Battery Chargers!

[Clintonious]

So what I’ve gathered so far from you guys, and all your great help, is that it’s important to get a battery charger that can balance the individual cells in a battery pack. The more cells your pack is made of, the more important this becomes!

What could post go wrong? A couple weeks ago my cousin’s house burnt down. Nobody got hurt, thankfully. But it’s not always like that. So yeah, that could go wrong!

I have a house full of kids… more specifically, curious little boys that might as well be named George! “George was a good little monkey and always very curious…”

So as it’s been explained to me, batteries should be charged somewhere where a fire won’t destroy anything valuable. I dare compare them to a firearm…
1) Don’t point them at anything you don’t want to destroy!
2) Keep your finger off the trigger till your sights are on the target!
3) Be sure if your target and what’s beyond it
4) All guns are always loaded!

Maybe it’s a stretch, but I’m picking up on a lot of similarities… and I don’t need little curious George to haphazardly plug a battery into the charger under his bed, right next to his stash of fireworks, and then forget about them and go play outside!

So with all of that said, and I apologize if I was too long winded, one thing I don’t have is experience with using one of these things.

The FT store has the…

• B3 compact charger, good for the 2 or 3 cell batteries and plugs into… the wall?
• The M8 bundle, good for everything… as long as you have DC power… like a car battery (I don’t want George to burn down my car either!)
• And from there the options on other websites exceeds my understanding!

So can you guys help me from here, and try to follow this format:

1. What do you use?
2. Does it require a special power supply?
3. What’s so great about it?
4. What’s not so great about it?
5. How much did it cost?
6. Where can I get one today?
7. What else do we need to know about it?

Thanks in advance!
~Clintonious

 

[Foamforce]

1. What do you use?
   

   X2 AC Plus Black Edition Charger / Discharger Power Supply | HITEC RCD USA

   The expansion of the Hitec charger line continues with the introduction...

   hitecrcd.com
2. Does it require a special power supply?
   Nope, it has both.
3. What’s so great about it?
   I bought this one because it has two outputs. In retrospect I would have preferred four, but those are uncommon. The other reason I like this charger is because it uses either AC or DC. Plug it in at home, or use the alligator clips and attach to my car battery in the field. Lastly, it's a name brand and balances the batteries very well.
4. What’s not so great about it?
   It uses adapter wires to go from the banana clip connectors to XT60 or whatever else you're using. It also has the balance board. So if I'm charging two batteries I need to plug in four adapters. There are some chargers that are specific to XT60 that have the XT60 ports right on the charger itself and also have the balance plugs right on the charger, so that you don't need any adapters unless you're charging a different style like XT30. Another not so great thing is that it "talks", which I find unuseful.
5. How much did it cost?
   $130
6. Where can I get one today?
   Amazon, but it's a common brand.
7. What else do we need to know about it?
   It has a 12v DC output that I've found useful on a couple occasions. It has an app, which would be nice except that it always crashes, so don't count on that.

 

[Mr NCT]

1. What do you use? Tenergy TB6-B Balance Charger Discharger 1S-6S Digital Battery Pack Charger for NiMH/NiCD/Li-PO/Li-Fe Packs LCD Hobby Battery Charger w/ Tamiya/JST/EC3/HiTec/Deans Connectors + Power Supply 01435
2. Does it require a special power supply? Has one
3. What’s so great about it? Easy to use once it's set up, lots of battery connectors
4. What’s not so great about it? Takes some research & reading to set up programs
5. How much did it cost? $50
6. Where can I get one today? https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00466PKE0/?tag=lstir-20
7. What else do we need to know about it? Comes with clips to run off car battery

 

[Merv]

What do you use?
Imax B6, I use 8 of them. I don't want to wait all day to charge my batteries. If someone calls and wants to fly, I'm good to go.

Does it require a special power supply?
The Imax comes in 2 flavors, one runs on 120v plus 12v, the other 12v alone. Pick the one you want, I prefer the latter.

What’s so great about it?
With 8 of them, I don't have to wait long to charge a bunch of batteries. They are easy to operate, inexpensive, when one quits, I can replace it. They work great on any battery up to about 4,000 mAh. They will charge a larger battery but it will be slow.

What’s not so great about it?
With 8, cable management can be an issue.

How much did it cost?
It varies, on sale they are about $20 each.

Where can I get one today?
They are widely available. Ebay, Amazon, AliExpress, Banggood. I'm sure many other vendors, pick the one you prefer.

What else do we need to know about it?
I started with a 4 channel charger, cost $125 or so. It was great, until one channel quit, then another.
That's when I decided to go with individual chargers. I put 4 of them on a board to make them easier to handle. I keep a couple spares on hand, so when one quits, I just replace it and order another on the slow boat from China. It's inevitable that one will quit every year or so. As long as I'm just replacing inventory, I don't care that it takes 3-4 weeks to arrive. I prefer the 12v only version, they are cheaper. This allows me to power them all with one large 12v power supply, less to plug in and fewer cords to manage. When traveling, just throw everything into an old suitcase and go.

 

[Clintonious]

Well I was hoping for a little more input… maybe it’s the slow season around here?

 

[Bricks]

Well I was hoping for a little more input… maybe it’s the slow season around here?

What are you actually looking for I could name some great chargers if you want to spend some serious money. You did get answers to most of the questions you asked.

Having some common sense generally rules when it comes to charging lipo batteries do they catch fire, yes they can is it common nope. Only fire I have had is crashing a plane and damaging a Lipo. The Lipo slid forward and made contact with a motor screw puncturing the lipo, my own fault for not making sure the screws were covered. I abuse my battery's badly and the above is the only fire i have ever had.

 

[tamuct01]

I started with a 50W charger that was good for up to 6S batteries. It had both AC and DC power inputs. As I moved to larger planes and larger batteries, 50W of charging power became a limitation. I bought a Harbor Freight case, found a pair of old server power supplies, a few 200W Turnigy chargers, and built a charging box. I have multiple charging dongles for anything from a 1S 150mAh to a 6S 5000mAh battery and can charge 3 different types at once and more if I do parallel charging of like batteries.

There's nothing wrong with starting small, but it's likely you'll want something larger pretty soon. The Harbor Freight boxes are a great value. The Turnigy chargers have been great. I have one of each of these:
https://hobbyking.com/en_us/0620duo-600w-charger-300w-x2-version-2.html (it's just 2x of these in the same box

https://www.amazon.com/Turnigy-Reaktor-300W-Balance-Charger/dp/B077HYKNSW/ref=cm_cr_arp_d_product_top?ie=UTF8

They used to make a 4x version also. They're all discontinued now. :-(

Server power supplies make a very efficient 120V to 12V DC power supply. You can usually find the pinouts online and how to "hotwire" them. It's a great option if you're ok with soldering and electronics. The new supplies are tiny compared to what I have (2x supplies from a Dell 2950), but mine were free.

Good luck!