Without a battery, the best and commonly used electric scooter won’t travel far. Being the only source of power, batteries are the key component. Also, they even affect the general functionality as well as the reliability of your electric scooter. In addition, there are many types as well as technologies present, where some are older than the other.
Currently, the most expensive and modern battery used in electric bikes is the Lithium-Ion battery. Sometimes you might feel that the modern and latest electric bikes are expensive. This is because the batteries are a bit expensive.
In this article, you can know a lot about the improvements made in the batteries in the past and what are the various kind of batteries used in electric bikes.
How Battery Technology Has Evolved Over Time
If any person says that battery technology is improving, then it is true. You can even find the best batteries running the latest model of electric scooters nowadays.
A perfect example would be the cellphone batteries. A few years back, they were huge and never lasted long. But now they have become small and last even for a day. See, the extensive amount of development in the cellphone battery tech clearly shows the amount of development and evolution the battery industry has.
Basic Power Of Electric Scooter’s Battery
Concerning electric scooters, they need more power compared to the cellphone. It is because they convert their energy into physical and real kinetic energy rather than supplying the lower based voltage electronic circuit board present in the cellphone.
So, it means that you would need some good amount of serious power for running the electric scooter. It is especially if you consider longer distance and higher speed as the major factor while selecting the electric scooter.
Types Of Batteries Used In Electric Scooter
Commonly, electric scooters are often powered by three major kinds of batteries.
The following are the batteries used:
- Sealed Lead Acid Battery (SLA)
- Nickel Metal Hydride Battery (NiMH)
- Lithium-Ion Battery (Li-ion, LFP, LiPo)
Now such kind of batteries has been in the market for quite some time. Just check their names, and you can easily know about their chemical composition. Basically, they are very much light compared to the sealed lead-acid batteries.
Since they are lightweight, they are more advanced but a bit expensive.
These so-called Nickel Metal Hydride batteries are created specifically for electric scooters.
Even though these NiMH batteries are expensive compared to the commonly found sealed lead-acid ones, still they are thirty to forty percentage lighter.
Plus, they even last longer compared to the lead-acid batteries.
Sealed Lead Acid Batteries (SLA)
Similar to the Nickel Metal batteries, these acid-based ones have been around for many years. Basically, they are the standard kind of batteries which you will find in most of the trucks and cars.
Since they produce a huge amount of current which can start any engine, the majority of the auto industries depend on them and are using them for many years.
Besides, they are the oldest kind of batter. So, they are the first ones to be used in the earlier versions of the electric scooters.
Also, currently, they continue to be popular and commonly used batteries used in various electric scooters. Why? It is due to the sheer power it produces.
Even though the SLA batteries are good, the major drawback is that they are very much heavy. Also, they are quite large too. But compared to the NiMH batteries, these are less expensive and are easily available.
No wonder these are often and commonly used in various electric scooters and bikes. One important thing to keep in mind is that the time period of the sealed acid battery depends on the surrounding temperature as well as the size and quality.
Lithium-ion Battery (Li-ion)
A fairly recent development in the battery industry is the Lithium-ion batteries. So, it is not surprising that they are a bit expensive. For some time, they have been taking the market by storm as they have an abundance of features.
Even they have a major advantage over other kinds of batteries.
They are the lightest kind of battery available in the market today. Also, as they can last longer compared to the regularly used Sealed Lead Acid (SLA) batteries, they are very much attractive to most of the electric scooter manufacturers.
Furthermore, they are very much lighter compared to the NiMH batteries and weight half of the sealed lead-based batteries. Also, there are other major factors that make the Li-ion based battery popular.
One of the major ones is that they need less maintenance when they are not used.
In addition, they won’t suffer from the ‘battery memory’ problem which is common among the NiMH batteries. You can simply ignore them for huge periods without having an issue. Due to such kind of major advantages, Li-ion batteries are becoming popular in various places.
But the only downside is the price. It is much higher compared to the sealed lead-acid batteries as well as NiMH batteries.
With regard to a modern scooter, price is becoming a major factor in terms of price especially as the cost of the battery of NiMH and Li-ion ones is high.
Kinds Of Lithium-ion Based Batteries
Now there are some special sub-kind of Li-ion based batteries and they each have their advantages.
Some of them are:
- LFP (Lithium FerroPhosphate) – These batteries have a longer life compared to the standard Li-on’s one. Also, they are a bit safer too. High-quality electric scooters will have the LFP battery but the cost of such a battery is a bit high.
- LiPo (Lithium Polymer) – The LiPo battery is a common Li-ion battery which is produced in a pouch format compared to the traditional cell format one. Not only they are useful and used in electronic gadgets, but they are also even used in electric scooters too. The major advantage of this battery is that it is small as well as flat in shape.