Request for input on charger components
1st use
Button on end must be pushed to make output active and also to activate light control. Meter reads low power with partially discharged batteries.
Green light on left signals output is discharging. Charged cell phone from dead to ~80% including about 1 hour heavy wireless data & screen usage, power level dropped with auto shut off. 44% in first hour, another ~15-20% during 2nd hour with use, balance in 3rd hour. Tried charging other devices including another phone and IPad, but battery capacity too low to do more than a percent or so on each. Lights continue to work.
Recharged via car charger, red light on right active while charging. Unit warm while charging. Red turns to green light to signal charge complete? Meter reads batteries full. Batteries removed and tested at 4.1v.
Two
Sanyo batts installed with 4.2v charge. Cell phone charged from ~50% to full in ~2 hours with screen and all radios active (and no cell tower) during entire charge cycle. Green light stays on after phone says charging complete, turns off after phone disconnected from power supply. Power meter no longer reads full (3 of 4 lights).
2nd cell charged while on from 15% to 100% in about 3 hours with some app use. Power meter down to low again. Lights still working well for what they are; quite surprising how well the two smooth beams merge.
Charged phone while using it for about an hour and output shut down part way through. When battery cutoff occurs, lights are also disabled. However, reactivating the unit will let lights work. (Will lights cut off?) Sanyos were both discharged to 3.04v so it appears the boost driver has this as a lower limit. Getting the flush Phillips screws out again was a pain. Need to look for hex/torx/knurled replacements!!!
Three
While I look for new screws, I’ll think on whether to try IMR 2250s or a single 3100 next (all 3 new from Kumabear). Hmmm. Well, I don’t like the way protected batts fit, so I’ve got Sanyos almost ready to go back in off a separate charger. I was able to cram 1 UF3000 in (lights worked), but I felt 2 Keeppowers were too tight and I don’t want to clip the springs (which are on both ends).
Couldn’t find good extremely small screws, so I’ve hogged out the case with much larger screws off a PC and have sanded the ridges off the faceplate corners. Hope it holds together. Tail stands fine with the larger screws.
Noticed that after charging phone to 100% the usb output shuts off and phone discharges. If I push the power meter button, output and phone charging cycle restarts. I also found that end plate needs to be completely seated. If it is not, the power meter can stay on, and that would drain the batteries over time.
Was going to try to rig up a way to try and measure draw current (though it might not be accurate due to extra resistance wire. But I somehow managed to create smoke. Can’t find where, batteries and all components look OK to the eye. So I’ve shelved that idea for now.
Lessons / To Do
- Test would be more useful if batteries had verified capacity -> get a charger that will measures this
- Chinese screws are garbage -> Replacements inserted
- Cutting up old USB printer cables is fun -> finish the cable wire leads
- Cell phone pics suck -> use digital camera when possible
- Know charger rating before using -> our Verizon car charger has no specs on it or the web site, it appears to be ~1A in that it does fast charging and was designed for 2 devices.
- Phone input monitoring would be ideal -> Please PM me if you find an Android Battery Widget/App that gives a charging input reading (I’ve found some that estimate charge time but without current values)