Best bang for the buck charger? Anything on the horizon?

Best bang for your buck without doubt is the Liitokala Lii 500.

Supposed to be a revised Opus available shortly.

Liitokala Lii 500

Lii500 is definitely the most bang for your buck. Cheap and lots of features.

The Xtar VC4 is also only ~$20 on Amazon if you really liked your old Xtar but does not have nearly as many features.

Dang, I ordered an opus 2.2 . I will go check out the Lii500 and maybe give the opus a try before I return it. Any reason the Lii500 is around $25 on ebay but not really available / $50 on amazon?

If you mean the Opus c3100 v2.2, it’s a good charger, and a bit more versatile. It will do +reasonable +internal resistance, not perfect. There is a lot of discussion about the fan, which I don’t find a big deal-just lube it occasionally. I DO use a better power supply.

I also have had 3x Lii500 (still have 2, gave 1 away). Those are a bit easier to use, maybe a bit more accurate, but none of them did internal resistance worth a damn. I consider that function useless on this charger. I thought maybe it was my original model until I got the other 2 and those acted exactly the same. Still, for the price hard to beat. I don’t know why Amazon is way more expensive. You can get it for $20-25 with a bit of shopping.
http://us.gearbest.com/chargers/pp_228907.html?wid=24

HJK has excellent reviews on both. There are also LONG threads on both in the forum. The one on the Opus has gone pretty technical about the fan and power supply.

Aliexpress is where I got my last 2 Lii500. I’m in WA. For some reason they don’t take Paypal from WA. I was VERY leery of putting a credit card to that site, but decided to risk it and it turned out OK….so far. I’ve had a credit card hacked from a battery charger site weeks after the purchase.
I’m assuming a new user to the battery/charger business would be similarly leery.
You can do almost as well from Gearbest ($17) and the coupon [GearBEST's Sale . Rovyvon A5 $15.99 . Convoy S21 $15.99] for the bare charger.

Is there any comparison done on the Opus vs the Liitokala? What are the pros and cons of both?

The biggest issue with the Opus is it does pulse charging. HJK doesn’t like that. The high pulses affect the power supply (possibly inadequate), and the capacity accuracy. It may be damaging to smaller batteries due to the high pulses. There is debate on that.
I’ve got a better 5A power supply, and find the accuracy ‘close enough’. It certainly is in the same ballpark as my Lii500, and 2 hobby chargers I have.
It has more settings, and is generally more versatile, at least I think so.
The IR works, mostly. It gives me a rough idea of what’s going on.
Some people hate the fan. I don’t find it a big deal. I also have the charger sitting on top of an 80mm computer cooling fan.

The Lii500 is cheaper/simpler, with less settings. It uses continuous charging which is more desirable and apparently more accurate.
No fan. You can see that as a plus or a minus.
The IR is useless. At least in 3 chargers I have not found one that works. It gives you ‘readings’ but these have no correlation to what I know the battery condition is actually like. Not even remotely close to the Opus readings.
Not quite as versatile. Having said that I use it most of the time for general charging and capacity testing. BUT for particular batteries or settings will go to the Opus. I trust both of them for charging and capacity.
The batteries go in ‘backwards’. No big deal but you have to get used to it.
Spaces are tighter. Once loaded with 4 cells it’s a minor pain to get them out.
But, for features:price ratio it pretty much does not have a peer.

The Opus BT-C3100 has two nice features: you can see what’s going on on all four channels at a glance and it can charge at 2A on two slots - which is nice for 26650. I’ve been using two of them for more then a year with no issue. I also bought two spare fans just in case…

The pulse charging would make me nervous with some cells. Cells like the GA degrade very fast when charged at 3.5A, tested here. The Opus charge pulses are around 2.5A. I think it’s reasonable to think there might be some additional degradation as a result of charging with 2.5A pulses.

Well I didn’t claim anything as a fact. But without the relevant tests we have to make decisions about whether to use a 2.5A PWM charger on our cells. And for me, given the testing done I linked to, I choose to not use that charger.

The Opus also can be set to run three successive discharge/charge cycles. I like this feature for new batteries, as it allows you to give them a little exercise up front and also baseline their capacity. I'll generally mark the purchase date and capacity right on the cell.

This thread has been great. Ive been reading over in the Opus thread with all the overheating problems. A $50 charger shouldn’t have that. I will use it, do some tests on my cells, and send it back. Version 2.2 obviously isn’t perfect with people replacing fans and under powered power supplies. Really shocked me when I learned about all that with a $50 charger. It kinda seems like there is a gap in a solid, feature filled, charger? Maybe wait for the Opus 2.3 or 3xxx? I was only charging 3 cells and my 2.2 was chucking hot, hot, air out of its little fan in a 70 degree room. Just when I thought I found her, I had to read the thread :frowning:

I don’t assume the worst,I just want the best. I like its internal resistance feature. That is almost something that is a must have, not sure how accurate it is or if a separate tool does it better for cheaper (will research after post). But it said a brand new VTC6 was like 40 and a Samsung 25-R at 60. LG HG (brown) that have had a little use showing 100ish. I like the idea of bringing batteries back to life as well, got a bunch of laptop batteries that I run cheap lamps off that could probably use some TLC. I guess it knows how to charge and discharge it better than a regular cycle?

If you want the best then be ready to pay for it and get the skyrc MC3000 (around $90)
or a 4channel hobbycharger (around $200)

Read my posts again.
The IR works on the OPUS.
It does NOT work on the Lii500.
There is a non-charger process to find IR with voltmeters. Looks complicated to me, but probably more accurate. I find the IR for the OPUS to be a rough ‘measuring stick’. As long as you keep measuring the same thing with the same stick you get some sense of status and progress.

If anyone has figured out a way to get reasonable IR with the Lii500 I’d certainly like to know. Or was I unlucky and got 3 bad ones?

Frankly if I had to only have 1 charger it would probably be the Opus simply because I can do more with it.

I have read of problems with the MC3000 in the reviews at Illumination Supply—If it’s a mass produced item in these times—I’m sure there’s a certain amount of failure—- On the top end of prices I might pay the extra for a dealer in the states with a good return policy

If you are looking for [perfect], you aren’t going to find it.
You did ask for [best bang for the buck]. In that category there are always trade-offs. You have to decide which are important for you. What you’ll get here is other people’s opinions. They may not be the same as yours. If you are like me, you’ll have to own and use an analyzing charger for awhile to even figure what is important to you. And, you may find that changes over time as you gain experience.

I’m in radio controlled planes so used lipo batteries and hobby chargers for years before I got into li-on. At first I used the hobby chargers. Works fine but it’s 1 battery at a time unless you cobble together some kind of holders. Then I got the Opus. I almost completely quit using the hobby charger. Opus was much easier, and faster. When I heard about the Lii500, and read the reviews I picked one up. I didn’t much like it at first. I’ve grown to appreciate it’s qualities and use it routinely now. It will do pretty much what most people want. The Opus will just do a few more things. Lube the fan, get a better power supply (cheap-I got a used laptop 12v/5A at a PC recycle store for $2), and most of the shortcomings are not an issue.

You can fix some of the issues with the OPUS, some you can’t. The shortcomings on the Lii500, you can’t fix those. They are just missing.

So the Lii-500 doesn’t actually give an IR reading? Or just not one that is remotely accurate? That seems to be the only thing it lacks versus the opus?

I have no clue about pulse charging and how it effects the battery life; But it just seems like a constant charge would be better? Were the old TR-01 and Xtar chargers pulse or direct?

I have used the opus some now and I have some old batteries from a laptop battery (they still work for my cheap 18650 flashlights that don’t have any over-drain protection so I use them for those, (thats another topic, next flashlights I buy I really would like some that are cheap but won’t just run a battery seemingly until it has no voltage left). I decided to try and run refresh mode and 2 or 3 days later it looked like it was doing another charge cycle. Will it just indefinitely charge and discharge a bad or near bad battery or did it need like 5 days and I pulled it early? (had to pull it, was leaving and I don’t like leaving any charger unattended for long periods)

Really my old TR-01 does the job of charging the cells just fine. Really anything beyond a safe charge is just bells and whistles (which are k00). Seems like its a bit premature for really good IR readings and what-not at a decent price point. I gotta say I am leaning towards an Lii-500 alibaba style (I also like that it has USB output because sometimes on trips I like to know that I can pack extra cells and my charger and use it to charge a cell phone or something since I have plenty of cells around.

I think I have an old laptop charger around somewhere, are they the correct polarity for the opus (saw a warning in the manual)? Does it need more juice or is that just the Lii? Got a bit confused on that.