Golisi S4
Golisi is a new name in chargers and starts with an simple 4 channel universal charger.
It arrived in a black very stylish cardboard box, there is some specifications on the back.
The box included the charger, a mains cable and the instruction sheet.
The charger has universal mains (110-240VAC 50/60Hz) and a 12V input on the back.
The user interface is two buttons and a large display. The buttons can be used to change what is displayed, but do not affect the charging. Current selection depends on slot used and number of batteries.
It is possible to select between V, h(time) and mAh
During power on all the segments are shown.
Current is selected depending on number of batteries and slots (CH4 alone is 2A).
On the bottom of the charger there are specifications.
The slots uses the classical slider construction and it works fine.
The slots can work from 32 mm to 70.8mm. This nearly covers anything.
The charger can handle 70 mm long batteries including flat top cells.
The default charge current for 1 or 2 cells is 1A, this is rather high for small cells. To fix this always put at least 3 batteries in the charger when charging 14500/18350/16340, they do not all have to be small or empty.
Measurements
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Discharge LiIon battery with 0.3mA when not connected to power.
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When power is connected with a full battery, it will charge with about 0.4mA.
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Below 0.3 volt the charger will report error
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Below 2V the charger will assume NiMH
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Above 2V the charger will assume LiIon.
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Below about 0.9 volt the voltmeter is not very precise.
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A slot with a battery will not increase current when other slots are finished (Good).
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Display turns off after 30 seconds.
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Voltmeter is within 0.02V
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Voltmeter stops updating when charging is stopped and will not show above 4.20V
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A single LiIon in slot 4 is charged at 2A.
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Two LiIon in any slots is charged at 1A
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3 or 4 LiIon in any slots is charged at 0.5A
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NiMH is always charged at 0.5A
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Charger will not restart when voltage drops.
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The display turns off after 30 seconds.
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It will restart charging on reinsertion of the battery or power cycling.
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Power consumptions when idle without battery is 0.2 watt
Charging LiIon
Charge current is 2A, 1A or 0.5A, depending on slot and number of batteries.
A good CC/CV charge curve with a termination current just below 150mA.
Display shows 3375mAh 3:34
The other 3 slots looks about the same, except slot \#4 charges at 2A when used alone.
Display shows 3331mAh 1:58
Display shows 2730mAh 3:07
Display shows 2995mAh 3:22
The old cell reach CV phase fairly fast, the charger handles this fine.
Display shows 2264mAh 3:28
Even this worn down cell is handled fine, but the charger current is a bit high.
Display shows 228mAh 0:31
Again the current is a bit high.
Display shows 804mAh 1:03
With 4 cells the current is reduced, but the termination current stays the same.
The charger uses a bit below 1A from the 12V input for charging 4 cells.
M1: 34,3°C, M2: 36,4°C, M3: 36,2°C, M4: 34,2°C, M5: 40,1°C, M6: 40,4°C, HS1: 50,8°C
M1: 38,8°C, HS1: 47,9°C
The charger needs about 3 seconds to initialize.
Charging NiMH
Charge current is always 0.5A with NiMH
The charging is terminated on voltage and there is no top-off charge. It looks like the temperature is just about to increase, i.e. the battery is as good as full.
Display shows 1767mAh 4:11
Display shows 1738mAh 4:07
Display shows 1633mAh 3:52
The other 3 batteries also terminates on voltage and also with a slight temperature raise.
Display shows 1703mAh 4:02
Display shows 2348mAh 5:34
These two high capacity batteries looks fine.
Display shows 2745mAh 6:30
But this old worn down cell did not really work or maybe it did, it was charged about 220mAh.
The AAA was also charged fine, but I am missing a temperature raise, i.e. it is not fully charged.
Display shows 674mAh 1:35
The full cell was detected in 12 minutes.
Display shows 88mAh 0:12
This time it looks like it may have used a -dv/dt (or 0dv/dt) termination.
With four AA batteries it needs about 0.5A from the 12V input.
M1: 34,0°C, M2: 35,9°C, M3: 35,4°C, M4: 34,0°C, HS1: 45,3°C
NiMH also needs about 3 seconds to initialize.
Testing with 2830 volt and 4242 volt between mains and low volt side, did not show any safety problems.
Conclusion
This is a fairly simple charger to use with no selections, but this also means it is a bit difficult to charge small cells with the correct current (There must be 3 batteries in the charger). Restricting the 2A current to a specific slot, means that it is always possible to charge a single cell at 1A.
The display shows charge current, volt and mAh, but the automatic turn off means that a button must be pressed to see the values. The display turn off also means that it is required to press a button to see when the charger is finished.
I will rate it as a good and simple charger, but I am missing a charge done indicator I can see without pressing a button.
Notes
The charger was supplied by Golisi for review.
It is possible to keep the background light on, just hold the button down for a few seconds and the auto-off feature is disabled. This is not explained in the manual!
Here is an explanation on how I did the above charge curves: How do I test a charger