Posted by: @transparent

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Posted by: @batpred

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But if you take a look at the current price of 15kwh batteries available from UK warehouses from ebay (I am not even considering aliexpress..), the ROI seems negative. 

...  from Seplos or Fogstar.

What Fogstar enclosure?

Seplos make the enclosure and the BMS, Fogstar bulk imports them and applies its "markup" (more like a multiplier). By the way, Seplos is also sold by other importers..

So Fogstar ship the cells and enclosure without instructions for poor folk to assemble.

By the way, option 2 or 3 on their support desk routes you to a special line to handle returns. 

The other result of this model is that as soon as you fall onto the Fogstar website and accept cookies, you get 10k ads on every page from them! It mirrors on the clickbait sites. Even then, I suspect they must be able to give away a lot of freebies to supporters and make an obscene profit. 

Don't forget to factor in the price of burning down your House - Garage - Shed *delete as appropriate.

Prices are falling, no doubt - but to put such potential energy in a unknown piece of kit is above the minimal risk...

Posted by: @ggw

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Don't forget to factor in the price of burning down your House - Garage - Shed *delete as appropriate.

Ah, hopefully you checked that your insurance will cover your risk of fire. When you assembled a battery kit with a mix of youtube videos and phone calls? 🙂 

Posted by: @bash

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@batpred 

So you've bought some then?

Please read above, I was really unfortunate and ill advised to buy via Fogstar. They actually promised to replace the BMS and nothing happened. Not only do they make obscene margins and profits, they do not follow through on their promises. That's customer support for you, hopefully they will be around for the warranty

I know it is not usual for people to come here and say they made a bad decision. At least one learns more from mistakes than getting it right first time. I should have followed my instinct when I saw the Fogstar ads filling my screens. 

My main comfort is that I made a great decision with the Solis inverter. Currently I am letting their AI take care of learning how to manage the battery...

Posted by: @batpred

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What Fogstar enclosure?

Fogstar released their own range of storage battery enclosures a couple of years ago.

They are available as a bare steel box without internal cabling and connectors
or as a complete kit with a high quality Pace BMS

Depending on availability, they have also supplied DIY kits for which you source your own LiFePO4 cells.
There is a long discussion topic on the Fogstar upright DIY case here on this forum which is what you're now adding to!

But they won't supply the Pace BMS as a separate item because it would oppose their own product range.

Posted by: @batpred

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Anyway, the products are there. The one below is available for £1000 at https:// www.ebay.co.uk/itm/127401623029

I think you might like to read some of the online reviews of Datou Boss equipment before using them for price comparison.

Look at this discussion on the DIY Solar site.

The mixed responses indicate that Datou Boss are changing what's inside their cases, but keeping the spec the same.

There also seems to be a reseller in Eastern Europe who acquired a batch of these units and then removed the higher-quality BYD cells which command a good price when sold separately.
The Datou Boss cases were then fitted with lower-quality cells. Those have short life expectancy.

Note how the intial reviews tend to be favourable,
but later purchasers are reporting failures and warranty issues.

I'd be happier buying a Datou Boss battery via AliExpress than on ebay.
AliExpress have their own customer complaints and returns process, which works even if the original seller stops trading.

@batpred 

Well you must be one of the very few dissatisfied Fogstar customers.

I had plenty of contact with their customer support having ordered 3 packs from them.

One case had a slight manufacturing defect and they immediately sent me out a replacement next day and only required a return of the defect one a few weeks later.

I also spent some time over a few months discussing the balancing issues mentioned previously. They agreed to ship in some additional parts from China for me at my request with no quibbles.

There is a reason why they are comfortably the most knowledgeable, respected and largest UK seller of home batteries.

Posted by: @transparent

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Posted by: @batpred

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What Fogstar enclosure?

Fogstar released their own range of storage battery enclosures a couple of years ago.

I see they label it Fogstar.. but the only Fogstar are the instructions and they are defective. 

We also know that they advertise very heavily, which is typical of companies that do not sell good products. What else could justify them overlooking quality requirements?

I know they never offered to take back what they supplied. This was even when they saw their instructions were leading to months to build a battery.. Any reputable distributor (as they do not manufacture, they are not more than that) would be keen to accept a return to correct their instructions..

They are clever, you can only keep inflated prices if you make sure the image of any competitors is tarnished. 

Posted by: @transparent

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There is a long discussion topic on the Fogstar upright DIY case here on this forum which is what you're now adding to!

Fogstar trust their cookie based online marketing so much that they can keep supplying defective products or defective instructions. 

Posted by: @bash

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I had plenty of contact with their customer support having ordered 3 packs from them.

Thank you for sharing. To be honest, I would expect to have very little contact with customer support in the 2nd or 3rd purchase of the same product!

But it makes sense, Fogstar do not improve their process, so quality issues linger. 

All I can say is when I add to my energy storage, it will not have any Fogstar label. 

Posted by: @transparent

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Posted by: @batpred

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Anyway, the products are there. The one below is available for £1000 at https:// www.ebay.co.uk/itm/127401623029

I think you might like to read some of the online reviews of Datou Boss equipment before using them for price comparison.

Look at this discussion on the DIY Solar site.

The discussion on the Solar site is not dissimilar from the one on this thread about Fogstar. But there, most people are happy with the product and one buyer has a negative view. But I do not get as many details of what may have been wrong as what I posted here. I had a continuous stream of errors and lack to follow on their promises.  

Posted by: @transparent

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I'd be happier buying a Datou Boss battery via AliExpress than on ebay.
AliExpress have their own customer complaints and returns process, which works even if the original seller stops trading.

Thank you for sharing. I usually pay with UK credit card and sometimes also via Paypal. So getting refunds for failed products has never been an issue. 

@Batpred

"Thank you for sharing. I usually pay with UK credit card and sometimes also via Paypal. So getting refunds for failed products has never been an issue."

With that being the case, why did you not choose a refund  for your failed Fogstar battery?

Posted by: @bash

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@Batpred

With that being the case, why did you not choose a refund  for your failed Fogstar battery?

A refund was not offered by Fogstar. On a DIY system, as they certainly know, questions would be raised. 

And when talking to Fogstar´s engineer in China, it always seemed the "carrot" of getting the system up and running was very close...

The battery is working. But in hindsight, buying a ready made battery is cheaper and less time consuming. 

I shared plenty of options from ebay.co.uk