Do you think these are protected?

Batteries and Chargers Rechargeable Batteries
1

I bought these on the basis they where listed as ‘protected’, however the cells don’t say anything on them about protection. Do you think they are?

Also if I wanted to measure capacity (mAh) how would I go about doing it?


2

I think they are

3

Yes, they are protected.

You will need a hobby charger to measure capacity.
I don’t have one, maybe someone can tell you more (how to, where to buy).

4

They do look protected, you can usually tell from the negative end which is slightly smaller in diameter than the rest of the battery. That part is the PCB which is stuck onto the negative end of the battery.

5

Thanks :slight_smile:

6

Definitely protected. In order to measure capacity you need a hobby charger, there are some fairly cheap ones that can be had for around 30 dollars.

7

Hi, I have bought these from BIC and they are totally not worth spending money on them. Maximal capacity that I measured was below 300mAh. If you have bought them from elsewhere, you may have a luck but I don’t believe it. I can recommend the TrustFire Flames from dealextreme that cost just 1 dollar more and have capacity over 900mAh

8

If you could recommend any hobby chargers that’d be great thanks.

9

What price range? The cheapest one is the Imax B6.

http://www.hobbyking.com/hobbyking/store/__6478__IMAX_B6_AC_Charger_Discharger_1_6_Cells_GENUINE_.html

10

ECO 6 + Power supply is cheaper and works just fine

11

Can that discharge and measure capacity?

12

Sure, it can. Software is the same in both chargers. Nice bonus is that you can monitor and log the data with logview if you buy USB/UART dongle.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/CP2102-Module-USB-to-USART-UART-3-3V-TTL-USB-To-COM-Free-Cables-/180956763688?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item2a21dd1628

13

The cheap hobby chargers usual has a max. of 1A discharge current, this is fine to check batteries.

If you really want to test and produce curves, you need something with a higher limit, like the iCharger 208B. It can discharge at much higher currents and also record the discharge offline, then you can connect the computer and download the curve at a later date.

14

This is right, but you can save the log even with the ECO 6 with the logview.

15

What power supply would you recommend? Also do you know of a place that sells the USB thing in the US? (I'm planning on ordering from a HobbyKing USA Warehouse)

16

I’m using this one

If you have no problem with spending a little more money, buy the Turnigy Accucell 6. It is almost the same charger but it is in better case and its build quality is a bit better. If you want the usb adapter, just search for usb/uart adapter (CP2102 chip is fine). The charger may need a little modifications to work with the logview. It depends on which revision you get. Everything can be found on the internet.

17

You can see the protection strip that connects +V the the protection board. See the text “and empty condition” on the top cell.

18

Cap is probably about 1/4 of listed. I get 10 min on the (14500) TF compared with 40 min with AW. I wasted enough money on these crap batteries. I will now only buy top shelf batts. Not saying anyone else should not buy them & you may even find a good one LOL… I recycled the ones I had. I tore the wrappers on them for when someone resells them at least they will have to go to the trouble of re-wrapping them. They piss me off!

Keith

19

Any budget recommendation for a hobby charger that can also do ~5A discharge curves?

Also, how does this logview and dongle stuff work?

20

The charger simply sends serial data during charging that are resolved and displayed by Logview.