I’ll keep it simple. I bought a nitecore intelli charger i4 v2 now I’m wondering if I should have opted for a hobby charger there all in the same general price ranges. If I keep the nitecore am I at a disadvantage for balancing and discharging for long term storage?
Some hobby chargers that caught my eye are:
imax B6
Hobbyking 50w 5A
Turnigy Accucel 6
Turnigy Max 80W
HobbyKing ECO6-10
Turnigy A-6-10
GT Power A-6
Hobbyking ECO8
I don’t have a power supply but that seems like another worthwhile purchase for working on electronics.
To further make me feel like I have a bit of buyers regret, I’m thinking when my son gets older I would like to get into RC cars boats and planes with him and these seem essential to that. Okay so maybe I dint keep it simple.
I’m really just starting out here but I don’t mind paying a little more for something that is better quality and has more growth headroom. I’m open to suggestions.
The i4 is a good charger, nothing wrong with it. It just cant do as much as a hobby charger. If I had to pick, I guess I would go for the Acccucel 6. A laptop like power supply can be purchased for it for about 10 bucks from ebay that just plugs right in.
I started out with a accucul 6 and then moved up to a accucel 8150. Never had a problem with either one besides the fan being noisy on the 8150. Not hard at all to fix. Now I have moved up to a icharger 208b. I will suggest if you plan on doing a lot with the charger now or in the future to go ahead and spend the extra cash and get the icharger. I almost spent enough buying the 6 and then the 8150 to have purchased the icharger to start with. :~
It really depends on what all you need a charger to do. If you just need to store and charger 18650’s and smaller li-ion’s and Nimh batteries, then the i4 will work. Use a Dmm to monitor li-ion cell voltage either by charging the cells up to 3.8v at rest or if there already charged, discharge them in a flashlight until 3.8v is read with the Dmm after the have been out of the light 5 minutes or so. If there around 3.8v there ready to be stored. I do suggest storing them in a cool place. The cooler the better as long as its above the freezing point.
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The hobby charger is very versatile on what you can charge with it. It can run a discharge test to check battery capacity, which can help in monitoring the life of the cell or to tell if a cell is crap. It can charge so many different types of cells. The charging rate can be set for the particular cell you are charging. This is good feature to have if you have different size li-ions that require different charge rates. It can prep li-ions for storage which you all ready know. Some chargers have a internal resistance test. This is good for checking the health of a cell or how well it can supply current. Some chargers have a usb data port which can be used with a computer along with a program called logview, to monitor and graph exactly what the battery is doing while being charged or discharged. Its nice to have graphs of a cell discharge to see how well it copes under different current discharges and lets you see the voltage sag of that cell.
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Not everyone needs a hobby charger, its more up to the individual on what they need a charger to do. So if you need some of those features the hobby charger will do it.
Thanks for the information. I definitely want the more functionality so it seems like that is the deciding factor. Now just to the fun part picking one out. while the icharger 208b looks nice thats probably still a bit more than I’m willing to dish out now. The accucel 6 does seem to have alot of appeal as a option. But to get something with a bit more headroom in between it and say the icharger 208b, the Turnigy A-6-10 looks like the bang for the buck answer. From what I’ve read its a slight upgrade over the accucel 8150. Well I’m going to keep looking a bit more at other options before I pull the trigger. I’ve ruled out the HK models and the imax listed above. Another contender is the AC680 but given its price the a-6-10 still seems to be the way to go. I’ll check back for any other suggestions
The 203 watt model will do 16.5 amps, the 175 watt 14.2 amps, the 150 watt 12.1 amps. I was lucky that I had 203 watt laying around not being used. If you need any help with the wiring, I could maybe help, just PM me. I took a few pictures when I tore into mine.
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Did you have a look at the icharger 106b?
Hey thanks for the PS suggestion I’ll take a look at it.
As far as the 106b, yeah I did but it was ~80 dollars compared to the ~35dollar A-6-10 which didn’t seem to have as much headroom (meaning beyond li-ion 18650s and similar). Decisions decisions
Speaking of external PS, checking the rcgroups maybe for 8 months I find a PS that can push 100 amp with 220v AC input, I buy a pair in ebay for less than 26$ shipped to my USA address, I’ve been using one of them for maybe three months to drive a car amplifier and some Leds strips in my living room, this PS is just perfect and cheap, here is some info;
I'd prefer to use the existing cord unless the brick is easy to take apart and put back together. Can the 12V's and grounds be combined? The way I'm reading this, they can be combined. If that's the case, do you know why they use three separate wires instead of one?
I’m pretty sure when I was in there all the same colored wires lead to the same place on the board. You can do this and keep the cord. http://www.instructables.com/id/How-to-turn-an-X-Box-360-PSU-into-a-12v-lab-PSU/?ALLSTEPS
Have no idea about the number of wires unless it was to keep size down for flexibility. 3 wires also can carry 3 times the current of a single one.
Or take it apart, not very complicated, Xbox 360 Power Supply Teardown - iFixit unsolder the existing wires from the board and wire in two large wires one to + and another to - about 16” long, 16 AWG would probably be plenty but larger wire wouldn’t hurt either, high strand count silicone wire would be the best, very flexible. Its all labeled on the board and you should know which color wire is which polarity. Then solder in a small wire from the blue wire solder pad to the red wire solder pad, add the appropriate banana plugs and your good to go.
