SR to ER battery swap DIY project

[Ynnhojnorood]

At this point we are talking about an F150 that weighs as much as an F350. The Lightning is already a ton over an ICE F150. Tom's video about local street weight limits brings EVs into a new light. Those Chevy, GMC and Hummer vehicles are over 4 tons. I think the F150 nailed it by keeping it close to 3 tons with a bit less range. All that extra weight for an extra few miles? Did you see the Hummer? It's like the old GM Hummers as far as inefficiency.

I’m now in a Sierra EV (Max) and get the same mi/kwh as I did in the lightning. I can’t imagine the Hummer is that much worse.

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[Bestword57]

Rolled the dice on this ER battery on eBay. Anyone else out there do this yet? Wish me luck boys and girls.

I rebuilt the battery on my 2006 Prius, but a couple others at the time had blazed down that trail before me.

My hat's off to you, Sir! We are all rooting for you.

 

[windydrew]

Sorry, I replied before seeing your reply!
But yeah, those DIY battery storage systems you're lucky to get above 5kwh out of any wall mount battery. Imagine having 10-20 times that?!?

You could but it'd be alot of reconfiguring of the cells in the SR pack to get it to your existing solar battery bank voltages along with a custom BMS. At that point, you're just harvesting cells. It would however be nice if I could figure out how to repurpose the onboard level 2 charger and 2 phase inverter... the options would open up quite a bit...

There are HV battery inverters now, as I have used a Nissan Leaf battery for home backup. The Lightning battery would be great!

 

[kdkool]

Finally got some free time and amazing weather for the swap.

The swap went went amazingly smoothly.

You do need to lift the vehicle to get about 16" of clearance to clear the battery. You will also need to add additional clearance for the dolly height.

Underneath the truck, there is a front cover held in by (4) 13mm screws. The rear cover is held in by (4) 21mm screws. Once the cover is removed, there are the connectors that need to be disconnected and the 2 coolant hoses. Take all the 8mm bolts off and then disconnect the harnesses. I started with the one on the passenger side first and disconnected the driver side one last. In the rear of the battery, there is a small single ground strap that needs to be disconnected. Remove the coolant hoses and make sure you use to something to catch it so it's not all over the floor / ground. I used (3) low profile jacks (2 to the front and one towards the rear) to push the battery up before removing the 8 main bolts (1-1/4"). With the bolts removed, I lowered it onto (2) harbor freight car dollies. You will definitely need some muscles to move the battery around if you don't have a smooth floor. I had a buddy use some tow straps to pull the battery around once it was lowered. Then we did the reverse with the ER battery. The hardest thing about the whole swap for me was aligning the battery to back into the chassis. Once that was done, I did everything else in reverse. I picked up some motorcraft yellow coolant and filled it back up.

Turned the truck on and it immediately recognized the extra range. Drove it around for a few miles and added some more coolant. No programming or errors. It just worked.

I'll post some pictures later but I'm astonished that it just worked without any coding or programming.

 

[molsonmatt]

Finally got some free time and amazing weather for the swap.

The swap went went amazingly smoothly.

You do need to lift the vehicle to get about 16" of clearance to clear the battery. You will also need to add additional clearance for the dolly height.

Underneath the truck, there is a front cover held in by (4) 13mm screws. The rear cover is held in by (4) 21mm screws. Once the cover is removed, there are the connectors that need to be disconnected and the 2 coolant hoses. Take all the 8mm bolts off and then disconnect the harnesses. I started with the one on the passenger side first and disconnected the driver side one last. In the rear of the battery, there is a small single ground strap that needs to be disconnected. Remove the coolant hoses and make sure you use to something to catch it so it's not all over the floor / ground. I used (3) low profile jacks (2 to the front and one towards the rear) to push the battery up before removing the 8 main bolts (1-1/4"). With the bolts removed, I lowered it onto (2) harbor freight car dollies. You will definitely need some muscles to move the battery around if you don't have a smooth floor. I had a buddy use some tow straps to pull the battery around once it was lowered. Then we did the reverse with the ER battery. The hardest thing about the whole swap for me was aligning the battery to back into the chassis. Once that was done, I did everything else in reverse. I picked up some motorcraft yellow coolant and filled it back up.

Turned the truck on and it immediately recognized the extra range. Drove it around for a few miles and added some more coolant. No programming or errors. It just worked.

I'll post some pictures later but I'm astonished that it just worked without any coding or programming.

This is amazing and impressive that you even attempted it. I’m surprised at how “easy” it was. What’s your plan with the old battery?

 

[Mpi]

Amazing

 

[NW Ontario Ford Lightning]

Finally got some free time and amazing weather for the swap.

The swap went went amazingly smoothly.

You do need to lift the vehicle to get about 16" of clearance to clear the battery. You will also need to add additional clearance for the dolly height.

Underneath the truck, there is a front cover held in by (4) 13mm screws. The rear cover is held in by (4) 21mm screws. Once the cover is removed, there are the connectors that need to be disconnected and the 2 coolant hoses. Take all the 8mm bolts off and then disconnect the harnesses. I started with the one on the passenger side first and disconnected the driver side one last. In the rear of the battery, there is a small single ground strap that needs to be disconnected. Remove the coolant hoses and make sure you use to something to catch it so it's not all over the floor / ground. I used (3) low profile jacks (2 to the front and one towards the rear) to push the battery up before removing the 8 main bolts (1-1/4"). With the bolts removed, I lowered it onto (2) harbor freight car dollies. You will definitely need some muscles to move the battery around if you don't have a smooth floor. I had a buddy use some tow straps to pull the battery around once it was lowered. Then we did the reverse with the ER battery. The hardest thing about the whole swap for me was aligning the battery to back into the chassis. Once that was done, I did everything else in reverse. I picked up some motorcraft yellow coolant and filled it back up.

Turned the truck on and it immediately recognized the extra range. Drove it around for a few miles and added some more coolant. No programming or errors. It just worked.

I'll post some pictures later but I'm astonished that it just worked without any coding or programming.

WOW!
Pretty interesting to know...tempting to close a deal on a salvaged ER pack.
Can you post again in a few weeks how it is all going - and if the truck now charges like an ER vs the SR charging speeds from before the swap.

 

[RobiWan]

Amazing! Very cool that you were able to do this. Thank you for sharing the progress.

 

[PreservedSwine]

Wow- just plug and play- no messing with forescan?

 

[TaxmanHog]

WOW!
Pretty interesting to know...tempting to close a deal on a salvaged ER pack.
Can you post again in a few weeks how it is all going - and if the truck now charges like an ER vs the SR charging speeds from before the swap.

SR's only have the front OBCC, it'll still charge AC 48 amps, it will be interesting to see how DCFC goes!

 

[RLXXI]

Sounds to me like Ford put some forethought into being able to replace the batteries at some point. This is fantastic news and cements a possible aftermarket for part availability.

 

[Jesse-Infotainment]

Keep an eye on charging. There are a few differences in Strategy between ER and SR. Hard to really know for sure because the ER in 22-23 had Dual OBC and SR had one. PCM, BECM had different strategy between the two.

As was stated the SR only had one On Board charger in 22-23.. the SR only had one.

 

[kdkool]

Keep an eye on charging. There are a few differences in Strategy between ER and SR. Hard to really know for sure because the ER in 22-23 had Dual OBC and SR had one. PCM, BECM had different strategy between the two.

As was stated the SR only had one On Board charger in 22-23.. the SR only had one.

Yeah I don't have the 80a home charger so it should not impact me. Charges at my normal 9-10kW rate.

 

[kdkool]

SR's only have the front OBCC, it'll still charge AC 48 amps, it will be interesting to see how DCFC goes!

I don't see why DC fast charging would change. It bypasses the onboard AC charger(s). I've only ever DC fast charged twice and that was to test the Tesla adapter and the electrify america app.

 

[kdkool]

This is amazing and impressive that you even attempted it. I’m surprised at how “easy” it was. What’s your plan with the old battery?

Not sure yet what I'm going to do with the old battery yet. I may make a science project out of it.

That's the onboard chargers, and inverter. Now to setup microcontroller / canbus controller to see if I can manage to get these modules running standalone for my camper.

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