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Speaker 2: This is a battery box I got from red Odo
Speaker 2: sometime back, and it's neat. It's similar in style to
Speaker 2: the auto dunk box that I did a review on
Speaker 2: one from Amazon a while back, which I think the
Speaker 2: price on that one's dropped also, although I think this
Speaker 2: one's cheaper, but there's a reason this one's cheaper. The
Speaker 2: ports on it are not great, and I've sent this
Speaker 2: information to red Odo and I think they've updated the
Speaker 2: ports on the later ones, although I looked on Amazon
Speaker 2: today and maybe not. I'm not sure. But anyway, this one,
Speaker 2: unlike the Auto dunk botch has box has these latches
Speaker 2: on the side that hold hold the lid down so
Speaker 2: you can kind of hold it like that. Now you
Speaker 2: get a lot of weight in it, and it might
Speaker 2: not be enough. It still has a strap that goes
Speaker 2: around it, but the auto dunk has the strap and
Speaker 2: nothing else. Every time you pick it up, it feels
Speaker 2: like the lid moves a little bit. So those extra
Speaker 2: latches on the side, I really think is a good idea.
Speaker 2: But what I don't like about this box is it
Speaker 2: came with two ports right here that ared cigarette lader
Speaker 2: style ports. I took this one out. It had one
Speaker 2: there and the same one there. It has a port
Speaker 2: here for USB A and USB C, and it says
Speaker 2: right there. On the USBA it says QC three dot
Speaker 2: zho and on the USBC it says QC four DA
Speaker 2: Do what other world is QC fourdado. That's not what
Speaker 2: we call it. We call it PD. I think, you
Speaker 2: know what, Maybe it's not a power distribution USBC port.
Speaker 2: I don't know, okay. And then it comes with a
Speaker 2: switch to switch everything on right here, And it comes
Speaker 2: with a power meter right here, and there's nothing at
Speaker 2: all on this side. Underneath it here you've got a
Speaker 2: power positive pretty good sized cable. Maybe I don't know.
Speaker 2: I'm guessing a six or eight gauge, probably eight gauge
Speaker 2: right there, pay positive and negative. Nothing over here on
Speaker 2: the negative side at all, and then the positive side
Speaker 2: is wired up with basically what feels to me like
Speaker 2: twelve gauge wire. So there's no power poles in it,
Speaker 2: there's no shunt in it, there's no solar charge controller
Speaker 2: in it. There's a lot of wasted space over here.
Speaker 2: I could put two more sockets here, two USB sockets
Speaker 2: and two power pole sockets or whatever. I could put
Speaker 2: another a better, larger meter up here if I wanted
Speaker 2: to something like that. And so it's a large box
Speaker 2: with a lot of wasted space in my opinion, So
Speaker 2: what am I gonna do. I'm gonna hack it up,
Speaker 2: That's what I'm gonna do. So I'm gonna change out
Speaker 2: some ports and put some power poles in it, and
Speaker 2: put a couple of other things in it. And today I'm
Speaker 2: not gonna add a solar charge controller, although I probably
Speaker 2: will later. In fact, I might add it to the
Speaker 2: top right there. I haven't decided yet. We're gonna hack
Speaker 2: it up, and I'm gonna show you what i'm gonna do.
Speaker 2: I've done some modifications to this box, as I was
Speaker 2: talking about. First off, there's no fuses in here. And
Speaker 2: some of the more expensive and better built box will
Speaker 2: have like a fuse block or inline fuses perhaps something
Speaker 2: like that. There's no fuses in this box at all,
Speaker 2: So rather than trying to install a fuse box or
Speaker 2: something extravagant, I got one of these BoJack fuses and
Speaker 2: you can get these different current ratings. This is a
Speaker 2: fifty amp fuse. It just obviously attaches right here to
Speaker 2: the positive port. You could put one on the negative
Speaker 2: port too, I guess if you wanted to, And then
Speaker 2: you tie all your peripherals down to this post and
Speaker 2: it acts as a fuse in between whatever you tie
Speaker 2: to the battery. Kind of tight to get on there,
Speaker 2: but there we go. So whatever you tie to the
Speaker 2: bat he goes here, and then the negative obviously goes
Speaker 2: over there. So this will fuse everything in the box.
Speaker 2: Rather than having an inline fuse for the posts or
Speaker 2: for the power poles or something like that, this will
Speaker 2: fuse everything in the box as long as you tie
Speaker 2: it to this side and not this side.
Speaker 1: So that's my fusing system for now.
Speaker 2: We'll see how that works. Got to make sure you
Speaker 2: put it and you can turn it three hundred and
Speaker 2: sixty degrees on this post. I put it right there
Speaker 2: so that it wouldn't interfere with what's what's up here.
Speaker 2: So since the last the first part of the video,
Speaker 2: I've added these power poles. I got these off of eBay.
Speaker 2: They are three D printed like this, and they I
Speaker 2: got one set that came with the power poles themselves,
Speaker 2: and then I got like four sets that were just
Speaker 2: kind of blank like this. I have a ton of
Speaker 2: power pools. I didn't really need any. I was trying
Speaker 2: to try two or three different varieties and see what,
Speaker 2: you know, which ones I like the best.
Speaker 1: These are fine.
Speaker 2: I got these also, and these sit kind of flush
Speaker 2: mount like, they're still round in the back, so you'd
Speaker 2: still drill a round hole. I used my step down
Speaker 2: bit on my drill to drill the two holes for
Speaker 2: this one, so you can do various sizes with that bit,
Speaker 2: so I could drill holes with that and then flush mount.
Speaker 2: And then these wouldn't be flush mount. They would they
Speaker 2: have a lip that sticks off of them like that.
Speaker 2: But these do too. Honestly, same thing, but these are
Speaker 2: just kind of like a different form factor or whatnot.
Speaker 2: I like the I did not use these on this build,
Speaker 2: but I think I'm going to on a future build
Speaker 2: on another box. I like these because they come with
Speaker 2: they're kind of flexible back here. These are three D
Speaker 2: printed also, so you can fit the power poles in
Speaker 2: them pretty easily. But then they come with these little pin,
Speaker 2: these little screw pins Hack's headed screw pins that go
Speaker 2: in the top right there, and those go between your
Speaker 2: power poles like this right here. You put this inside
Speaker 2: of here, and there's this tiny little hole right there,
Speaker 2: and this will go betwe clean it like that, and
Speaker 2: then of course this will be inside the case at
Speaker 2: the time. This goes in the case like that like that.
Speaker 2: This pin right here goes down through the top here,
Speaker 2: and it holds the power pole in place so that
Speaker 2: when you plug something into it like that, it doesn't
Speaker 2: push it out the back. So these did not come
Speaker 2: with any such pin. There was one again, there was
Speaker 2: one that I got, and I think it was this one.
Speaker 2: Here's no, it's this one here. It's one of these.
Speaker 2: The same manufacturer makes these. These didn't come with power poles.
Speaker 2: This came pre assembled and it had a little wooden
Speaker 2: dowel pin that went through it. But then the rest
Speaker 2: of these didn't come with any pins at all, So
Speaker 2: I'm curious to see if you guys have ever built
Speaker 2: anything like this. I'm curious to see what pins you're
Speaker 2: using to go through these casings to hold the power
Speaker 2: poles in place. I figure I go up to Low's
Speaker 2: or home depot and get some kind of like really
Speaker 2: small roll pin or something like that and push it
Speaker 2: through there. But I'm wondering if there's a better option available.
Speaker 2: The video today is sponsored by red Odo Power, who
Speaker 2: makes this box. They have a brand new twelve one
Speaker 2: hundred and forty amp hour bluetooth battery. It's a group
Speaker 2: thirty one sized battery with forty percent more capacity than
Speaker 2: their one hundred amp power battery, and during the month
Speaker 2: of November of twenty twenty four, they have their Black
Speaker 2: Friday Sale going from November first to the eighteenth for
Speaker 2: an exclusive discount of six percent sidewide and a free
Speaker 2: gift with purchases over five hundred dollars plus. On their
Speaker 2: Black Friday Sale from November nineteenth to December third, they'll
Speaker 2: have an even bigger discount with the same free gift
Speaker 2: with purchases over five hundred dollars. So I saw two
Speaker 2: double power pulse sets. Oh yeah, one more thing. I
Speaker 2: have this power Works one. These you can buy fully
Speaker 2: assembled and whatnot. And these have a screw type connector
Speaker 2: that goes in the back that holds them from the
Speaker 2: backside that have this nut that goes around These don't
Speaker 2: have a nut or anything that goes around them. But
Speaker 2: I drilled the hole just barely enough to kind of
Speaker 2: press it through there, and right now that seems like
Speaker 2: they're fitting just fine. So we'll see how well that
Speaker 2: holds up.
Speaker 1: But I got those too.
Speaker 2: But these Powerworks ones are great, but they're more expensive
Speaker 2: than all these other ones, so I was trying to
Speaker 2: see what the best option was for that. So anyway,
Speaker 2: I installed two of the doubles, and that's on the
Speaker 2: side here. This was a blank side that didn't have
Speaker 2: anything at all. And then I removed this voltage meter
Speaker 2: and was gonna put one of these one of these
Speaker 2: on the top. But it didn't really fit very well.
Speaker 2: I didn't feel like it was I don't know, I
Speaker 2: just I didn't feel like it. It looked kind of
Speaker 2: weird and it sunk down in there a little bit
Speaker 2: too far. Because this is this hole is actually bigger
Speaker 2: than this voltage meter. So I went ahead and just
Speaker 2: put the voltage meter back in This section right here
Speaker 2: had two of these twelve volt cigarette laighter adapter plugs.
Speaker 2: I took one out and I installed a double USBCPD
Speaker 2: plus QC three point zero port. This is stock. This
Speaker 2: one is stock. This is a sixty five widely is
Speaker 2: that one stock? I actually might have traded that out too,
Speaker 2: because I think it had a it might've had a
Speaker 2: smaller one than that. I can't remember right now if
Speaker 2: I traded that one out or not, but I know
Speaker 2: I traded this one out because there were two of
Speaker 2: these in here, So I increased my number of USBA
Speaker 2: and USB B or USB C ports. So I've got
Speaker 2: that there, and then you could trade that out and
Speaker 2: get rid of that whole thing if you wanted to.
Speaker 2: I kept it because I got a couple of things
Speaker 2: with cigarette lighter adapters on it, so I figured I'd
Speaker 2: just leave it there because I've already got it. And
Speaker 2: then this right here is the underside, and of course
Speaker 2: this goes to the battery, and this goes to the battery.
Speaker 2: Now these and I went back and forth on what
Speaker 2: to do about these. I could have connected them here
Speaker 2: and then they would have connected, you know, through this
Speaker 2: to the battery and the been fused at the battery
Speaker 2: like that. I decided to go ahead and connect these,
Speaker 2: but I haven't done it yet. Obviously. I got these
Speaker 2: connectors with the built in heat trinket AutoZone connected that on. Oh.
Speaker 2: I bought a new set of trippers because somebody on
Speaker 2: YouTube that I was watching on the Fishing and Stuff channel,
Speaker 2: he recommended these. And these are really cool because you
Speaker 2: can see they have red, blue and yellow for the
Speaker 2: larger side, the larger and smaller sized crimpers. So these
Speaker 2: were incredibly helpful to crimp these on nice and tight
Speaker 2: right there. And then of course they just use the
Speaker 2: heat gun, activate the heat shrink on those and make
Speaker 2: them nice and tight like that, installing the housings first
Speaker 2: and then pressing the Yeah see there's not a pin
Speaker 2: in that one, so I can kind of pull it
Speaker 2: out of there like that. I found a nail that
Speaker 2: would fit in there, and it fits in there, but
Speaker 2: it keeps falling out because it's not very tight. So
Speaker 2: again i'd like to know what kind of pens people
Speaker 2: are using. But I made this pressing the wire after
Speaker 2: crimping the powerful connector onto it and pressing the wire
Speaker 2: into the housing was easy after you mount the housing
Speaker 2: in the box, so that kind of held it all
Speaker 2: in place. So what I'm gonna do is, I'm going
Speaker 2: to take this main wire on both sides and I'm
Speaker 2: going to take these four red wires to the four
Speaker 2: power poles, four red power poles, and I'm gonna put
Speaker 2: them all on this port right here, and I'm gonna
Speaker 2: do the same with the black black all on this
Speaker 2: port right here. So that will enable me to have
Speaker 2: I think the most amount of current up to fifty amps. Really,
Speaker 2: because this is a fifty amp fuse, that will enable
Speaker 2: me to pull the most amount of current from these
Speaker 2: that I can. I got this I Greeley wire. This
Speaker 2: is a oxygen free, pure copper wire. I had some
Speaker 2: ironclad copper wire kind of leftover from something else I did.
Speaker 2: I decided to scrap that and get some good wire
Speaker 2: because I've been a lot of the videos I've been
Speaker 2: watching on YouTube, and I talked to Mike Kate Emberdee
Speaker 2: and he was like, yeah, the pure copper wire is
Speaker 2: the best stuff to do, and that's what will Prowse
Speaker 2: says as well. And I just wanted to. I didn't.
Speaker 2: You may not need that high quality wire for a
Speaker 2: project like this, but this is my first one hundred
Speaker 2: amp hour battery box with a fifty amp fuse, So
Speaker 2: in theory, I could be pulling some amps through it,
Speaker 2: charging stuff for USB, a radio key down, doing ftaight
Speaker 2: at the same time, and all that's running. So I
Speaker 2: decided to just wire this directly to the battery or
Speaker 2: that's how it will be here in a second, and
Speaker 2: then that'll give me the best option rather than going
Speaker 2: through a bunch of connectors that might decrease the current
Speaker 2: capacity and not allow me to pull as much current
Speaker 2: at one time. Not that I really think I will
Speaker 2: need that, but this is just how I did it.
Speaker 2: This is the first battery box I've ever hacked and
Speaker 2: quote unquote built by myself, even though I didn't really
Speaker 2: build it. I just kind of like modified it. So
Speaker 2: future projects I might change my mind, but that's how
Speaker 2: we're doing this one. Okay, got everything wired up, got
Speaker 2: it put together. You can see we've got thirteen point
Speaker 2: three volts. That's another reason to wire these directly to
Speaker 2: the battery. They're not regulated by this switch, which I
Speaker 2: don't know what the voltage or ampage rating on this
Speaker 2: switches that came with the box. This switch right here
Speaker 2: in this meter, but I didn't want to be restricted
Speaker 2: buy them. Presumably my power poles are going to be
Speaker 2: pulling more current than USB will. But you can see
Speaker 2: that turns on right there, so we're good. This one
Speaker 2: turns on here, Oh it was on.
Speaker 1: Yep, there we go.
Speaker 2: Turn those both off. Okay, good, those are good there.
Speaker 2: Now let's test and see how well my wiring may
Speaker 2: or may not work to the power poles. I'm going
Speaker 2: to take my MPPT solar charge controller here and plug
Speaker 2: it in to one of the power poles. Now there's
Speaker 2: one of these that I didn't plug up because I
Speaker 2: ran out of ring terminals. But I'm just gonna put
Speaker 2: this in here like that and then yep, okay, it's working.
Speaker 2: It's not got a solar panel hoop to it. I
Speaker 2: just wanted to see if it would light up, and
Speaker 2: of course it does E one. Yeah, that means actually
Speaker 2: I need to change it to Life four. There we go.
Speaker 1: There we go.
Speaker 2: Okay, just like that. Yeah, it's not gonna do anything
Speaker 2: right now because it's not got any solar panels on it,
Speaker 2: but plugging that in, Okay, that's probably the one that
Speaker 2: doesn't have connections. There's that one's good, okay, And then
Speaker 2: this is the one without the pin, and it I
Speaker 2: gotta get. You see how it's pushed back in there.
Speaker 2: That's why you want to put the pin in between,
Speaker 2: but through the casing and through the powerful connectors so
Speaker 2: they don't push back in like that. So I'm have
Speaker 2: to take that one off and find out what kind
Speaker 2: of pin goes through them, because these three D printed
Speaker 2: connectors did not come with a pin, so I need
Speaker 2: some sort of pin to go through there, some roll
Speaker 2: pin or like I said, that one had a woulden
Speaker 2: the one that this one came with the inserts already
Speaker 2: in here and it I took the pin out to
Speaker 2: look at it, and it had a wooden dowel in it.
Speaker 2: I guess that's like a toothpick almost, So maybe a
Speaker 2: toothpick would work.
Speaker 1: I don't know.
Speaker 2: Might check that out and see. But that is the
Speaker 2: hack of the red Odo battery box. Again. Red Odo
Speaker 2: is sponsoring this video. Ham Radio will save you a
Speaker 2: six percent discount on everything on their website, and I'm
Speaker 2: pretty sure that's a permanent code They said they were
Speaker 2: going to leave that code, but I think they have
Speaker 2: an eight percent discount going on their website right now
Speaker 2: for Black Friday, so check the links in the description below.
Speaker 2: Check out their website and which is also linked below,
Speaker 2: and check out all the different sales they're having during
Speaker 2: the month of November. This will not be the last
Speaker 2: red Odo battery video that I make. I've got at
Speaker 2: least two more planned, so we're going to see how
Speaker 2: well that goes. Let me know if you have one
Speaker 2: of their batteries, which you think about it, and if
Speaker 2: you have any suggestions on this battery box modification, this
Speaker 2: hack for this battery box, put them in the comment section.
Speaker 2: Blow Thanks a lot, guys,