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Lead-acid battery vs. concrete. Which is heavier per sq. ...

B

Brad Buchanan

Member
Morning folks.

I have a very old electric forklift that has a
huge inoperative battery. I have been operating
it with a couple of 12 volt auto batteries perched
on top of the battery housing.

I did some investigating and found that the
battery is composed of 12 2 volt cells 6" x 7" x
24" encased in plastic housings.

I am thinking about pulling all the cells out of
the housing which is 1/4" steel, filling it with
concrete to about a foot from the top and
installing 4 6 volt golf car batteries.

The battery serves as ballast for the truck and I
was wondering if the concrete would weigh as much
as the removed cells.

Thanks in advance for the help and comments.

Brad
 
Concrete weighs about 150 lbs square ft.

You could look up the specs on the forklift battery, or weigh one of the golf cart batteries, figure the size, get a rough estimate of the weight.
 
(quoted from post at 10:47:54 07/26/14) Morning folks.

I have a very old electric forklift that has a
huge inoperative battery. I have been operating
it with a couple of 12 volt auto batteries perched
on top of the battery housing.

I did some investigating and found that the
battery is composed of 12 2 volt cells 6" x 7" x
24" encased in plastic housings.

I am thinking about pulling all the cells out of
the housing which is 1/4" steel, filling it with
concrete to about a foot from the top and
installing 4 6 volt golf car batteries.

The battery serves as ballast for the truck and I
was wondering if the concrete would weigh as much
as the removed cells.

Thanks in advance for the help and comments.

Brad
Click to expand...

The thing is it's solid concrete with a SG of approx 2.4 vs. lead which is not solid. A battery is acid which has a SG of just over 1 and rubber/plastic. Solid lead has a SG of 11.35
 
their should be a tag on the side of the battery with the weight of the battery or stamped right on the side in the steal.
Ypop
 
Lets do some quick math.
1 cell 6x7x24= 1008 cu. in.
1 cu. ft.= 1728 cu. in.
1 cu.ft concrete approx 150 lbs
150/1728= .087 lbs per cu. in.
1008x.087= 87.7 lbs concrete per cell
If you can pull and weigh one cell you should be able to compare weights.
HTH Jf
 
I would say just do it. Line battery case with cardboard in case you want to use battery case again.

Brother-in-law has a very large fork lift for his boat storage, stores one boat over another boat.

His fork lift has all kinds of suit case weights hanging off the back for ballast.

You can always figure out a way to add more ballast if needed.

I made a ballast weight for neighbor's massey. He lifts 1100 # bales of hay, so I made him 1100# ballast for his 3 pt out of a 55 gallon drum filled with concrete. Works great. Happy neighbor.
George
 
Thanks for all the great replies!

Looks like the concrete will weigh about 2/3 as much as the cells which will be fine for what I do with the truck.

I drained all the acid out of the cells and rinsed them out. The local scrap guy offered .12 per pound and after checking I think that is a way lowball price for these.

The cells weigh about 110 lbs each and there are 12 of them.

Brad
 
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