Here's the state of my search: BatteriesPlus is... odd. The corporate site, and after a phone call, tell me they don't do GSA, but some of their franchises do. I called the local one, and they do.
However, the only RBC 43 they offer, I might as well buy direct from APC, at well over $300 for the set.
Battery Sharks, and Apex, don't do GSA... but they *do* offer replacements for about $100 for the set.
Having checked with my manager, we'll try the open market quotes. I would like a third recommendation, so I can offer purchasing three quotes.
Recommendations?
And thanks to all.
mark
On Tue, Feb 12, 2013 at 1:28 PM, m.roth@5-cent.us wrote:
Here's the state of my search: BatteriesPlus is... odd. The corporate site, and after a phone call, tell me they don't do GSA, but some of their franchises do. I called the local one, and they do.
However, the only RBC 43 they offer, I might as well buy direct from APC, at well over $300 for the set.
Battery Sharks, and Apex, don't do GSA... but they *do* offer replacements for about $100 for the set.
Having checked with my manager, we'll try the open market quotes. I would like a third recommendation, so I can offer purchasing three quotes.
Recommendations?
And thanks to all.
mark
CentOS mailing list CentOS@centos.org http://lists.centos.org/mailman/listinfo/centos
Not sure if my last message made it to you and the list:
http://www.refurbups.com/Catalog/Government-Military
That's who I use for personal purchases and reselling to my clients. I have no experience with GSA purchases through them however (just online orders). I've always gotten the correct product. I think I've ordered probably a dozen or so times in the past few years. Quick shipment. Batteries are boxed up very well (cardboard cradles to hold batteries).
Joshua Zukerman wrote:
On Tue, Feb 12, 2013 at 1:28 PM, m.roth@5-cent.us wrote:
Here's the state of my search: BatteriesPlus is... odd. The corporate site, and after a phone call, tell me they don't do GSA, but some of their franchises do. I called the local one, and they do.
However, the only RBC 43 they offer, I might as well buy direct from APC, at well over $300 for the set.
Battery Sharks, and Apex, don't do GSA... but they *do* offer replacements for about $100 for the set.
Having checked with my manager, we'll try the open market quotes. I would like a third recommendation, so I can offer purchasing three quotes.
Recommendations?
Not sure if my last message made it to you and the list:
No, it didn't, and thank you very much, that's a perfect hit.
That's who I use for personal purchases and reselling to my clients. I have no experience with GSA purchases through them however (just online orders). I've always gotten the correct product. I think I've ordered probably a dozen or so times in the past few years. Quick shipment. Batteries are boxed up very well (cardboard cradles to hold batteries).
Sounds good. So far, *all* of them, when I look at the description of the batteries, say "high rate", which means they'll understand what I'm talking about.
mark
On Tue, Feb 12, 2013 at 01:28:32PM -0500, m.roth@5-cent.us wrote:
Having checked with my manager, we'll try the open market quotes. I would like a third recommendation, so I can offer purchasing three quotes.
Recommendations?
Battery Mart? Looks like they're government CCR http://www.batterymart.com/p-eight--12v-5ah-sealed-lead-acid-batteryf2.html
Looks like $159 for an 8-pack for RBC-43 http://www.batterymart.com/p-eight--12v-5ah-sealed-lead-acid-batteryf2.html
On Tue, 2013-02-12 at 13:28 -0500, m.roth@5-cent.us wrote:
Here's the state of my search: BatteriesPlus is... odd. The corporate site, and after a phone call, tell me they don't do GSA, but some of their franchises do. I called the local one, and they do.
However, the only RBC 43 they offer, I might as well buy direct from APC, at well over $300 for the set.
Battery Sharks, and Apex, don't do GSA... but they *do* offer replacements for about $100 for the set.
Having checked with my manager, we'll try the open market quotes. I would like a third recommendation, so I can offer purchasing three quotes.
Recommendations?
When it was not an emergency purchase, I have historically used McMaster-Carr, an industrial supplier, for my replacement batteries.
http://www.mcmaster.com/#sealed-lead-acid-batteries/=lg9y5y
I think you are looking for either the 7448K26 (12V 5Ah F2 $21.67 each) or the 7448K81 (12V 6Ah F2 $26.72 each), which are NOT the ones I am usually buying. I have never had a problem with their batteries.
Their web site makes no GSA claim, but "Google" suggests they do.
http://www.gsacontractswon.com/department/gsa/mc-master-carr-supply-company-...
You pay shipping, which is typically reasonable. Or they will ship on your shipper number. My ground delivery for orders placed before 5PM is typically the next business day, which is one reason I use them.
Like others have suggested, it's the local BatteriesPlus for emergencies.
Steve
On 02/12/13 19:19, S.Tindall wrote:
On Tue, 2013-02-12 at 13:28 -0500, m.roth@5-cent.us wrote:
Here's the state of my search: BatteriesPlus is... odd. The corporate site, and after a phone call, tell me they don't do GSA, but some of their franchises do. I called the local one, and they do.
However, the only RBC 43 they offer, I might as well buy direct from APC, at well over $300 for the set.
Battery Sharks, and Apex, don't do GSA... but they *do* offer replacements for about $100 for the set.
Having checked with my manager, we'll try the open market quotes. I would like a third recommendation, so I can offer purchasing three quotes.
Recommendations?
When it was not an emergency purchase, I have historically used McMaster-Carr, an industrial supplier, for my replacement batteries.
http://www.mcmaster.com/#sealed-lead-acid-batteries/=lg9y5y
I think you are looking for either the 7448K26 (12V 5Ah F2 $21.67 each) or the 7448K81 (12V 6Ah F2 $26.72 each), which are NOT the ones I am usually buying. I have never had a problem with their batteries.
Huh. No, I want to pay on the order of $12/individual battery, or around $100 or so for the set of 8; The one I found, Batteries+, that does do GSA, wanted about $30 each; as a comparison, APC sells them for about that.
I got a tad testy with one vender, who suggested that folks working with the gov't weren't interested in saving tax dollars.... <snip> Thanks, though.
mark
On 2/13/2013 06:12, mark wrote:
Huh. No, I want to pay on the order of $12/individual battery,
Please don't misuse "order." It's a corruption of the scientific term "order of magnitude"[1][2] which, used correctly, means that the values you're comparing use the same factor of 10 in scientific notation. If we take your claim literally, you'd be satisfied with any complete battery that cost less than $120 * 8 = $960.
(I will also come after you if you misuse "literally". :) )
$100 or so for the set of 8;
You've got one low-ball quote, and now you're demanding that everyone else meet it? Sigh...
The way I see it is, you've also got a whole bunch of people offering the same thing for $20-30 per VRLA[3] unit. That means either:
a) $20-30/VRLA is a good price and consequently you should be worrying about how others are managing to low-ball that; or
b) there's widespread price-fixing.
Given how many news stories you can find about misbehaving cheap batteries, I'd bet on option a). Just because the label has the same voltage and amp-hour rating as what came out of the APC UPS, doesn't mean it's exactly the same thing. Batteries are tricky. Boeing and Tesla Motors are both in the news now because too few people really understand batteries.
If you're willing to open up the APC sled and replace the individual VRLAs directly, the cheapest *reputable* vendor I've found is Mouser. Their part # 632-GP1245 looks close, but don't take my word on that. I'm just eyeballing photos and springboarding off the McMaster dimensions; I have no direct experience on that particular swap.
Mouser wants $16.30 each of these in qty 10. Just for reference, one of Mouser's direct competitors, DigiKey, wants about $25 for the same thing. That put's the $22-26 McMaster quote you've tried to reject right in the same range.
I also don't see that you're accounting for return shipping and the cost of the sled. If you buy the pack from APC, they ship you a complete, assembled battery pack, along with a reusable box and return shipping label. You put the old one back in the box you got the new one in, and send it back for recycling. That's worth something.
When you buy individual VRLAs, you have to account for your time opening up the sled, swapping VRLAs, and reassembling it all. Then you add in your time to dispose of the spent VRLAs. I'm sure you can find plenty of places locally that will take them, but I'll bet your salary and gas costs will wipe out your DIY savings.
You're probably not counting opportunity costs[4], either.
--------- [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_order_of [2] http://mathworld.wolfram.com/OrderofMagnitude.html [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VRLA [4] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opportunity_cost
Warren Young wrote:
On 2/13/2013 06:12, mark wrote:
Huh. No, I want to pay on the order of $12/individual battery,
Please don't misuse "order." It's a corruption of the scientific term "order of magnitude"[1][2] which, used correctly, means that the values you're comparing use the same factor of 10 in scientific notation. If we take your claim literally, you'd be satisfied with any complete battery that cost less than $120 * 8 = $960.
Now, this is serious nitpicking, and it also argues over common usage. But if you *really* want to get into it, I could note that I want on the order, base 2.
(I will also come after you if you misuse "literally". :) )
$100 or so for the set of 8;
You've got one low-ball quote, and now you're demanding that everyone else meet it? Sigh...
I take it you haven't done a lot of purchasing, where alternatives were considered? APC offers it at the highest price for their own UPSes. Many other companies offer compatibles, and this kind of rate - the lower one - is what I've been paying for over three years.
Actually, since of the three or four with the ballpark (go ahead, argue *that*) of $100 for the set of 8, none offer GSA, I've checked with my manager, and I'll just go ahead and get three quotes for open market value. <snip>
Given how many news stories you can find about misbehaving cheap batteries, I'd bet on option a). Just because the label has the same voltage and amp-hour rating as what came out of the APC UPS, doesn't mean it's exactly the same thing. Batteries are tricky. Boeing and Tesla Motors are both in the news now because too few people really understand batteries.
No. The only *real* issue is getting the vendor to understand that every single battery manufacturer is lying, because they *haven't* tested them on rackmount server UPSes, and yes, I don't care what the OEM says - and I've spoken, personally, to two or three OEMs - they MUST be HR (high rate) batteries; nothing else will make the UPSes happy.
The compatible batteries I've bought and put in the UPSes in '10 are only *starting* to go, so three years (including '10, since most of them were in the first half of the years) isn't bad, esp, when, with our "wonderful" power that blinks at least once a day to the server rooms, they do get hit.
If you're willing to open up the APC sled and replace the individual VRLAs directly, the cheapest *reputable* vendor I've found is Mouser. Their part # 632-GP1245 looks close, but don't take my word on that. I'm just eyeballing photos and springboarding off the McMaster dimensions; I have no direct experience on that particular swap.
Oh, sorry if I wasn't clear: that's what I do, open the sled and replace with the new set of eight individual batteries. Not a big deal. <snip>
When you buy individual VRLAs, you have to account for your time opening up the sled, swapping VRLAs, and reassembling it all. Then you add in your time to dispose of the spent VRLAs. I'm sure you can find plenty of places locally that will take them, but I'll bet your salary and gas costs will wipe out your DIY savings.
Nope. I bring the old batteries to my cube, and when I've got enough to make it worth it, I call the folks in hazardous waste who explicitly take care of recycling batteries, and they come get them.
You're probably not counting opportunity costs[4], either.
And you're not looking at the bigger picture: I'm a sysadmin. We're not overworked, though there's plenty to do. The Republicans in Congress pretend to cut the budget; therefore, saving the US gov't, in the form of my division, budget dollars, since I'm on a fixed rate, is cheaper than trying to get more money out of Congress to save my time by shipping the entire sled and recycling that.
mark
Mark did you look at atbatt.com, I have been looking recently and they are ones that I have been looking to go with, not sure if they do GSA though...
Tom Bishop wrote:
Mark did you look at atbatt.com, I have been looking recently and they are ones that I have been looking to go with, not sure if they do GSA though...
Just looked at them. They're about half-way between full APC prices and the discounters I've been looking at. They do have a page about organizational purchases, but no GSA.
Thanks, though.
mark
On 2/14/2013 11:41 AM, m.roth@5-cent.us wrote:
Tom Bishop wrote:
Mark did you look at atbatt.com, I have been looking recently and they are ones that I have been looking to go with, not sure if they do GSA though...
Just looked at them. They're about half-way between full APC prices and the discounters I've been looking at. They do have a page about organizational purchases, but no GSA.
do be sure you're comparing pears with pears and not apples with oranges.
serious UPS's are supplied with high discharge rate UPS certified VRLA batteries, which are NOT the same as the typical cheaper VRLA's you'll find at a discounter, intended for use as burglar alarm etc batteries. standard VRLA batteries are usually specified by their voltage and amp*hour rating for a 20 hour discharge rate, while UPS batteries use Watts at a 10 minute discharge rate.
example: Panasonic LC-R127R2P is a standard VRLA 12V 7.2AH (at 20 hour rate) battery, thats rated at a 0.36 amp discharge rate. UP-VW1245P1 is the high discharge rate UPS version, rated at 268 watts (45 watts per cell) for 10 minutes, which is about 3.5 amp hours at a 22 amp discharge rate. these two batteries are physically equivalent in size, weight.
yes, you can use the regular ones in your UPS and save a bundle. I have a old(!) SmartUPS 2000 powering my home network, loaded with 4 x LC1220P's (12V 20AH). My total load on this UPS is only like 500 watts, so it will last for HOURS during extended power failures (winter storms, typically). I wouldn't want to pull 2000VA out of this, however.
On 02/14/13 18:48, John R Pierce wrote:
On 2/14/2013 11:41 AM, m.roth@5-cent.us wrote:
Tom Bishop wrote:
Mark did you look at atbatt.com, I have been looking recently and they are ones that I have been looking to go with, not sure if they do GSA though...
Just looked at them. They're about half-way between full APC prices and the discounters I've been looking at. They do have a page about organizational purchases, but no GSA.
do be sure you're comparing pears with pears and not apples with oranges.
serious UPS's are supplied with high discharge rate UPS certified VRLA batteries, which are NOT the same as the typical cheaper VRLA's you'll
<snip> I take it you didn't read previous posts by me in this thread, including my rant about how every OEM LIES, and that they've never tested their "regular" in a rackmount?
mark
On 2/15/2013 4:53 AM, mark wrote:
I take it you didn't read previous posts by me in this thread, including my rant about how every OEM LIES, and that they've never tested their "regular" in a rackmount?
OEM would be the battery manufacturer (Panasonic, Yuasa, Universal, etc) or the equipment manufacturer (APC, Eaton, etc). resellers are not OEMs.
where is this 'lie' ? are you saying APC doesn't test their rackmount UPS's in a rack? I've never seen Panasonic say anything about racks or not, their spec sheets talk about temperature, age, voltage, charging etc.
lead prices have shot through the moon, as have transportation costs (and lead acid batteries are heavy buggers). 5 years ago I could get Panasonic 12V 20AH batteries for about $40 each, now they are around $100 each.
John R Pierce wrote:
On 2/15/2013 4:53 AM, mark wrote:
I take it you didn't read previous posts by me in this thread, including my rant about how every OEM LIES, and that they've never tested their "regular" in a rackmount?
OEM would be the battery manufacturer (Panasonic, Yuasa, Universal, etc) or the equipment manufacturer (APC, Eaton, etc). resellers are not OEMs.
where is this 'lie' ? are you saying APC doesn't test their rackmount UPS's in a rack? I've never seen Panasonic say anything about racks or not, their spec sheets talk about temperature, age, voltage, charging etc.
Ok, when I say "OEM" I mean the actual manufacturers of the batteries, such as Sigma, or PowerSonic. I've spoken to reps from both of them, and both of them have asserted that the "regular" is fine, even when I've talked about HR batteries, and the need for them *to* those reps. 100% of the time, if I put anything *but* HR in, the APC SmartUps will not see it as correct, and the "replace battery" light stays red, meaning we won't know when we *actually* have to change it.
Is that clear enough?
lead prices have shot through the moon, as have transportation costs (and lead acid batteries are heavy buggers). 5 years ago I could get Panasonic 12V 20AH batteries for about $40 each, now they are around $100 each.
That's fine, but I'm talking about the prices I, personally, have written PO's for over the last three years.
mark
On 2/15/2013 2:25 PM, m.roth@5-cent.us wrote:
That's fine, but I'm talking about the prices I, personally, have written PO's for over the last three years.
so how many man hours have you wasted to save a few $100 on these batteries ? if it was our production data centers, the UPS VAR would be on a service contract, and THEY would be replacing the batteries on schedule as part of that contract. Time is Money.
we're getting /way/ off topic for CentOS here. there are some general sysadmin mailing lists that might be better suited to this discussion.
On Fri, Feb 15, 2013 at 4:52 PM, John R Pierce pierce@hogranch.com wrote:
That's fine, but I'm talking about the prices I, personally, have written PO's for over the last three years.
so how many man hours have you wasted to save a few $100 on these batteries ? if it was our production data centers, the UPS VAR would be on a service contract, and THEY would be replacing the batteries on schedule as part of that contract. Time is Money.
Yeah, but money is money too... Why use CentOS if you like throwing money at service contracts?
On Fri, Feb 15, 2013 at 5:52 PM, John R Pierce pierce@hogranch.com wrote:
On 2/15/2013 2:25 PM, m.roth@5-cent.us wrote:
That's fine, but I'm talking about the prices I, personally, have written PO's for over the last three years.
so how many man hours have you wasted to save a few $100 on these batteries ? if it was our production data centers, the UPS VAR would be on a service contract, and THEY would be replacing the batteries on schedule as part of that contract. Time is Money.
we're getting /way/ off topic for CentOS here. there are some general sysadmin mailing lists that might be better suited to this discussion.
+1 kill -9 $this_thread, pls.
On 02/15/13 19:35, zGreenfelder wrote:
On Fri, Feb 15, 2013 at 5:52 PM, John R Piercepierce@hogranch.com wrote:
On 2/15/2013 2:25 PM, m.roth@5-cent.us wrote:
That's fine, but I'm talking about the prices I, personally, have written PO's for over the last three years.
so how many man hours have you wasted to save a few $100 on these batteries ? if it was our production data centers, the UPS VAR would be on a service contract, and THEY would be replacing the batteries on schedule as part of that contract. Time is Money.
we're getting /way/ off topic for CentOS here. there are some general sysadmin mailing lists that might be better suited to this discussion.
+1 kill -9 $this_thread, pls.
I agree. All I asked for was recommendations for battery vendors, not an argument as to why I should do this.
This is my last on this thread. If someone *really*, *really* wants to argue about how I'm spending our tax dollars, email me offlist, and I'll decide if you're worth explaining it to.
mark
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John R Pierce -
Joshua Zukerman -
Les Mikesell -
m.roth＠5-cent.us -
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S.Tindall -
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Tom Bishop -
Warren Young -
zGreenfelder