Old UPS batteries (APC SUA 1500)... where do you source them?

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StoleMyOwnCar

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I have an APC SUA 1500 that I got off Ebay a good while ago. This is the last battery replacement I got for it (about 4.4 years old now give or take)... 142$ at the time:
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00004Z8GN

The red light is on (though it goes off every now and then for a while) and it starts beeping at me every... eh 8 hours or something. Anyway, as you can see in the Amazon listing, it isn't available with prime shipping. Non-prime options are 190$ give or take, and most of the sellers look a bit sketch. Non-sketch sellers seem to be 200$+

There is some other battery brand (ABC) for cheaper, but last time I bought it, it basically lasted very little time. Non-APC batteries appear to be absolute garbage.

So where do I get one now? At 190-200$ I might as well just switch brands or something... too expensive for a battery without enough guarantee, unless I'm mistaken. Advice? Thanks.
 
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It's just two basic 12V lead-acid batteries glued together with a plastic adapter cap thingy on top. It should be simple enough to get two new good-quality batteries for significantly less and reuse the adapter from the spent pair. I'd bet there's already articles and YouTube videos to do so for that model.
 
I get my batteries on eBay. Quick check reveals plenty of choices in the $70-90 range. That, of course, would require you to leave the walled garden of Lord Bezos, if you can stomach that.
I usually look for sellers where they have relatively high sales volume. Look at sold items in the listing - if they're selling several a day, they must have fresh inventory. The batteries will die over time, such is their nature unfortunately, so you want as fresh a set as you can find.

Getting 3-4 years out of a set is pretty good if you ask me, that seems to be my experience with both OEM batteries that come with the UPS and aftermarket replacements.
 
BlueLineSwinger said:
It's just two basic 12V lead-acid batteries glued together with a plastic adapter cap thingy on top. It should be simple enough to get two new good-quality batteries for significantly less and reuse the adapter from the spent pair. I'd bet there's already articles and YouTube videos to do so for that model.
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You mean generic 12v batteries like these? https://www.amazon.com/12v-sealed-lead-acid-battery/s?k=12v+sealed+lead+acid+battery

I'll try googling around but I could use some recommendations for both brands and size factor... I think some of these would fit in an SUA1000 or SUA 750 but not a 1500.

slavie said:
I get my batteries on eBay. Quick check reveals plenty of choices in the $70-90 range. That, of course, would require you to leave the walled garden of Lord Bezos, if you can stomach that.
I usually look for sellers where they have relatively high sales volume. Look at sold items in the listing - if they're selling several a day, they must have fresh inventory. The batteries will die over time, such is their nature unfortunately, so you want as fresh a set as you can find.
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It has nothing to do with me preferring Amazon. It's just that if it's shipped with Prime shipping and sold directly by Amazon, I view my chances of being ripped off to be considerably lower, and the price is usually better than office suppliers that I've seen.

I've been burned by Ebay multiple times before, so I don't use it terribly often right now... if you could give me some recommendations for sellers you think would be reputable, that would be great.

slavie said:
Getting 3-4 years out of a set is pretty good if you ask me, that seems to be my experience with both OEM batteries that come with the UPS and aftermarket replacements.
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I know, 3-5 years to me is fine. But a bad battery may last like 1 year, and have a one year warranty (if it even has that). Not seeing the official APC brand up on Amazon from a reputable seller just has me at a bit of a loss lately.
 
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StoleMyOwnCar said:
There is some other battery brand (ABC) for cheaper, but last time I bought it, it basically lasted very little time. Non-APC batteries appear to be absolute garbage.
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APC does not make batteries, they simply take OEM batteries and slap their label over them and sell them as their own. If you peel off the sticker on the battery pack, you'll find the original manufacturer label. In the case of these "sandwiched" packs, the labels are usually facing each other inside the pack, so you have to split the batteries apart to see them.

Your "battery" is actually a battery pack made up of two 12 volt 18 amp-hour batteries in series to make 24 volts, with a fuse across one set of terminals. These packs aren't hard to rebuild, you just need to pop the plastic shroud off the tops of the batteries and disconnect the fuse and wiring. You can then split the batteries with a paint scraper if you want to separate them for moving around safely. The adhesive tape holding them together tends to get weak and brittle over time and can suddenly let go if you don't support both batteries when carrying them.

I have a few battery brands I trust, with the top two being Yuasa and Universal Battery. But UltraTech and Power Sonic aren't bad if you don't want to spend big bucks on batteries. To rebuild your pack, you'll need two batteries with screw terminals, here's a few batteries that will work.

Yuasa NP18-12B
UltraTech IM-12189NB
Power Sonic PS-12180NB
UPG UB12180NG
 
So I watched a few videos about how to put these back together like this one:





Then I noticed in one of the comments for disassembly in one of the videos, they note that undoing the fuse is generally safer. That kind of makes sense to me. Hence when rebuilding the battery, would I not be better served putting the harness on first and THEN putting the fuse on? Seems like it would be safer?

GiGaBiTe said:
APC does not make batteries, they simply take OEM batteries and slap their label over them and sell them as their own. If you peel off the sticker on the battery pack, you'll find the original manufacturer label. In the case of these "sandwiched" packs, the labels are usually facing each other inside the pack, so you have to split the batteries apart to see them.
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Well I have no doubts, most computer parts are some OEM thing, but generally I'd like to believe that they do some level of QC on them in order to make sure they work... I sure as heck know that the ABC battery I bought off Amazon didn't work worth a crap... lasted exactly one year so that they could skate the warranty clause...

GiGaBiTe said:
I have a few battery brands I trust, with the top two being Yuasa and Universal Battery. But UltraTech and Power Sonic aren't bad if you don't want to spend big bucks on batteries. To rebuild your pack, you'll need two batteries with screw terminals, here's a few batteries that will work.
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https://www.batterysharks.com/Yuasa-NP18-12B-p/np18-12b_b12-18.htm

So offhand I found this one. Is this supplier reliable? Thanks for all of your information.
 
StoleMyOwnCar said:
Then I noticed in one of the comments for disassembly in one of the videos, they note that undoing the fuse is generally safer. That kind of makes sense to me. Hence when rebuilding the battery, would I not be better served putting the harness on first and THEN putting the fuse on? Seems like it would be safer?
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I've rebuilt so many of them that I just go at whatever comes apart the easiest first. They're SLA batteries so unless you smack a dead short across them with a screwdriver, you'll be fine unless one of the batteries is leaking.

I've never heard of that website and that listing seems fishy. They advertise it being a Yuasa and the image is a Sigmastek? Genuine Yuasa batteries aren't that cheap, my wholesale supplier has Yuasa NP18-12B batteries listed at just under $100 a piece, if they can even get them. There's a national battery shortage due to current world events and whatever comes in goes right out the door as fast as they get it.

Amazon has a listing of a real one, but they're out of stock with no availability:
https://www.amazon.com/Yuasa-NP18-12B-17-2AH-Battery-Terminal/dp/B00FA61MWE

StoleMyOwnCar said:
Well I have no doubts, most computer parts are some OEM thing, but generally I'd like to believe that they do some level of QC on them in order to make sure they work... I sure as heck know that the ABC battery I bought off Amazon didn't work worth a crap... lasted exactly one year so that they could skate the warranty clause...
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The reason the garbage off-brand SLA batteries don't last is because they use thinner and sometimes shorter lead plates in the cells. The thinner plates makes them more subject to damage from shock and heavy loads eroding the plates, and them being shorter makes them less able to deliver heavy current loads. It's pretty easy to tell the quality of a SLA battery based on weight, the cheaper more garbage ones sometimes way as little as half of what a normal one does. They'll work for a year or two under normal wear and tear, compared to 4-6 years for a quality battery.

I can't vouch for any of the Amazon branded batteries because I've never used them, but you may unfortunately have to roll the dice with the shortage going on.
 
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GiGaBiTe said:
I can't vouch for any of the Amazon branded batteries because I've never used them, but you may unfortunately have to roll the dice with the shortage going on.
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https://www.ebay.com/itm/124059344029

Well the other user suggested Ebay... Unless something on Ebay works, like the one above, or something else in this list:
https://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_nkw=rbc7+battery&_sacat=0

I'm not really sure what to do... At this rate, I might have to just buy a mediocre Cyberpower or something from Microcenter, because replacing the battery with something that's not crap would cost more than an entirely new unit, at least until the shortage calms down. Sucks I can't find a place to source the OEM APC batteries atm...
 
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I slapped a cheap no-name SLA battery in my APC unit for my router and Synology and it's been fine through power outages. I wouldn't necessarily go out of my way to source an OEM battery for double the cost.
 
GiGaBiTe said:
There's a listing for Power Sonic batteries on Ebay:

https://www.ebay.com/itm/133780669260
Click to expand...

Thanks, I bought a pair.
kirbyrj said:
I slapped a cheap no-name SLA battery in my APC unit for my router and Synology and it's been fine through power outages. I wouldn't necessarily go out of my way to source an OEM battery for double the cost.
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Like I said, the ABC battery I bought legitimately lasted about a year, so... 4-5 years for 2x the cost, or 1 year for half the cost... I'd go with the former. I guess I just chose a really bad brand though.
 
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StoleMyOwnCar said:
Like I said, the ABC battery I bought legitimately lasted about a year, so... 4-5 years for 2x the cost, or 1 year for half the cost... I'd go with the former. I guess I just chose a really bad brand though.
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Or maybe just a dud sample?
 
kirbyrj said:
Or maybe just a dud sample?
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I was wrong to begin with, looking at the data it lasted 2 or 3 years. Which still kind of sucks considering it wasn't that much cheaper than the APC, but not as bad as I initially suspected.

Anyway, the Powersonic batteries came in today. I bought some insulated screwdrivers from Home Depot just in case, along with some 2 sided mounting tape, gloves, etc, and went at it. Happy to report that the new batteries did not explode. Put them in, fired up Red Dead 2 to put some load on it and then proceeded to press the Test button. Kept it going just fine. No lights yet.

The manufacture date says November 2021, if I'm reading this correctly. GiGaBiTe is them being 3-4 months old going to be a bad thing? They came at about 4/5 bars charged, it looks like.
 
StoleMyOwnCar said:
The manufacture date says November 2021, if I'm reading this correctly. @GiGaBiTe is them being 3-4 months old going to be a bad thing? They came at about 4/5 bars charged, it looks like.
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Don't worry about it. It would appear they were barely off the ship from Asia. Batteries are never shipped at full charge.

I'm certain I've bought food that wasn't that fresh.
 
StoleMyOwnCar said:
I was wrong to begin with, looking at the data it lasted 2 or 3 years. Which still kind of sucks considering it wasn't that much cheaper than the APC, but not as bad as I initially suspected.
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Again, APC does not manufacture batteries, they slap their label on OEM batteries from various other manufacturers. If you peel the APC label off, you'll see the original OEM under it.

StoleMyOwnCar said:
The manufacture date says November 2021, if I'm reading this correctly. GiGaBiTe is them being 3-4 months old going to be a bad thing? They came at about 4/5 bars charged, it looks like.
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Retail batteries are generally a few months old by the time they leave the manufacturer and are passed around in logistics to get to the end consumer. They're fine in most cases.
 
I have been rebuilding APC battery packs for years. Now I have yet to encounter one that has a "fuse" it in, but I've definitely encountered "two packs" that are connected together with an adapter of some sort. I have always just cut the sticker and undone the wires. Then I go and find matching 12v batteries on my own, reconnected all the wires and tape everything up with blue masking tape. Has worked for a long long time. I will never buy retail APC battery packs.
 
OFaceSIG said:
I have been rebuilding APC battery packs for years. Now I have yet to encounter one that has a "fuse" it in, but I've definitely encountered "two packs" that are connected together with an adapter of some sort.
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It's usually a fusible link, rather than a discrete fuse.
 
GiGaBiTe said:
It's usually a fusible link, rather than a discrete fuse.
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Mine had a discrete blue 60A Maxi fuse in between the 2 batteries.

How much current is a 1/4" (.250" or 6.3MM) quick disconnect stab rated for anyway?

Fusible link, like the kind cars use? a piece of wire that melts when too much current is passed much like a normal fuse does but with no fancy shell.
60A_Maxi_Fuse.jpg
 
Format _C: said:
Mine had a discrete blue 60A Maxi fuse in between the 2 batteries.

How much current is a 1/4" (.250" or 6.3MM) quick disconnect stab rated for anyway?

Fusible link, like the kind cars use? a piece of wire that melts when too much current is passed much like a normal fuse does but with no fancy shell.
View attachment 450781
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That's just a generic spade fuse. The one in my pack is literally just a copper bus bar with a break in the middle and a small curved bit of copper in the shape of what's inside a fuse. Maybe in the past it had some enclosure around it, but I got this 1500VA unit used from the junk yard for cheap because it needed batteries.
 
if you have a battery supply house locally, like batteriesplus they will have a ton of SLA sizes to choose from. I've rebuilt or replaced several APC and other UPS battery packs that way. Another problem with assembled SLA kits is how long they've sat unused - SLA doesn't last forever on the shelf and NOS won't work well so always check the age.
 
rhkcommander959 said:
Another problem with assembled SLA kits
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I would also think the lower sales mean the pre-made packs sit longer after being made as well, SLA and lead-acid batteries in general have fairly high self discharge that is why the directions (which I'm sure no one else read LoL) say to charge unused packs one every 4-6 months depending on ambient temperatures.
 
Format _C: said:
I would also think the lower sales mean the pre-made packs sit longer after being made as well, SLA and lead-acid batteries in general have fairly high self discharge that is why the directions (which I'm sure no one else read LoL) say to charge unused packs one every 4-6 months depending on ambient temperatures.
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Exactly! Test the voltage upon receiving and you'll have an idea how long its been sitting for.

Charts are easily available with a quick search for voltage to battery capacity.
 
Well, those Power-Sonic cells were a dud. It's only been 1.5 years and the "replace battery" light is already on...

I'm not sure what to try next. The official APC battery straight from them is $210. Supposedly this should have been a much better deal, but... If I'm purchasing two of these in the same time span an official battery would have lasted, that's not a deal.

I could also literally go out and buy a brand new Cyberpower unit from Costco for the same price as the replacement battery from APC (actually less):
https://www.costco.com/cyberpower-1...ible-power-supply-ups.product.4000091462.html
But I'm not sure if this UPS is as good as this old one.
 
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I'm also kind of wondering if this APC SUA1500 itself is working as intended at this point... I've had it for such a long time, what if it's not even treating the batteries properly anymore? I'm not sure if that's a thing, though.
 
I had an APC unit for 15 years, only had to replace the batteries twice. Near the end I had to toss it as it developed a fault in the relay where it just kept switching between battery and live constantly. I got my moneys worth out of it so I just bought a cyberpower unit to replace it, and its been working fine these last 5 years.
 
Anytime you rebuild these dual batteries as long as you wire up the new cells the exact as the old cells you should be fine. Some units require batteries in series (24v same amps) versus parallel (12v higher amps).
 
On my oldest UPS I reused the plastic harness 3 maybe 4 times before I spent the money on a full new battery pack. It's well over ten years old now and I wouldn't use it on anything critical just because of aging. It's used on an embroidery machine. Besides being a motor, the machine uses the timing of the line voltage so pure sine is required. Was a bit pricey back then, but embroidery machines aren't cheap. Allows time to find a good stopping place rather than in the middle of a pattern.
 
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Starfalcon said:
I got my moneys worth out of it so I just bought a cyberpower unit to replace it, and its been working fine these last 5 years.
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I'm thinking of doing the same at this point, to be honest. Just maybe going to go to Costco and grab a Cyberpower 1500 unit. At least I would have it in my hands immediately, too. Fact is it's going to be cheaper out the door than buying an official APC battery for my SUA1500, and rebuilding my own battery pack is obviously not working for me, since I got some dud batteries. Rolling the dice on $99 batteries gets expensive. Dunno wtf else to do tbh. It would also save me a lot of space to use the Cyberpower unit. The APC unit is built like a brick, but it's also a brick. The only thing is that I'm not sure how good the output quality is on the the Cyberpower unit vs the APC unit. Or how reliable it is, given that I have a 4090 in my system so this thing is a bit high wattage...
 
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StoleMyOwnCar said:
I'm thinking of doing the same at this point, to be honest. Just maybe going to go to Costco and grab a Cyberpower 1500 unit. At least I would have it in my hands immediately, too. Fact is it's going to be cheaper out the door than buying an official APC battery for my SUA1500, and rebuilding my own battery pack is obviously not working for me, since I got some dud batteries. Rolling the dice on $99 batteries gets expensive. Dunno wtf else to do tbh. It would also save me a lot of space to use the Cyberpower unit. The APC unit is built like a brick, but it's also a brick. The only thing is that I'm not sure how good the output quality is on the the Cyberpower unit vs the APC unit. Or how reliable it is, given that I have a 4090 in my system so this thing is a bit high wattage...
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I have 2 units of an older revision of the Cyberpower that's linked, one on my 4090. No issues at all, works very well when switching even when I'm at full GPU load (which I usually am for DC crunching).
 
Grebuloner said:
I have 2 units of an older revision of the Cyberpower that's linked, one on my 4090. No issues at all, works very well when switching even when I'm at full GPU load (which I usually am for DC crunching).
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I have Cyberpower units in other areas of my house. This APC unit has always been (and is) reliable, but these battery costs are kind of killer. I wonder what the battery costs for the Cyberpower unit. It would be kind of dumb if it's cheaper to outright replace the unit.

I went and picked it up at costco. One thing that bugs me out the door is that it has a lot fewer ports on it, but we'll see. Hopefully it will simply work...
 
StoleMyOwnCar said:
I have Cyberpower units in other areas of my house. This APC unit has always been (and is) reliable, but these battery costs are kind of killer. I wonder what the battery costs for the Cyberpower unit. It would be kind of dumb if it's cheaper to outright replace the unit.

I went and picked it up at costco. One thing that bugs me out the door is that it has a lot fewer ports on it, but we'll see. Hopefully it will simply work...
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I can't remember what I paid, but I replaced the batteries in one of mine with official parts for a very reasonable amount. Certainly much less than I shelled out for the unit in 2016.
 
Just had batteries fail in my CP1500PFCLCD.
I had a real good experience with Replacement Battery Store
Great Prices, good communications, and fast ship. All came as expected.
I was skeptical at first due to low price but decided to take a chance. I would not hesitate next time.
 
StoleMyOwnCar said:
I'm thinking of doing the same at this point, to be honest. Just maybe going to go to Costco and grab a Cyberpower 1500 unit. At least I would have it in my hands immediately, too. Fact is it's going to be cheaper out the door than buying an official APC battery for my SUA1500, and rebuilding my own battery pack is obviously not working for me, since I got some dud batteries. Rolling the dice on $99 batteries gets expensive. Dunno wtf else to do tbh. It would also save me a lot of space to use the Cyberpower unit. The APC unit is built like a brick, but it's also a brick. The only thing is that I'm not sure how good the output quality is on the the Cyberpower unit vs the APC unit. Or how reliable it is, given that I have a 4090 in my system so this thing is a bit high wattage...
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Yeah thats the one I bought, Ive only had 2 power outages so far and it gave me more than enough time to shut my system down. Havent had any power issues at all, I keep my system, monitor, router, and cable modem all plugged into it. On top of that I have random old retro systems and monitors plugged into it also, and it has taken that without an issue.
 
owcraftsman said:
Just had batteries fail in my CP1500PFCLCD.
I had a real good experience with Replacement Battery Store
Great Prices, good communications, and fast ship. All came as expected.
I was skeptical at first due to low price but decided to take a chance. I would not hesitate next time.
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Cyberpower has a page where they sell their own official batteries, I think. I'm going to assume you know this, but it's not actually a good experience until it's at least 3 years later and the battery is still working. Getting a faulty battery quickly is still just getting a faulty battery. Like what happened with my powersonic packs. I had no issues with installation, initial setup, or shipping. But failing within 1.5 years still makes it a bad buy.
 
StoleMyOwnCar said:
Cyberpower has a page where they sell their own official batteries, I think. I'm going to assume you know this, but it's not actually a good experience until it's at least 3 years later and the battery is still working. Getting a faulty battery quickly is still just getting a faulty battery. Like what happened with my powersonic packs. I had no issues with installation, initial setup, or shipping. But failing within 1.5 years still makes it a bad buy.
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You are right of course but at 18 each vs 32 from CP I'll take my chances.
 
I think I might take this Cyberpower back. Its definitely gassing off. Kind of smell faint traces of it whenever I come back home from work to sit down at the computer. It's not a horrendous amount since if it was the rash on the back of my hand would start acting up (any exposure to stuff like super glue or bleach is enough to make it flare up instantly), but still, my APC unit certainly never did that. Alternatively I could try moving it or something, but dunno kind of undecided.
 
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