Overcoming the battery-busbar problem (for now). Here is what I found! 

Thanks so much for the in depth work on this Andy. It's the ultimate point of your channel, so show people not only what you're doing, but how and why. Rarely do we see people go into such detail especially in todays throw away culture. It's quite surprising to see the amount of people saying "use copper", who have either forgotten or neglected to look at your previous experiences with copper and tinned copper. There are pro's and con's of both materials, in my case I've decided to stick with Aluminium and the approx. 2000 bars I've sold so far have all been working well as far as I know. This extra preparation information will be included with future bus bar sales as a bonus. I might even consider a small sachet of Alminox (the paste I use now) in bus bar sales. While the product is vastly different, the underlying formula is the same as if we bought seeds to grow a plant from a shop. If we buy the seeds, drop them on the ground and walk away, we will probably find that in 3 weeks it's still a seed sitting on the ground doing nothing. However if we ensure the soil is appropriate, dig the hole, add the right amount of water, and bury it as prescribed, we come back to a sprouting plant. Preparing bus bars, doing nuts to the right torque, properly crimping lugs, and much more, is all part of the process of a DIY battery. This is the stuff we don't usually see behind the scenes in factories making these by the thousands. Good find with the raised edges too, even though the outside edge hangs just over the diameter of the battery terminal, the inside edge would likely affect the contact patch. So ensuring the surface is flat is a worthwhile step, and it's also something anyone can do with no special tools. For people who use the various pastes, be wary of what is used to apply the paste to the bus bar or to any surface. Using a cue tip needs to be done VERY carefully, because the fibres can easily dislodge and remain on the surface. If you're doing a lot of them, you can go to your local crafts store or pharmacy and get a similar looking item but it has a foam end on it (often used for applying face paint or make-up too), and this avoids the fibre issue. For larger areas, there are things called a "dabbing sponge" that would be ideal. Or as Andy uses, a clean rag can be easy for the bus bars, but tricky to use on battery terminals with studs. And finally for the people who still didn't see the info about the bars, they are made from 5005 sheet (not extrusion), laser cut (not stamped), and are 20 x 4mm. The current carrying ability is well above what Andy requires for this application. I use them on batteries that I allow up to 250A current drain.

I'd still ditch them. Aluminum is a terrible choice for DIY packs. Managing the oxide is a neverending task and copper or nickel is an infinitely better choice, especially in a pack that is functionally outdoors (no climate control). You won't win this fight against chemistry. That's my advice as a professional electrical engineer.

What I have learned is that aluminum should be used for containers of Spat but not busbars.

This has probably already been said but you should use a flexible bus bar or cable for terminal connection. The subtle expansion and contraction during charging and discharging could cause terminal failure over time.

To tell the truth, I have never trusted aluminum in electrical applications. As a professional electrician, I have always used Ideal NOALOX Anti-Oxidant Compound to coat aluminum connections. Having maintained a number of 40 to 250 hp 480-277 volt and 208-120 volt 3 phase irrigation pumps I can tell you the connections would not last a season without anti-oxidant paste. I also used to recoat the connections on these high amp applications once a year but never let them go more than two seasons without a recoat. With aluminum, there is one other worry. The expansion rate is so great, the connection tends to move and wear off minute amounts of aluminum causing the connection to loosen and arc. The expansion also seems to change the shape of the connection almost as if someone hammered the wire and connection thinner. Finally, are you absolutely certain that the bus bars are actually heavy enough to carry the load? I would take a cross sectional area of the bus bars and compare it to the cross sectional area of the nearest wire gauge to determine the load capacity. Good luck with the aluminum. It has been my experience that no matter what, at least a certain percentage of connections always end up being trouble over time. Sorry, I should have said something sometime ago about my apprehension, but you seemed so sure of what you were doing. Also, how did you cure the stripped threads on cell #6 (I think)?

Incroyable cette resistance d'oxydation et comment elle peut influé sur les cosses ainsi que sur la batterie ! merci beaucoup Andy hâte de suivre les prochains épisodes...😊

I really appreciate, I have never thought about bus bars being flat until your issue.. very cool idea to sand them and see how flat they are. This is positive news Abshir

Andy..you are amazing on attention to the details. I have experience issues with busbars before and resorted to same solution as Mermaid Lady. Your test was so scientific that made me to rethink of my busbars .

Change the busbars to COPPER, IMO; experience taught me just that. Keep up the good work.

If you want to go a bit crazy on truing the surface place the sandpaper on a sheet of glass before sanding. That's what I used to do when truing CPU surfaces and heatsink surfaces before applying thermal paste.

you are doing all the hard work for everyone thank you !!!!

Very interesting indeed, I’ve ordered flexible copper busbars in hope I don’t have too many issues. I was watching one of your videos yesterday while waiting to pick up the kids and I did have to chuckle as you said at the end of the video you sometimes sit for hours watching your bms, that’s exactly what I do. My wife thinks I’m mad. Was a fascinating video about adding a battery in parallel with a lower state of charge.

Right at the Moment I'm installing the Electrics at my RV. After your Video today I was testing my Multiplus 12/1600 with around 1200W. I did not reach 100A load on my LiFeYPo4 selfmade Battery but I right away checked all connections for any heat! And thanks to you and this Video, I found a not perfect fitting connection in my Installation! 😳... This just heated up, so I needed to clean and tighten things correctly. In the end, I did not thought that such monor things could be so crazy bad. So Thanks!!!! It helped a lot to stay safe!

There was a bit of a fiasco in the 1970’s in the USA and Canada where new homes were being wired with aluminum wiring instead of copper. The connections in the various boxes were having heat issues much as you were having. There were untold numbers of homes that had to be re-wired due to fires and the threat of fire. Some electricians stated “oh we’ll just coat the connections with anti-oxidation paste and that will solve the issue”. It didn’t. The houses got re-wired with copper. So… I just stick with good ol’ plated copper bus bars and not worry. Really appreciate the work you’ve put in to your videos!

While it is true that the oxide forms very quickly, it's only the first 4 nano meter that forms almost instantaneously; the deeper oxide takes a lot longer, so adding no-oxide right after sanding is fine. Incidentally, your experience also shows the reasons to use a conductive paste such as MG847 or silver based compounds: it's to make a uniform connection between two contacts when they might not be fully 'flat'. The paste fills the 'gaps' between the two contact areas.

Very useful video. PS: To avoid IR reflections, you can put a small patch of electrical insulating tape on the busbar and measure the temperature with the IR camera on the electrical tape

Good to see you made some improvement with the sanding. I guess you'll find out in time if they hold up.

Personally I would ditch the aluminium in favour of tinned copper. Aluminium is not a good choice for low voltage application’s unless it’s welded.

Depending on the type of aluminium, if it is extruded, cut from sheet, cold rolled or formed it will form an oxidised surface within 20 minutes of manufacture or working. This is well known in the marine industry where many boat hulls are made from aluminium. Also, not all aluminium is the same you need to be aware that the resistance of some aluminium is higher than other types. It is not all suitable for bus bars. The higher grades are better but not perfect. Use Copper for bus bars. Yes it is more expensive but it is also more conductive and does not have these issues.

Can't wait to see your fix

Congratulations! You shave the problems away one by one 🙂 The bus bars that still get warm might have similar issues on the poles of the cells. They should be deoxidized as well. BTW: You may use the sandpaper and grease at same time. Then you will have even less oxide. Proof is that you can solder aluminium foil quite well if you apply oil or grease and rub with the soldering irron. Regarding the blue cables: Good practice will be to put one lug on bottom and one on top of the bus bar. Then they should behave symmetrically.

Great Video. This video and the last video should be a must-view for anyone building a battery. The high currents we deal with require special attention to all connections. A few points: * No-oxide is to prevent oxidation but will not remove oxidation. * That was a great discovery about the raised lip around the edge of the busbar. When the busbars were cut (or stamped), it probably raised the edges around the cuts. * You may want to hit the cell terminals with a wire brush right before you install the busbars. * That is a good point about the aluminum bus bars not bending as easily as the copper.... Another reason to use copper. * I am not very surprised about the difference in current on the lines to the BMS. The current ratio will be inversely proportional to the resistance ratio of the two lines. Just a little bit of resistance in one of the crimps or connections can throw off the ratio.

Interesting. Never would have thought to much of bus bars but for sure I will be testing them when I build my first pack in a month when the batteries arrive.

your making good points for copper busbars .....

Glad to see you have sorted out the issue, with lots of people calling out the use of aluminium bus bars, I have to agree. Andy you need to use pure gold bus bars, skip the tinned copper, go all in 😂. Keep up the experimentation, it would be boring if it just worked first time.

Nice spot. I'd have family telling me how they "know" it should work, but it does not, so it must be some other imaginary thing. Like they'd guess at the metal being poor quality or something. Lots of guessing, but no actual testing. So great you actually checked, tested, and found a solution.

Looking good. I sand my terminals with inox on them while I sand them.

When I used to polish fibre optic leads, the instructions were to polish in a figure of 8. This did make a difference when using the £5000 tester for loss. Maybe its the same for busbars for uniform flatness., 👍👍

I vote too to change the aluminum. Aluminum is a very reactive material it oxidate instant

Aluminum is a contact disaster. I always sand the busbars with WD40 so they don't corrode again. Then I apply noalox to the busbars and screw the whole thing together. Since then it's been quiet. Grinding alone only improved it for a few weeks. Greetings from bavaria =)

congrats for the improvement. What is about the contact face on the poles? Are they flat enough? Remember the issues with Al wires in DDR electrical installations. The are prone to fail, especially when getting aged.

I love your batt box off-the-chine

I got a set of buss bars from Paul. They are working great for me. Other commenters are saying ditch them. I say NO. The terminals are aluminum anyway. There is always going to be a greater chance of issues with unlike conductor minerals.

I commented before about the flatness of your mating surfaces. I am curious as to why you haven't checked the factory surface of the cell terminals. Given the inflexibility of the aluminum bars, any unevenness on the call terminals will work against you as much as the bus bar irregularities. This is a critical topic here to raise awareness, no matter the configuration. Great job Andy!

Andy your findings are great information, and most certainly very worthwhile as a reminder for us all to be extra careful when assembling our battery packs. However have you calculated the energy losses across your original set up, my point would be that I don't think you had a significant problem in the first place, or even a minor problem as far as energy losses are concerned, nor a long term problem either!

Essentially, the rigid busbar doesn't always make good contact due to the slight angle when tightened down. The crimp ring lugs on the other hand are independent and able to make better contact due to the flexibility. My EVO batteries came with 2 layer flexible busbars that can mate with the terminal more easily. Thicker isn't better. What the manufacturer did was use two thin layers one of top of the other to carry the amperage. They are fastened in the middle with heat shrink tube. I highly recommend this or use of the ring lug to connect your batteries.

Andy, you are making me laugh!😂

I have also been using aluminium busbars, both on a 32 cell battery pack and with Victron batteries in a motorhome with no problem. My systems have two differences which might be significant. 1. I made my own busbars from lengths of flat bar. I did use Andy's test using fine sand paper to check flatness and they are absolutely flat so checking the source material for flatness is important. 2. So far I haven't charged or discharged faster than 50A but typically have charged and discharged for periods of over 10 hours without any appararent terminal post heating. I do not have a thermal imaging camera but as Andy demonstrates any significant heating would be discernable by touch. The motorhome has been using lithium batteries with aluminium busbars for 3 years now and the 32 cell pack has been running for one year. Normally problems will show up within that time so it seems to me that the quality of connection is more about the specific mechanics of the materials and assembly technique rather than just chemistry.

As I told in a comment on the last video: Do not use a washer alone, use a serrated washer, to cut through all oxides, a washer and a spring washer to keep the force constant over temperatures...

Thanks Andy, Looking at the nickel plated copper busbars, these are hard drawn copper which is not soft in any way, just as an idea you could heat the copper busbar up to a high enough temperature that would anneal the copper and soften it up, similar to when you buy copper tubing in a coil that is easily bent, you wouldn't know how flat the post on the battery was either, you could even try thin annealed copper washers between the battery post and busbar, in the early days many engines had copper head gaskets that you would re-use after annealing them again over a flame

I saw in another video that even lugs are not straight and need to go a similar process. Basically one need to ensure planeity of the two connecting surfaces as you cannot apply enough torque to ensure initimate contact. cheers

I make all my busbars out of 3mm copper. It's not cheap, but they barely get warm with 100amps running through them (hard to notice any additional warmth to the touch).

Heya well it looks like you solve the problem hope that it stay good now

Good video. I noticed years ago that modern 3 pin Australian 3 pin 240V etectrical plugs, now had pins that were stamped out of sheet and not accurately cut from engineered strip brass. The punching meant the nartow pin had a curved cross-section, and so like your busbars had a lip next to any edges. This resulted in a very narrow contact area. If the attached lead had 1 sq mm or 1.5 sq mm cable,, the heat wasnt conducted away, and pins and plug got burnt. I also noticed some of your thermal shots showed the nuts snd studs were the hottest parts, meaning they were the conductors. As you probably know stainless steel has only a few percent of the conductivity of copper so is not good. So any improvement in inter-cell or post connection, is worthwhile. As 25 x 6mm is a common Aluminium extrusion, and i cant see why with increased cell sizes these days, and little limitation of vertical height or space on cell tops, more robust links are not offered or manufactured. 150 sq mm is great. I made some for a 48V set of 460Ah cells i acquired a few years ago. Once again, great work on your reports, many thanks.

I go with the copper camp. I also only use brass nuts, bolts, threads and washers with battery grease on all terminations. When I worked on multiple aluminium 1000A busbars we always cleaned the bars first using a wire brush and Vaseline together. Then we did a drop test across the connection using high current and checking for any potential across the joint. Any potential and we started all over again.

Very interesting, thanks.

Pure copper bar and make your own. My thought is that you have to make the aluminum bus bar so thick to carry the current that when you torque them down they are so stiff they can’t conform to the terminal differences between cells. Just my two cents

Hi Andy. Why are you stuck with aluminium. Why not copper, nickel or even appropriately sized stainless steel. I'm afraid even your perfectly sanded busbars will reoxidise again.

Shinny metal will reflect heat! And can show as hot in the thermal! 😎👍

I'm sorry you had a problem, but also glad. You've saved me and others because I was totally unaware solid aluminum busbars would be a problem. I haven't bought anything yet, I'm just about to, so you saved me a lot of time and frustration. How often do you think you might have to repeat this process?

Thank You.

Andy, have you thought about using copper crush washers between the plate and the terminal? They use these types of washers in the automotive industry as a liquid seal (eg. oil sump bolt, banjo bolts). As the name suggests, the washer will squash down to mate up to an imperfect surface. An item that was not looked into - how flat/smooth is the terminal face on the batteries? Making the bus-bar dead flat is great, but if it is then bolted down to an imperfect battery terminal then the hard work is lost.

Andy, it most likely does happen to a lot of people, but they probably don’t stare at their battery with a thermal camera every day to find out lol. If I say ouch when I touch them, then I know they are too hot, otherwise, I just keep sendin it. Actually, in all honesty, I have temperature sensors every 3rd busbar connection. I check them on my phone way more times than a sane person should. But after I roasted a stainless steel washer, by putting it between two connections carrying 3-400 amps, I constantly stay worried.

Thank you

I find that applying the electrical grease to the sandpaper directly. Then I wipe them off with a paper towel covered in grease so it keeps it greasy. I install them greasy and it seems to prevent oxidation since it squeezes the grease out under the contact points of the busbar. YMMV

Nice video Andy. I think it is always combination of things. What i'm worried is what will that Al busbar do over time..It is pretty critical how much you tightened it and hod plane is your busbar..S i would try to put some temperature probe on one busbar and leave it for later one and check if it will increase in temperature over time..i would go for those cables..even if you have to make your own with lets say 50mm cables ..I think this might allow flexing and also less likely Al will melt..or how is that process called as AL will usually change shape once it is under constant pressure.

Andy, I'd like to tell you that I find 4 Nm too soft adjustment for such a thick bar to make proper contact. May be increasing torque would save u time and work. Up to 8 Nm that assembly is more than safe to tight. Just a contructive opinion.

Thank you for your RU-vid channel. I am in Mundaring WA and have start doing things very similar to yourself with working towards a small off grid power system for a tiny house design for my future living. Question for a simple off grid would 24v be better than 48v. I have been going over pros and cons like running lighting, fridge and other things straight from battery rather than using a inverter to run everything on 240v, or would you think just going 48v and run standed equipment on 240v AC?

I made my busbars out of the left over alloy C channel lengths and just cut them the length of the pack with a circular saw and drilled holes in the right spot then sanded them by hand and put it all together, I had none of the tools to test heating etc but two years later my system is working fine. I guess it depends on how much you want to draw from the pack at once though.

Leider habe ich dieses Problem vor dem Einbau meiner flexiblen Busbars auch festgestellt, da ich misstrauisch war, ob die Fläche vernünftigen Kontakt gibt. Habe ich mit diesem Sandpapier geebnet, und dabei festgestellt, das es Probleme gegeben hätte. Danke, für dieses Video, es bestätigt mein Vorgehen….. liebe Grüsse nach sunny hot Australia.

looking at the marks left after sanding they look like they have been pierced and stamped out of sheet material on a press (seen this many times as a toolmaker) they should be planished after the stamping process to flatten the surfaces, looks like the planishing pressure was not high enough, even better would be to grind the faces flat and parallel on a lumsden grinder, nice job identifying the high spots giving a very small contact area. just watching the battery install again and noticed the caption saying "Laser cut", didnt see that the first time round. must admit not seen this from laser before - every days a school day 😁

nice info

This is where I would be trying copper washers! Not only are they good conductors, they also make good gaskets which once cleaned, won't allow air to get in between the contract surfaces....

¡Gracias!

I think you hit the nail on the head, it is a mix of three issue 1. Build up of oxide on Al. 2. Thicker Al busbar is not flexible enough to ensure good contact over whole area of battery terminal especially to over come the other problems. 3. The bussbar are not perfectly flat, this looks distortion of the flat material as the bussbars are Punched out of flat plate so a bit of local Distortion at punched edges. I have built a 404 Ahr battery (@12v) from 202 AHr cells and used thick Al bar as busbars for our van. Busbars holes were drilled (and deburred), ends were sawn then filed. Finally I polished the bars to remove the accumulated oxide and installed (I did a bench install and a few weeks later final installed). This was then run at 90A (45A PER CELL as 4S2P) and no heating at the terminals (just the 200A switch gets warm!). Been running for two trips of 2 weeks each and looking at BMS ((JBD 250A) all looks good. About to repeat 90A load and check no new hot spots. So no issue using Al for busbars provided prepared right then torqued nice and tight. This not only produces a good electrical contact but also a gas tight contact to stop future oxidation at the Al to Al connection. Again thanks for the videos.

It would be interesting to test at 150% of normal max, or ideally 2x normal max. In other words, if your BMS limits to 100amps (fairly quickly shuts off), bypass the BMS and test for 30 minutes at 150 amps or 200 amps. Starting with the battery fully charged, a 200 Ah or greater battery should have no problem at 200 amps for 30 minutes. That will show any heating issues more quickly, and if it is good at 200%, it will be good at the normal max.

Terminal velocity! Aluminum has an oxide form almost instantly, maybe you can find a soft stainless brush to clean the buss and terminals with, a clean one, and keep it clean with acetone, did you check the voltage drop across the terminal and buss? (I missed the last video!) But I'll watch it, soon! 😜

gold bus bars and your problem is solved forever 🤣

I don't know if you saw my other post, I have seen a fairly good price on nickel coated copper braid flexible bus bars at £40 for 15pcs which I thought was good in comparison to the others I have seen of the same type. "Minerals Official Store" on AliExpress have them listed as "Tin plated copper braided strap M6" with various thicknesses.

I was thinking you could put one of the BMS voltage input (blue) cables on the bottom of that little bus bar and the other on top. That way they both have the same contact surface on that little bus bar. And, add/move washers appropriately on the other side of that bus bar to make sure the little bus bar is level.

I'm pretty sure that I am about to buy the exact same kit of batteries except with their choice of BMS and balancers... It looks a lot more involved wiring it up than expected but possibly that's just because of your choice of BMS.... The bars are probably uneven from the hole being drilled into them, I always use a counter sinker to clean up all of my holes when I drill holes at work in aluminum... Nice monitoring with the heat gun though. That has me worried that I should also have one as I am firing up my solar system for the very first time soon.

Hi off-grid garage I recommend you use aluminium foil in England this is called bacon foil at the top and underneath the link

thanks tanti saluti dall'Italia👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏

You should do this on a thick piece of glass, also use a full sheet of wet and dry and do the entire surface, move it in a figure 8, that removes the metal evenly. Better still do not use alloy for this job! Good luck. Edit, a good glass is an old oven door glass. Also much better to use some lubricant, a mild dishwashing detergent in a spray bottle to keep things moving nicely would suffice, when doing steel use DWF.

Try the 4 GA busbars that Maddie sent you and test them using the infrared camera. If they don't heat up, then they are plenty thick enough.

Hi Andy, your journey has been an interesting one. We are completely off the grid and have been for over 15 years. At present we are running on lead acid batteries, 880 amps at 24 volts with a victron inverter. After watching your channel and a few others, going down the lithium road will be the next step. I'm asking out of complete ignorance, the EVE batteries have aluminium terminals with stainless studs, why is the bottom of the busbars more important than the top, where the nut and washer tighten down on the busbar and do you think over time there would be any reaction between the aluminium and the stainless. Cheers Drew

7:04 - A new saying for you Andy: "It's just not cricket!"

I always use copper bus bars we live off grid and run 80 nickle iron batterys. The problem with those bus bars you can get thermal runaway and cook your batterys.

there is a reason nobody uses aluminium for bus bars. its just not a good idea. you should use your meter to measure the voltage drop between the terminals

Measuring the voltage across the buss bar would work too. Measure the voltage drop between cells.

I wonder if copper washers would help at all would be a fun experiment. I use a zinc paste for large aluminum buss connections, but sounds like they don't have that over there.

Maybe a softer metal washer that acts like a gasktet ...like copper in between the battery terminals and busbar might help?

Battery terminals are not all the same height, could be off just a little causing uneven contacts. Flexible connections/bus bars you don't need to worry about the difference in terminal heights

Hi Andy. Would be very interested in seeing you compare aluminium and copper resistance. Thanks

@10:50 I would keep an eye on that, I wonder if it is due to poor crimping on the terminal or poor connection inside the BMS.

If a pure silver foil of thickness 0.3 mm is screwed between battery and copper plate bus bar will show least ohmic resistance so do it and see differences ....

You get better results if you use common soap bar and little water to lubricate the paper (hence wet n dry paper) stops the paper clogging up

I also keep having problems with oxidation on aluminum bus bars in various projects. I'm thinking about silver plating or gold plating. According to the product advisor of the company Tifoo, this is not a problem.

Would you reccomend 2 layers of copper busbars ontop of each other? Or are the terminal screws to short for 2 busbars?

Heck get some 2 gauge cable, silver solder the ends hammer and sand flat drill a hole for the terminal, it should be a perfect buss!

Hi Andy, which thermal camera are you using please

I was impressed with those busbars so I tried to order some of them for my project. PowerPaul won't ship to the USA :

Non-flat surface at contact area of busbars and cable lugs, no matter of its material - it is permanent pain for installation. It is a "byproduct" of its manufacturing process with pressing and cutting operations. The same problem is for power semiconductor heatsinks.

I'm wondering if the bus bar ends are pressed, to assure flatness, sanded, cleaned with acetone, then greased, if that would make any difference. Might want to consider sanding the terminal bases with 800 grit. It appears the circular sanding did the trick.

Another example where less is more. Using the cheap bus bar would probably have worked out of the box, while those fancy aluminium bus bar are just a failure.

The unbalanced current in the BMS cabling is likely due to incorrect assembly of the termination. The two wires' crimps should sandwich the terminal busbar between them so the contacts are identical. As we see them there are multiple higher resistance paths through the terminal screw and washers and from one crimp through the other. On the other side of the terminal, the crimp should be under the terminal busbar to keep it level.

it would be interesting to see the voltage difference from one end of the busbar to the other

Oddly enough, what I see is oxidized and unoxidized aluminum. :-) I'm not saying they are perfectly flat, but that was my first thought when I looked at it. Yes, aluminum oxidizes quite quickly, here in the desert it is even worse due to the increased ozone. I see now that you've figured out why double cables like that, I crimp into a single lug rather than stacking high current connections. Yes, I tested quite a few things with my thermal camera, I don't have the same background and don't get reflections. I don't even blend in the visual camera, just the infrared.

if the busbar is laser cut my guess is that due to heat the metal srinks in that way so thats why it causes those perfect curving empty spaces around and after the holes . but its only my guess

If you are interested in tin plating your copper for corrosion resistance, the channel NerdRage has the recipe. It is only tin and S. acid with thiourea from tarn-X silver polish. You just dip the copper in till you get enough in a few minutes coating it. That's it. Just don't store it, it goes bad after a month and won't work. Warmer works better too, it has crystals that need to be melted. Just watch his video, he explains in detail.