# What happens to UPS backup time once you replace the original one?



## sling-shot (Mar 7, 2018)

In the last 10 years I have gone through 4 UPSs. 1 WeP model, 2 Numeric pieces and lastly 1 V-Guard. The first 2 came with 1 year warranty and V-Guard with 2 year warranty.

All of them did well during their warranty period. Were providing promised backup of at least 15 minutes off mains supply. In all this period I have not significantly altered the power demand except for may be a 25% addition due to some additions/changes of the internal components.

After the warranty period is over, and sometime later the battery backup gradually went down and I replaced the battery with a brand new one recommended by the manufacturer.

As I notice, in each case without fail the replacement battery is not able to provide any sort of decent backup and whatever it provides does not last more than 6 months. And 6 months will be the warranty for the new battery.

For my latest V-Guard I had installed Exide battery recommended by their technician but it does not provide reliable backup. With the Numeric model, the technician understood my problem and replaced the whole board free of cost inspite of the unit being out of warranty but still that did not help. So I suspect it is the fault of replacement battery.

What is happening here? Is it a planned obsolescence thing? Or a conspiracy theory?


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## billubakra (Mar 7, 2018)

sling-shot said:


> In the last 10 years I have gone through 4 UPSs. 1 WeP model, 2 Numeric pieces and lastly 1 V-Guard. The first 2 came with 1 year warranty and V-Guard with 2 year warranty.
> 
> All of them did well during their warranty period. Were providing promised backup of at least 15 minutes off mains supply. In all this period I have not significantly altered the power demand except for may be a 25% addition due to some additions/changes of the internal components.
> 
> ...


@gta5


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## bssunilreddy (Mar 7, 2018)

sling-shot said:


> In the last 10 years I have gone through 4 UPSs. 1 WeP model, 2 Numeric pieces and lastly 1 V-Guard. The first 2 came with 1 year warranty and V-Guard with 2 year warranty.
> 
> All of them did well during their warranty period. Were providing promised backup of at least 15 minutes off mains supply. In all this period I have not significantly altered the power demand except for may be a 25% addition due to some additions/changes of the internal components.
> 
> ...


If the Exide Battery which you bought is rated at 12v,7ah= 84 volt amp hour capacity and if your V-Guard battery came with higher capacity battery then normally the drain will be more.


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## sling-shot (Mar 7, 2018)

bssunilreddy said:


> If the Exide Battery which you bought is rated at 12v,7ah= 84 volt amp hour capacity and if your V-Guard battery came with higher capacity battery then normally the drain will be more.


I had the first replacement done by V-Guard technician himself who installed the replacement Exide battery and also gave me the warranty certificate that came with it. He said V-Guard itself provides only 6 month warranty but if I take the battery to Exide myself with the certificate I will get a full year coverage in case of need. 

Unfortunately for me when I finally managed to do it, it was beyond one year and I had to buy a new battery. The new one was alright for 6 months or so but then started degrading again.

I will have to open the case and check the battery capacity.


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## whitestar_999 (Mar 7, 2018)

Best option seems to be getting a pure sine wave home inverter & any decent ups so ups role only is to add an extra layer/2nd backup option in case of power cut.


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## sling-shot (Mar 7, 2018)

whitestar_999 said:


> Best option seems to be getting a pure sine wave home inverter & any decent ups so ups role only is to add an extra layer/2nd backup option in case of power cut.


I have a sine wave inverter. But it won't be able to keep up with the demand of the whole house for much long. Sine wave inverters don't cause noticeable change in fan noise hence easy to forget that one is on inverter mode. 

I keep the inverter in manual mode so that I can keep power draw to the minimum when depending on it. 

If there is a power loss, I would rather have the fan running and light on


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## bssunilreddy (Mar 7, 2018)

sling-shot said:


> I had the first replacement done by V-Guard technician himself who installed the replacement Exide battery and also gave me the warranty certificate that came with it. He said V-Guard itself provides only 6 month warranty but if I take the battery to Exide myself with the certificate I will get a full year coverage in case of need.
> 
> Unfortunately for me when I finally managed to do it, it was beyond one year and I had to buy a new battery. The new one was alright for 6 months or so but then started degrading again.
> 
> I will have to open the case and check the battery capacity.


1st of all check the battery V, ah rating of your old V-Guard original battery and compare it with your present Exide battery. If the V-Guard battery has higher rating than Exide then battery fault doesn't exist. If both the batteries have the same rating then Exide battery is at fault.
If the Exide battery has lower rating than V-Guard original battery, due to frequent charging & discharging, the battery life gets decreased.
Just check and confirm here once!


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## whitestar_999 (Mar 7, 2018)

You can just add more batteries to Inverter then to increase backup time,only restriction being total wattage of devices(aka 1.5kw inverter with usual batteries give 3-4 hours of backup while increasing batteries will give 5-6 hours of backup but total connected load can not cross 1.5kw).


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## sling-shot (Mar 7, 2018)

bssunilreddy said:


> 1st of all check the battery V, ah rating of your old V-Guard original battery and compare it with your present Exide battery. If the V-Guard battery has higher rating than Exide then battery fault doesn't exist. If both the batteries have the same rating then Exide battery is at fault.
> If the Exide battery has lower rating than V-Guard original battery, due to frequent charging & discharging, the battery life gets decreased.
> Just check and confirm here once!


I will do that but I need more time. 

Also please note that this has happened across 3 different manufacturers and in all cases the replacement was done by their own authorised technician. If they are all indeed replacing with a lower spec battery, wouldn't that be an intentional fraud like how Apple crippled their phones with updates?


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## sling-shot (Mar 7, 2018)

whitestar_999 said:


> You can just add more batteries to Inverter then to increase backup time,only restriction being total wattage of devices(aka 1.5kw inverter with usual batteries give 3-4 hours of backup while increasing batteries will give 5-6 hours of backup but total connected load can not cross 1.5kw).


The additional battery would have to be placed somewhere outside the case. Wiring would be exposed too.


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## gta5 (Mar 7, 2018)

1) is your UPS located in hot location ? 

2) what is your usage pattern ? .. when power goes off .. are  you using your UPS to it's maximum until it can no longer provide backup everytime ? how frequent is this ?


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## sling-shot (Mar 7, 2018)

1. I am in a moderate climate zone, coastal Kerala.

2. I generally use UPS only to safely shutdown but my area happens to have a lot of 1 minute power outages that randomly go to 10 minutes and sometimes 30 minutes or more. Nobody can guess when and where. So I sometimes need to wait out the 10 minutes to see if the power supply resumes before deciding to shutdown for good because if it is not back in that time, it is unlikely to come back any time soon.


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## gta5 (Mar 8, 2018)

sling-shot said:


> 1 I am in a moderate climate zone, coastal Kerala
> 
> 2. I generally use UPS only to safely shutdown but my area happens to have a lot of 1 minute power outages that randomly go to 10 minutes and sometimes 30 minutes or more. Nobody can guess when and where. So I sometimes need to wait out the 10 minutes to see if the power supply resumes before deciding to shutdown for good because if it is not back in that time, it is unlikely to come back any time soon.




 i mean , under the table, in closed space where airflow can't reach from ceiling fan, cooler etc ..

First confirm that manufacturing date of battery was not old when your battery was replaced ( check battery if it has manufacturing date and match it with your bill/certificate date.. quite possible that you receive some old lying stock of battery,   )

if not above then with good quality battery i think it is mainly due to usage pattern..

Afaik .. lots of frequent discharge of even 1-2 minute is probably not letting your battery reach full charge capacity as these take long time  to fully charge, especially after that 10-12 minutes deep discharge .. with these batteries you have to keep them charged near fully capacity for long life  , if you don't charge them full often  , you will loose battery capacity fast.. 

and do you also switch off UPS  switch when going to sleep at night / not using computer for long period  ? 

has this type of usage pattern/increased changed over time..


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## sling-shot (Mar 8, 2018)

It is in an open space with good ventilation. 

There are fluctuations with the voltage. 

I will have to try not using the computer for a full day while the UPS charges and see what happens.


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