I’ve spoken with DLYFull yesterday, like I said before, and they said that if there’s not enough interest for a brand new aluminium charger, they could use their current UT4 as the base.
The reason for making a whole new charger base? 75-78mm 21700 compatibility and better heatsinking.
It was pretty clear that a new mold would be too big a risk from the beginning, but what do you mean when you say it will be aluminum? Are you thinking a single milled chunk, or a bent case like the steel cases commonly seen on other electronics? A solid piece would be fantastic just for the heft, but I’m a bit concerned it would impact costs quite a bit - and what measures will be taken to prevent bare cells or internal components from shorting against the conductive body? Surely a thin layer of anodizing or paint isn’t sufficient?
This seems like an interesting project for sure, but I’m concerned the specific requirements you have for a charger may be to niche compared to others, and the budget may make it impossible to create a quality product that meets the requirements safely.
Have you considered working with the Cheali Charger software It’s open source, and seems to do just about everything you want when paired with an Imax B6. A custom case with all the bits and pieces you want could be a lot easier to create, and basing it off an existing product could improve reliability. Or is there a reason you don’t want to go this route?
@bmengineer, I’m not worried about that. Who do you think built the aluminium ISDT chargers?
A thick layer of black anodizing(50um+) should be sufficient.
Anyway, that, I don’t know yet what method will be used. I’ll have to ask later.
About the 49$US budget, they said that even with the nickel plated brass holders, it’s actually a rather reasonable price as a 4 cell charger for the BLF GB, even including the necessary safety measures and testing that I asked for.
Any larger than that, and new tooling would make it much more expensive, since it’s built out of aluminium. Still way less than a plastic mold though.
I wasn’t aware ISDT had aluminum slot chargers. And what are your thoughts on Cheali? Even if you’re set on using entirely different software, supporting the readily available open source software seems like an obvious path to take, no?
The developer for cheali himself (Paweł Stawicki) is no longer actively working on the firmware. I think he perfected it and couldn’t find anything else to improve.
You can count with me in bulking up unconditionally, I do not back up even if am not straight interested right now due to economic reasons.
And even if I am a money-efficient :-) fellow I have to admit I personally would extend the price target a little bit, at least to guarantee room for the new aluminium chassis idea and/or other power user requirements/features. Aluminium can also be nickel plated for the rails.
Now that we're here BlueSwordM, you may want to start ordering nickel plated beryllium copper springs for the rails. :-D
Unnecessary granularity in the higher end while insufficient at the lower, button wise.
For less clicks, as default range something like 35 - 50 - 70 - 100 - 140 - 200 - 300 - 400 - 600 - 800 - 1200 - 1600 - 2400 - 3200 would fit best, imho. Progressive granularity in any case.
When you keep pressed a key on a computer keyboard it auto-repeats. This can also be of help but please make it quick enough (low repeat delay, high repeat rate).
