Review / Measurement: Charger module with TP4056 controller

Thank you for your answer. You are right, I’ve read this part (Pavithra_uk’s results in the other thred) too and these are the same boards I’ve got with all the equal markings. Did you used any of them? I think the biggest risk would be if the termination voltage is not accurate enough (>4.2V). For most applications it wouldn’t matter if the charging take a little longer than possible with genuine TP4056.

Antenne, tell the seller it costs more to ship it back to china than its worth. The seller of course is already well aware of that, he is just hoping you will give up and go away.

I haven’t seen anyone chart the charge profile of any clone chips yet. So we don’t even know if they are proper cc/cv.

I wonder if it anyway possible to mod these cheap usb charger boards to adjust the final voltage? my TP4056 10440 charger is only charging to 4,17v and because the small 10440 battery has so little energy to begin with, i would really like to get a charger that charges it to 4,2-4,25v.

I understand it is possible to charge lithium battery to 4,25v but you lose half the possible charge cycles, from 500 to 250, but because these small battery is relatively cheap i would happily exchange some charges for more lumens and longer runtimes, and just replace them when they can’t keep up anymore.

You don’t only lose charge cycles, capacity will be degraded. Your working against yourself by overcharging.

Yes i know capacity will be degraded, that is the nature of the best unfortunately.

And the capacity degrading happen with all lithium battery, for every cycle you get a tiny bit less, i would like to exchange a bit more capacity for a bit more loss of capacity per cycle.

And because i often only discharge them to max 3,3v i think it could possibly even out in the end.

But as i said at least i would like to charge them to 4,2v, so is there any way to fix these boards so the charge to full capacity?

I don’t agree that i work against my self if i would slightly overcharge, i can easily discard a battery that doesn’t fully charge at the expected time anymore, and buy another one.
And until that happen i would gain more output and more runtime, exactly what i want.

It might be possible to increase the termination voltage by providing the chip a ground that is actually slightly above ground. 0.03v. Input voltage can vary though. You need to start with stable voltage then pull the 0.03v off that.

Instead you could just try a few chips until you find one that hits 4.20v.

Another way to near 4.2V termination voltage is reduce charging current by changing programming resistor

Instead of stock 1A, if program to 250mA, termination current will be 25mA (or 12mA for some boards) then battery can reach 4.2V

Thanks for the ideas Halo & Pavithra

I already have reduced charging current to 130mA because i am charging a 350mA 10440 battery, and it is with that reduced charging current i only get 4,17v.

@Halo, how would i provide the ground slightly higher? is it by somehow feeding the - on the 5v side with a to start with 0,03v load?, do you have any idea how i could do that? maybe by a battery or a adjustable powersupply……
Or do you mean that i should pull 0,03v of the 5v power source i use to power the board?

below 4.2vdc that is the batteries internal resistance resting/stabilization point…trying to get it to EXACTLY 4.2vdc will rarely happen…

If it stays well above 4.1vdc after a “full” charge the battery is still good…if it starts going much below 4.1 after the charger says it’s charged then it might be time to retire that battery as it is no longer anywhere near it’s 80–100 capacity anymore

I put 2.2K resistors on mine…I get right at 500mA charge current and the batteries terminate much closer to 4.2vdc…takes a LONG time…but that is the nature of the beast…lower charge current but also less stress on batteries and more charge cycles but much much longer charge times

Hi Kaiser,
I do not know what the additional BAT- connection is for yet, It may be that they are common battery grounds.
On the original board a MOSFET (8205A) disconnects the negative battery terminal when the battery voltage drops too low. I am hopeing that the EN connection will do the same from an outside signal.
R & G connections are for a 3 pin dual colour LED.
I have ordered some to test and will let you know my findings.
I am trying to create a type of 5V UPS for a Raspberry Pi.

Hi John,

If you find anything usefull about this type of TP4056 please let us know.
I already received mine and used for what it was intended for. I had a cheap Tesco branded cordless screwdriver. I wasn’t using it much because batteries didn’t last long and it takes quite long to charge. But since I had some laptop-pull 18650 batteries I thought it might be interesting to replace original batteries with one 18650 and use TP4056 board for charging. Conversion went quite easy. Only thing that motor refused to work when connected to P- so I’ve soldered it to second B- instead. I don’t know why because multimeter was shoving the right voltage. But I’m not that good with electric stuff so can’t tell the reason. Maybe it’s something obvious :slight_smile: Anyway, the screwdriver works and charges now.

Just had an email from the supplier. He states that the EN pin does nothing.
Looking at tghe photo of the board it looks like it goes to 2 pind on the chip next to it.
This could be a DW01x chip as pin 1 & 3 on that chip go to a MOSFET gate

So all I got was fake, and all of it has chips have the same logo. And for all of it I asked the seller will they ship genuine items. The answer was yes. Of course they didn’t. Two of them are obviously using the same dropshipping service, because I recived on the same day, 2 identical packages, from different ebay sellers, in identical envelopes, identical packaging inside. Ebay has become pretty useless and unreliable crap. Now I’m supposed to do what, open 3 disputes over 4$ worth of goods, and have endless conversations in chinglish. It’s more the unreliability that annoys me.

sorry to hear that, you have the worst luck with ebay it seems, it would be really hard not to be really pissed off when you asked and they straight up lied to you.

Maybe we should keep a database in the forum with bad ebay sellers………?

I have one on order from DX. If it ever gets here I'll let you know what it is.

spent a bit more time on that $3 purchase, and asked ebay.com to step in, since seller didn’t provide return shipping label (I got non-genuine tp4056 ICs), quote:

_“Since this is an international transaction, eBay cannot force the seller to pay for the return shipping of the item. The rules on the site are geared towards members located in the US since eBay.com is the US core site. In order to return for a full refund, you will need to pay for the shipping out of pocket and then upload the tracking number in the return request.

If the return shipping is more than expected, then I would recommend you continue working with the seller on a partial refund amount on the items.“_

That means ebay buyers protection isn’t worth anything anymore, before very recently when it was not as described you ALWAYS got you money back as long as you could prove it without having to send anything back EVER.

I think i will pay a little more if i find the same item on aliexpress now if i have to, because there it is at least still like that.

Cajampa, but it doesn’t sound like vex_zg is trying to do a SNAD claim.

Vex_zg, is it the seller that says you need to send it back or did you do a SNAD claim and ebay says it needs to be returned?

I agree, i have a sneaking suspicion of that also, they really hide that option well nowadays, before the resolution center was way more visible and easy to use.

I just filed a claim against a shoddy seller who sold me a flashlight lens that looked nothing like the listing pictures, when i didn’t get a response on the return/refund section of the resolution center i tried to get ebay to step in but couldn’t i only got error messages. But today i got my full refund from the seller :slight_smile: it was only 2$ but it is the principle & i am still missing the part i thought i had bought :frowning:

Some sellers like to give you a hassle in hopes you’ll just go away. They know return shipping back to china with tracking is much more than a lot of items are worth.
Take a picture of the board you received showing the chip markings then send that to the seller along with a copy of the picture in their listing and quote the message you sent prior to sale asking if the item is as pictured. Tell them refund or neg feedback.