Derek (@dJOS ) did the heavy lifting. It turned out the system was too expensive for someone to make and sell. Then we were all excited and planned version 2 with a processor etc.
Finally enthusiasm faded and here we are.
I however still like the IC its based on (TLC4040) it is the only all in one chip I've found that allows you to reduce the max charge voltage. For long life Li cells should be charged to about 80% of their max capacity. For a UPS where the batteries will be held at the charge setting you would want reliability more than max capability. However advertisers want to claim more capacity so they run them at 100%.
3 Likes
I still wonder if it would make since to release a BOM and the board desig so someone could opt to get it made by PCB way or the like if they wanted to. Even the 1.0 version he madd is a cool setup.
This version isn’t my design and is open source - its quite expensive to have made tho.
The reason I even looked for something like this was because we lost power, then my hub bricked and only the flashing blue light. (Just a note, habitat replaced the old one. 
Now, I do shut down my hub once a month from the habitat menu.
Otherwise, it is now powered by this device. Now, it was the cheapest device that had a good clean dc power source. Since I have many 18650 cells from old laptops, so this board also allowed that.
I actually ran it for 3 days on 2 3000mah cells.
So, now my hubitat hub does not crash from a power outage. That's it.
Makes sense. All my hubs (except the one up north) are on a UPS. I was trying to think of a reason to use these instead or in addition to the UPS, but I can't think of any good reason to do so. Without power there's very little I can control anyhow, so I might as well let them do a clean shutdown when the UPS runs out of power.
@dJOS & @pauljneil2
I've skimmed this thread (ngl: have not read all 945 comments) but I still don't understand how to DIY battery backup for under $10.
Went to the link @dJOS posted, but am clueless as to what to do with the link, and @djos also posted "Its quite expensive to have made tho..."
So, @pauljneil2 - you say your Hubitat is now powered by "this device...it was the cheapest device that had a good clean dc power source..."
Which device is your Hubitat powered by, and if it is a DIY device, is there somewhere with step by step directions for those of us who are clueless.
You can't. Inflation. These are the ones @pauljneil2 mentioned, and are two for $12:
and you'll need some 18650 batteries, which are roughly $3 - $8 each depending on capacity and vendor. Each board takes two batteries.
The only DIY you need to do with this board is solder a USB cord onto the output terminals, which are clearly marked "UPS +" and "UPS -" at one end of the board. Easiest thing is probably just to buy a USB pigtail cable, Amazon has lots of them.
2 Likes
It's possible, maybe, that you can still get the good cheap 18650 shield from the op.
This listing on AliExpress shows the:
18650 Battery charge shield board V3 Micro USB (4001282850260).
But with shipping it's a bit of a gamble that they send you the actual item that's listed. 
Well... They did when I ordered from them 5 years ago. 
Yes, @dcaton1220 is right. That is the one I use.
I have 2 3000mah cells from an old laptop battery. So, 6ah for two of my cells @4.2vdc boosted to five vdc going into whatever 5v device you need but I have seen 3.5ah and 3.8ah cells too.
This device can make you 5vdc @ three amps or 9vdc or 12vdc depending on the unit purchased or the resisters used) and charges the cells from usb-c.
I mean, how many USB power blocks do we have laying around. Lol. I use them with my OLD one amp charger and they still work great and last for days without power, so I believe that even though this setup can not properly shut down the hub like the other one up top, it can still be a useful power supply.
Oh, and the three amps at 5vdc is dead on. My Motorola mesh routers use a DC power supply to provide 5v @ 3a or, I purchased a couple of the Motorola repeaters (without wall watts and put all of them on their own 2 battery supply. Anything 3a or lower amps is a good match. I still have the original wall warts that put out 3a but they are not needed with the use of the 1amp charger. I hope that made sense.
THANK YOU!!! VERY much appreciated.
For the wire I need to solder to the UPS+ & UPS- terminals, the other end of that is a USB that fits into the Hubitat, correct? Could I just use a USB cable I have around that fits Hubitat on one end and cut off the other end to solder?
Has anyone found an enclosure that fits this setup?
Sure. Any respectable cable ought to have color coded wires. Goes without saying though, make certain you are connecting the proper pins. Not sure what would happen if you put 5v on the data pins, but I wouldn't want to find out. They might not be connected to anything inside the hub, but who knows.
Amazon has USB-C power pigtails that would work. I use them myself.
This. Use a socket pigtail. That way you can use any cable.
- Do you have details on the resistor changes needed to change a 5v board into either 9v and 12v ??
Yes, you can cut off a micro or c cable as long as the pigtail matches the hub. Next, you can charge this from any 2.4a power block and a USB-c input cable.
I know this is from 12 days ago, but you should be able to monitor a mains powered device and use that to shutdown the hub in an outage. I know people use power monitoring plugs for this. Any active device should work.
A simple script could be something like:
Every 15 minutes ping device.
Check last activity timestamp.
If it is more than 15 minutes old something is wrong.
Decide how long you want it to go until shutdown and then shutdown the hub.
You can mess around with the times. If the hub runs for 12 hours on battery then there is no hurry for the checks. If power is out for more than, say, an hour then I would likely do a shutdown.
A smart UPS is more elegant, but you should be able to do something similar with a dumb device.
Yes! Absolutely! That is what I did because the other one was so expensive, but these are not, and they work well with the loads specified.
I actually made an app (like you suggested) that looks for when a device looses power (like my fridge and freezer) then wait for any specific time lapse you want, then shut down the hub. Since I know the hub can literally run for days, and possibly weeks since I didn't wait until the cells could not provide the power needed. I may eventually run another test to actually put a time frame on it.
Thanks for the verification.
Paul
