Harvesting 18650 cells from 8-cell (2S4P) Cable Modem Batteries

Processing a batch of 8-cell Arris cable modem batteries to build additional battery packs for the power wall.

Working with lithium ion batteries is inherently dangerous. Be sure you are experienced at doing this kind of work and take adequate safety precautions before attempting this yourself. The techiniques illustrated in this video are for entertainment purposes only.

There are likely several ways to open these packs. I found this technique worked best for me. It was fast and involved no cutting with sharp blades. I experienced no cell damage in opening hundreds of these packs using this technique, YMMV.

These batteries seem to have two different LG cells in them, the older LGCAS31865 and the newer LGDAS31865, both rated at 2200mAH, 1075mAH nominal charge rate. I picked up 80 battery packs, netting 320 pair of cells for testing. I think I had 2 - 4 pair of cells that tested out below 2000mAH, those I'll need to separate and see if any of the individual cells are still good.

The average capacity was 3623mAH and the median was 3613mAH. This comes in higher than my existing new and used battery module capacities, so I'll probably use the upper end of this group to build some higher capacity modules and then some of the lower ones to build some 35AH modules to match the 4 - 35AH modules I have left over from the old 4S system.

Battery Hookup link for modem batteries (stock varies):
https://bit.ly/3ftt0LQ

More to come, processing some 4-cell modem batteries...

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Intro/Outro:
Louisiana Fairytale by Austin Rogers
https://web.archive.org/web/20170402222425/http://drfiddle.com/show_tune.php?id=94