Tracking Packs and Training Schmucks

Dropped in on the Denver Electric Vehicle Council meeting today--held in Boulder, doncha know--and walked away feeling buzzed, like an acolyte who was eavesdropping on the Council of Trent. They knew so much, I knew so little, and yet nobody kicked me out of the room.

This particular meeting concerned the PakTrakr, a battery monitoring system built by Ken Hall & co. up in Windsor, Colorado. The PakTrakr is a single instrument that can do the work of voltmeter, ammeter, and a whole lot more. I'm miles away from putting batteries in the car, and I don't yet know the dark art of monitoring volts and amps, but it's not too early to start thinking about batteries.

For simplicity and economy, in the end I'll probably load the car up with six garden variety, 12-volt, deep cycle batteries, but here are some things worth considering:

• No battery pack (collection of separate batteries, wired together to supply the juice) will be ever be perfectly balanced, and weaker batteries charge faster, causing over-charging, thus
  
• Charging the whole pack without attention to the weaker links will inevitably cause trouble, and
  
• Trouble = $$, needless frustration and other "events" (explosions, fires, etc.).

So what's a guy to do? Maybe put the PakTrakr to use, which allows you to monitor the whole pack and each battery individually. We'll see.