Miboxer C4-12 Couple of Queries

Possibly looking at getting one of these, can anyone tell me what it defaults to for charge rates on different batteries?

I was watching a video review and he put in a 26650 which was charging at 1.5 amp, a 16340 which defaulted to 0.1amp and a AA which was charging at 0.25amp and thought these were very low.
I tend not to “fry” my batteries and generally run something between 0.5 and 1C but the examples above were a lot below that …… if anybody knows what they default to for a relatively healthy battery …. AA’s …… AAA’s and 18650’s are the ones I’d be most interested in knowing about and does it vary depending on the battery’s health?

Also are there fakes of these around and if so any pointers on where best to buy from, I don’t mind if it’s a lot cheaper coming from China as I’m not in a rush for it as long as it’s genuine.

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I have an almighty Miboxer, but forgot the designation. 4-bays.

I think it checks the internal resistance of the cell when first loaded, then sets the charging current accordingly. Someone correct me if I’m mistaken.

I usually let it use its default settings anyway. Lazy, I suppose. :laughing:

Yeah, the charger has some kind of algorithm to decide how fast to charge the cells and it seems to even change rates on the fly as the cell’s IR changes with voltage. I actually really like it. You can manually override the current if you want but I’ve found it is MUCH faster than my old charger and it seems to do a better job as well. My wife has a hand held AA powered scanner and a AAA powered AM/FM radio that she seems to use A LOT. So, I like the C8, 8 channel charger as she can have 5 or so AAs and AAAs in there and there are still slots open for my 18650s, 21700s or 26650s for my lights.

Also, I’m lazy like Lightbringer. :slight_smile: I messed with the buttons and such when we first got the charger but lately I just put them in, wait for it to show the voltage and then walk away. I got mine direct from the MiBoxer Aliexpress store.
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My only gripe with it is the non-US style wall wart power supply which with the “adapter” feels like a bit of a fire hazard. I really should source a “proper” power supply for it.

For what it’s worth, 1C is pretty fast for a NIMH cell. Generally for NIMH, you want to charge somewhere around 0.5C or less.

You can see the goofy power supply in the background.

Actually, no for NiMH.

Charging at 0,5-1,0C for NiMH cells is actually good for them.
They aren’t nearly as temperature sensitive compare to lithium-ion during charging.

See, due to how NiMH cells behave during charging, using a higher current charger helps with end of charge detection, and proper charge cutoff, which does help with cycle life.

Which is why it is so important to not use a dumb charger.

When I was younger, my father used a dumb charger to charge our NiMH AAs we used a ton.

Most of them don’t work at all anynore, except for the Duracell’s that came with a smart charger. They still have 1700mAh of capacity.

I’m not a battery expert although I have flown RC things for in excess of 10 years so do know a bit about them, I did some fairly extensive research a couple of years ago about charging NiMH’s mainly because that’s what my transmitters use and whilst it does need a reasonable rate for the cut off as you say, the consensus seemed to be that around 0.25 / 0.33c was the ideal rate that the end of charge detection was still effective but was the “most friendly” for extended battery life and not getting how whilst charging which is what does the most damage.

When I bought my last charger I made sure it could be set down as low as 0.2amp as a lot of the smaller batteries are around 700 mah ….

This was though just other people’s opinions but some of them were battery geeks so not saying you’re wrong only recounting their views … if you have any links that show why 0.5 - 1c is better please do share them as at the end of the day I’m only interested in getting the best out of them.

As others already pointed out, it uses Internal Resistance test to determine charging current. And there in lies the problem. In my experience, C4-12’s internal resistance results are somewhat inconsistent , which sometimes leads to questionable charging current rates. But for the most part, it is programmed to err on the safe side. So if you let it choose charging rate automatically, you may end up with very long charging times now and then. But you can always manually set the charging rate if you need it charged faster.