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Everyone who has a uninterruptible power supply (UPS) for the computer at home knows its one significant drawback, which flies to its owner “a pretty penny”. This is of course the fragility of its batteries. Usually, with luck, they live 3 years, and then lose their capacity and functionality. This makes it impossible to use the UPS directly for its intended purpose.
We put supercapacitors in the UPS instead of the battery

Nearly all uninterruptible power supplies use closed, maintenance-free lead acid batteries. The very word “maintenance free” makes it clear that it is impossible to restore such a battery, and if possible, then definitely not for long. And then the idea came up to replace the battery with supercapacitors (ionistors). They have an enormous service life, are absolutely tolerant of high loads, the number of charge-discharge cycles is more than 10,000. Therefore, if you are lucky, the uninterrupted battery will become eternal!

Will need


6 supercapacitors with balance protection board. You can buy ready for .
We put supercapacitors in the UPS instead of the battery

A balance sheet fee is a must. Without it, the operation of ionistors in a series circuit is impossible, since everything is fraught with the failure of any element when recharging.
The capacity of 1 element in the circuit is 500 Farads and the voltage is 2.7 V. That is, 6 pieces will make up a battery that can be charged up to a maximum of 16.2 V.

Replacing the battery in the uninterruptible power supply with supercapacitors


In theory, as always, everything is smooth, but in practice, everything is not as we would like.
We put supercapacitors in the UPS instead of the battery

In this example, a UPS was used that had a maximum load power of 300 watts. A dead battery was removed in it and a board with supercapacitors was installed instead of the battery.
First start. And then the first failure: the UPS of course turned on, but refused to charge the ionistors. Why? The fact is that in the UPS circuit there was a protection that did not charge if the initial battery voltage is less than 10 V.
The second attempt. Then I took a third-party adapter with an output voltage of 10 V and simply charged the capacitors before turning it on.
We put supercapacitors in the UPS instead of the battery

Turned on the UPS and it finally worked. The ionistors continued to charge to the threshold voltage of the acid battery.
We put supercapacitors in the UPS instead of the battery

As a result, it was decided to remove the protection against low voltage, finalizing the UPS circuit.
But these are not all pitfalls. Further, the operating time was checked when the power was turned off. And the results are quite specific. The UPS shuts down when the voltage across the ionistors drops below 10 V
We put supercapacitors in the UPS instead of the battery

As a result, the total operating time, depending on the load power, could be from 5 to 30 seconds. Although, the load that this UPS used to supply was not quite powerful, its operating time was 18 seconds. In principle, for my tasks, this time was quite enough.

Installation in the housing


It was impossible to put this line in place of the standard battery. The decision was to make a cut in the side of the case and bring the elements out.
We put supercapacitors in the UPS instead of the battery

We put supercapacitors in the UPS instead of the battery

As a result, the appearance was not particularly terrible, given that the UPS is located in a secluded place.
We put supercapacitors in the UPS instead of the battery

As it turned out, the idea is quite working. Of course, the capacitance of the capacitors must be significantly increased in order to achieve a significant increase in operating time in the event of a shutdown.
Although there is a flip side to the coin: with an increase in the total capacity, the total initial charge time will also increase ... which will negatively affect the usability.

Watch the video


See the author’s video clip for a complete UPS upgrade with protection circuit adjustments.
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Comments (22)
  1. Ivan
    #1 Ivan Guests May 23, 2019 19:08
    8
    With such a cost of ionistors, batteries can be changed 4 times for 3 years, 12 years ... I don’t know ...
  2. Guest gosh
    #2 Guest gosh Guests May 23, 2019 19:18
    2
    As far as I remember, the UPS for the computer produces 220 volts. What 16 volt UPS is the author writing about? Why do we need such a UPS? Some wandered mare.
    1. the guest
      #3 the guest Guests May 24, 2019 09:22
      19
      Before writing your nonsense, take the trouble to study the work of IPB. Inside there is a 14 volt battery, the author put together an alternative battery of 16. A 220 volt is output at the output through an inverter. Teach the materiel, sivaya mare.
      1. Guest gosh
        #4 Guest gosh Guests May 25, 2019 20:57
        1
        I didn’t sort the UPS for a while. The first served for 4 years, no less. Now I have been using the second one for more than 5 years. Why should I take it apart? He worked his term and went to the scrap.
    2. Pasha
      #5 Pasha Guests June 3, 2019 1:58 p.m.
      3
      So find out first, and then write.
  3. AC
    #6 AC Guests May 23, 2019 19:20
    1
    What about the charging / discharging cycle? How many times does the UPS turn on charging per day?
  4. the guest
    #7 the guest Guests May 24, 2019 07:40
    6
    Cloak of pure water.
  5. Vasisuali
    #8 Vasisuali Guests May 24, 2019 10:26
    1
    how complicated and dreary ...
  6. Guest Gennady
    #9 Guest Gennady Guests May 24, 2019 1:42 p.m.
    8
    So far completely uncompetitive! Absolutely! On the same Ali, you can buy five LiIon 2600 mAh for 600 rubles, for 120 rubles a protection board for them and get not 20 seconds, but at least 15 minutes (900 seconds) of UPS operation. Almost certainly ionistors with a board are more expensive, have more dimensions, and 45 times less energy. Mostly ionistors are used where it is necessary to give a very large current in a short time.
    1. Sad gopher
      #10 Sad gopher Guests May 25, 2019 5:53 p.m.
      0
      And who needs 15 minutes? 20 seconds to save the state and turn off the computer when the network is lost is enough. And for no other reason, the UPS is not needed
      1. Guest Eugene
        #11 Guest Eugene Guests June 5, 2019 04:31
        3
        You can distract yourself and not have time to turn off the computer in 15 seconds, it’s easier without any UPS
      2. Orphan
        #12 Orphan Guests August 10, 2019 18:27
        0
        In 15 seconds I won’t even have time to bark, not to save_and exit. 300 sec minimum And so the tweeter voted for the whole screen saver.
    2. Guest Michael
      #13 Guest Michael Guests May 30, 2019 12:28
      1
      They wrote it right, I have done it for more than a year, everything works fine. And the dimensions of the battery are smaller.
  7. popvovka
    #14 popvovka Visitors May 25, 2019 11:08
    0
    Judging by the size, it costs 7 Ah, at a price of 1,400 rubles, the most expensive. It works for 4-5 years. 3 years, apparently a cheap sigment battery.
  8. Ivan
    #15 Ivan Guests May 25, 2019 2:59 p.m.
    5
    The master is simply experimenting, so he does not look at the price. Putting a battery, of course, is wiser. But experimenting is always so interesting! I liked the article.
  9. Tolya
    #16 Tolya Guests May 25, 2019 10:10 PM
    5
    UPS doesn't make sense for a few seconds ...
  10. Guest Dmitry
    #17 Guest Dmitry Guests May 27, 2019 08:31
    1
    The balance board is generally useless here, since the ionistor has no requirements for exceeding the voltage on it (at least 100 volts to the bank, apply, the excess will simply be lost when disconnected). It is not a capacitor that can leak.
    1. walked by
      #18 walked by Guests June 10, 2019 10:38
      1
      well done, here and show it in practice, and we will observe from the side how the ionistor will dissipate the excess voltage)
      Do not know the question, do not be awry!
      Overvoltage is as contraindicated for ionistors as conventional capacitors.
  11. user10h
    #19 user10h Guests June 1, 2019 1:14 p.m.
    1
    it is a pity that with a series connection of the ionistra their capacity decreases ((
    In this case, divide 500 farads by 6 and only 83 farads remain (
    1. Nikola
      #20 Nikola Guests 11 june 2019 14:14
      0
      Capacity remains the same
      1. Guest Vlad
        #21 Guest Vlad Guests June 14, 2019 9:50 p.m.
        2
        Learn electrical engineering ignorant. When the capacitors are connected in series, the capacitance decreases, and when parallel connected
    2. Aksakal
      #22 Aksakal Guests June 11, 2019 19:42
      1
      It’s easier to put an old battery out of a car. There will be more sense.

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