extra functionality

All power stations, all dedicated dashcam batteries, all battery management systems (BMS) I've used for my DIY batteries, etc., are unable to accurately reflect the state of charge (SoC).
This is due to the wide range in charge and discharge currents and the accumulation of measurement errors, which requires constant recalibration.
The most accurate is the Ecoflow River 3.
 
It’s been over 9.5 months since I installed Ecoflow River3 in my Jeep, powering two Viofo Mini2 dash cams via two USB-A ports using HK4 cables with removed voltage regulators (my original 5V direct connection system).
It worked flawlessly the entire time.
It survived both winter and summer, with sub-freezing charge protection tripping once and overheat charge protection tripping twice, while still powering the dash cams in both cases.

I love features like Wi-Fi and Bluetooth and app, the ability to remotely turn off the battery and the dash cam(s) when not needed, the ability to change the charging current on the fly via app, time-out, port memory, and the pretty accurate state of charge indication.
It is easy to install and maintain.
Overall, this is an excellent power station for a dash cam, much better than any dedicated battery on the market in my opinion.

Now the time has come, and today I replaced it with my DIY, LTO battery.

It's a simple drop-in replacement.
I didn't change anything in the car's wiring.
The LTO battery is powered via the same CLA-XT60-I cable, and the same two USB-A dash cam cables are connected via a Y-splitter to the USB-A (QC3.0) port on the LTO.
 

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Looking nice. I'm waiting to see if maybe the new sodium-ion power stations or 12V batteries start showing up, but I'm not going for the outdated Bluetti. I can't quite decide which has served me better, the Solix C300 or the River 3, because both have advantages and disadvantages for my use case. Neither is perfect, but if you could combine them, I’d have the perfect one.
 
Yes, it's difficult to find the perfect option for every situation.
Solix has much better USB ports, but I prefer the River3 app and its functionality.
The new Bluetti Elite 30 V2 looks good - a sort of combination of Solix and River - but it has high self-consumption.
Standby DC power consumption is about 5W — about 3 times that of the River3.

It's interesting that you mentioned Sodium-Ion (Na+) batteries.
And the only Bluetti power station that uses these cells is, frankly, a joke.
Currently, Na+ cells are inferior to LFP cells in every way except the ability to charge at sub-zero temperatures.

I even considered building a battery using these cells:
3.1V 10Ah Sodium-Ion battery

They are drop-in replacements for the similarly sized LFP batteries I used here:
GPak

Thread 'LFP (LiFePo4) Battery for Parking, 192Wh (DIY)'

This thread is the third one in a series of alternative parking batteries for dash cams.
Coming from these two threads, on ‘Power Stations for Parking’ and ‘LTO Battery for Parking’.

https://dashcamtalk.com/forum/threa...-dedicated-options-extra-functionality.49972/

https://dashcamtalk.com/forum/threads/lto-lithium-titanate-oxide-–-the-ultimate-battery-for-dash-cam-parking-recording-diy.50484/

I believe, we should not rely on car's starter battery to power dash cam in parking mode, stressing it with a constantly...
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My current setup is is a viofo a229 pro in 3ch mode with LBR that I can typically get about 50-60 hours of parking mode in and recharges in about an hour.

The setup is as follows:

2x power taps
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2x Ugreen 150 watt car chargers (140 watt outputs)
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Anker Solix c300 DC (288 watt hours LFP)
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Zoupw 188 Wh LFP Battery
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USB C Trigger with adjustable voltage set to 12v
\\\///
HK4 hardwire kit w/ custom relay to car ACC
\\\///
Viofo A229 Pro

Overall, the setup works relatively well. The 2x power taps and chargers give a theoretical 280 watt charging capacity for the system, which means an hour of driving gives about 25 hours worth of run time (viofo a229 pro is not very efficient in LBR). A relay is needed with the HK4 kit to prevent cross talk between the car 12v system and the battery 12v system since it uses the same negative line across both.

I ran into trouble with the anker solix battery with the trigger because for some reason at around 24 hours, it would flicker power to the usb c trigger causing the camera to shut off, but since it was in parking mode it would not turn back on until you restart the car. Putting an intermediary battery (ZOUPW) fixed this (but is more conversion losses).

The 150 watt chargers required m.2 heatsinks to keep cool as they would overheat from the power draw despite overall car power system voltage staying at 13.1. I also occasionally have issues with the dual input charging. At lower temperature with low charge state, the anker battery seems to limit to low current on one charger, and then on charge state greater than 85% it also shuts off the second charger.

Now that we approach winter, the biggest challenge is that in cold temperatures, I have to wait an extraordinarily long time for the batteries to start charging. I am working on building a temperature regulated heater with some insulation to try and keep the batteries warm.

All said and done, it does what I want it to do with some TLC, but definitely not care free.
 
halomstr said:
......
Now that we approach winter, the biggest challenge is that in cold temperatures, I have to wait an extraordinarily long time for the batteries to start charging. I am working on building a temperature regulated heater with some insulation to try and keep the batteries warm....
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Nice setup, @halomstr !
Cold weather charging and performance are the main drawbacks of LFP batteries.
It seems you're quite a hands-on DIYer; Check out this thread on DIY LTO batteries; it might inspire you:

https://dashcamtalk.com/forum/threa...-battery-for-dash-cam-parking-mode-diy.50484/
 
I went ahead and bought the 140Ah Litime smart battery, mostly for my security cameras. For what it’s worth, the smart part of the battery is not really useful for the kind of work we put them through, since the smart sensor isn’t able to register anything under 1.5A at 12V, which means anything under 18–20W. Learning the hard way again, even though they confirmed it would still show the % and voltage correctly. Well, I can now report that it doesn’t, but I’m learning a lot as I go.


It’s very hard to tell what the battery percentage is anyway for LiFePO4, so I got myself a Victron smart shunt, which is reported to show usage over time correctly. However, people don’t usually put such batteries on such small loads. At last, I can now see more realistic usage, which is nice, and it detects amps down to 0.010A, so all seems good now, other than the fact that it looks like a freaking homemade bomb.


The only useful thing from the smart part of the battery is that I can turn it off and on via Bluetooth, but then again, this probably consumes some power that a dumb battery wouldn’t. You could also just get a killswitch for a dumb battery too, so…


I also finally hardwired my dashcam Cellink battery to an empty fusebox slot, and I have no freaking idea how much this slot can take, so I left the battery at a 5A fixed position. Since the battery has only power and minus cables, and my car seems to only have low-voltage ACC-controlled fuses, and I don’t know what the wiring behind it is, I probably shouldn’t risk more than 5A.

If anybody wanna take a look at my fusebox. Only the green circled row is ACC controlled and has live contacts in my Skoda Kamiq. picture
 
Glad you got it to work!

Sawyer said:
all seems good now, other than the fact that it looks like a freaking homemade bomb.
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Over this past summer, my wife and I took our daughter to the American Ballet Theater in New York City. As we entered the underground parking lot, the attendant made me open the trunk (looking for explosives or other threatening items). He was a bit hesitant to let us park after seeing my DIY battery box with wires coming out of it. He looked a little more at ease after I showed him the array of cameras on my windows that are powered by the battery he was looking at 🤣
 
Here is a link to my post in the "Ecoflow and Viofo" thread—just in case anyone needs it.

GPak

Post in thread 'ECOFLOW and Viofo'

dopacan said:
Hi everyone,
Been going through a lot of threads but still not fully clear, so wanted to ask.
Setup
  • Toyota C-HR Hybrid (don’t want to touch factory wiring, afraid of messing with hybrid system and warranty issues)
  • EcoFlow River 3
  • Viofo A329
  • Considering Viofo HK4 / Viofo HK6
Goal
Fully isolated, plug & play. EcoFlow powers the cam, charges from 12V socket. No fuse tap, no grounding.

Issue
If I feed both ACC + BATT from EcoFlow, camera is basically always on.
After5 min - Parking mode is not reliable — sometimes it doesn’t exit when I start driving...
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Another link to my post in the "Ecoflow and Viofo" thread—just in case anyone needs it.

GPak

Post in thread 'ECOFLOW and Viofo'

sysio2000 said:
Ok.
I had done some tests 🙂
It looks like when Ecoflow R3+ battery discharge to 0%, even if "Port Memory On" is set, the power at the cigarette output occur when battery will be charged to min 5%. I took approx 10-11 min with home charging (at the car even more).
(the same situation with USB-C output).

Unfortunatelly 10 min (or more) Viofo start recording delay time isn't acceptable to use it for dash cam 🙁
I have to figure-out how to set the Ecoflow settings to:
1. Power my VIOFO from Ecoflow at the beggining of engine start (acceptable delay - max 2-3 minutes).
2. Set max...
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GPak said:
Another link to my post in the "Ecoflow and Viofo" thread—just in case anyone needs it.

GPak

Post in thread 'ECOFLOW and Viofo'

sysio2000 said:
Ok.
I had done some tests 🙂
It looks like when Ecoflow R3+ battery discharge to 0%, even if "Port Memory On" is set, the power at the cigarette output occur when battery will be charged to min 5%. I took approx 10-11 min with home charging (at the car even more).
(the same situation with USB-C output).

Unfortunatelly 10 min (or more) Viofo start recording delay time isn't acceptable to use it for dash cam 🙁
I have to figure-out how to set the Ecoflow settings to:
1. Power my VIOFO from Ecoflow at the beggining of engine start (acceptable delay - max 2-3 minutes).
2. Set max...
Click to expand...
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Nicely done. Anyway to get delayed charging to the power station from the car. Like how the 70mai pack has delayed charging. Apologies if I missed it.
 
A delay and a "soft start" function are integral features of the EcoFlow River 3/3+.
If you watch the video from the previous post and pay attention to the timestamps:

- At the 3:34 mark, the power supply unit displays an output voltage of 14V, and the current outputs is minimal (for wiring and the dashcam).
- At the 3:43 mark—after a 9-second delay—the River 3+ begins charging; simultaneously, the power supply's output current gradually increases, indicating that the "soft start" function has engaged.
- At the 3:49 mark—another 6 seconds later—the output current reaches its maximum value of 8A.

Thus, the River 3+ is characterized by a charging delay lasting approximately 9 seconds, followed by an additional 6 seconds of "soft start."

The River 3 should be similar.
 
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Thanks. Do you think it would make a huge difference in power consumtion if I used the usb c port or the 12v port on the river 3? I have a black vue which is 12v.

I guess to make things easier I can use this: https://www.amazon.com/gp/B0DWK654QXThe 12v ciagrette connector always slips out now and then.

I also saw in a few posts the usb c cable you used is usb c to 15v? Any specific reason for the 15v instead of 12v ?
 
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stephenjones said:
Thanks. Do you think it would make a huge difference in power consumtion if I used the usb c port or the 12v port on the river 3? I have a black vue which is 12v.

I guess to make things easier I can use this: https://www.amazon.com/gp/B0DWK654QXThe 12v ciagrette connector always slips out now and then.

I also saw in a few posts the usb c cable you used is usb c to 15v? Any specific reason for the 15v instead of 12v ?
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The 12V DC port is regulated, which entails associated losses; therefore, the difference in power consumption between the 12V port and the USB-C port is not significant.
Actually the USB-C port is a bit more efficient, if my memory serves me right...

The cable you linked should work, verify it actually outputs 12+ volt
 
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Thanks but would I not need 12v cables since it is a blackvue? The one you referenced seem to be 5v.
 
No worries. Last question (for now). Is it helpful to get like a usb c to 15v cable instead of the 12v? I saw somwehere on here usb c to 15 v is what was being used. I guess the hardwire kits take care of the voltage in that setup but in mine its straight to the camera.
 
stephenjones said:
No worries. Last question (for now). Is it helpful to get like a usb c to 15v cable instead of the 12v? I saw somwehere on here usb c to 15 v is what was being used. I guess the hardwire kits take care of the voltage in that setup but in mine its straight to the camera.
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Voltage drop in cables is always a concern.
When using Viofo dashcams with HK4 or HK6 hardwire kits, I prefer to use the 15V cable.
This is because the 12V is very close to the HK4/6 low-voltage protection cutoff threshold (11.8V), and a significant voltage drop may result in the dashcam shutting down.

However, I am unsure how a Blackvue dashcam would react to a 15V input. (I think it should be OK since car's alternator output is around 14.5V)

If, on the other hand, the 12V cable actually delivers a 12V and better slightly higher voltage—say, around 12.1 -12.2V, then no issues should arise.
 
Thank you. I have not integrated the ups as of yet since I hit a little snag. The setup without the ups works fine on the anker dc300 but not on my river 3 plus. I have a xt60 cable. Is the issue that I need a xt60i with the extra pin ? If so , any recommendations?
 
stephenjones said:
Thank you. I have not integrated the ups as of yet since I hit a little snag. The setup without the ups works fine on the anker dc300 but not on my river 3 plus. I have a xt60 cable. Is the issue that I need a xt60i with the extra pin ? If so , any recommendations?
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The River 3+ should be working; please check the connections—something must be wrong.

The River 3+, ships with the original 3-pin XT60I charging cable.
Because of this, I was under the impression that it would not work with a regular 2-pin XT60 cable.

However, much to my surprise, the River 3+ actually works with a regular XT60 cable.
Consequently, an XT60 splitter - which allows you to tap into the positive ACC signal - will also work with this power station.

I tested it and recorded a short video:

 
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