for the more exotic batteries I will need to power all the new flashlights I will be forced into buying after reading all the great advice you will be giving me. H)
What is the current feeling running about the best charger for the non standard battery types beyond AA? I would like to cover most of the exotics
with one charger, and I am the type that likes to know more about what is going on with each battery rather than less.
I've seen reference to "Hobby Chargers", but don't quite know what that means. Any guidance you can give me is greatly appreciated.
You'd be surprised what kind of mileage you can get out of AA/AAA lights these days. My current favorite light is actually an ultrafire RL-168 (single AA/14500), and you can't beat eneloops and other LSD (low self discharge) cells for longevity. Throw the battery in the light, put the light in your glove box, and six months, a year from now, it'll still be at 80%+ charge.
If you're in for monster throw, you'll end up most likely having to go with 18650 cells. They're 3.7v (nominal) lithium ion cells that you can find pretty cheap chargers for, eg. this. I'm sure someone else will come along with a better recommendation before long, but it's a decent starting point.
Check out the dealer ratings threads before you buy anything... Personally, I favor DX for price, but they've got long lead times and semi-crappy service.
Oh, and hobby chargers are usually used for charging battery packs, rather than individual batteries. So if you've got, say, an RC car or helicopter that has a battery with a molex connector on it, you'd need a hobby charger.
This is a really popular charger. I have the Tenergy version of it, all of my Lions fit it and it terminates at exactly 4.20 every time so I can recommend it.
I have this hobby charger also but I don't use it much it is kind of overkill. It is good for measuring cells and it will charge anything if you want to have only one charger.
Trustfire TR-001 is also a decent inexpensive choice. You can't go wrong with wf-139 , i like he tr-001 because you also can charge 16340 cells without mods to the charger.
I can only agree. I haven't recieved my XTAR charger yet, so I can't say if they are similar, but after having dismantled a WF-139, they look horrible. The soldering isn't good, the components are properly recycled from old electronics or something like it and it looks like a quick prototype mockup. After seeing this, I keep an extra good eye on this charger every time I use it - and I would definitely inspect all parts of the circuit board before using it, if I accidentally dropped the charger.
If you don't want to wait weeks you can get the Tenegy one from Amazon in a couple days for a couple bucks more, that is what I did. I have ordered several TR-001s from DX for friends and they are exactly the same as the Tenergy except for the stickers.