Chargers 2 chargers and still not one will balance charge

holtneil

holtneil

Active Member
Hi guys why cant I get a battery to balance charge , I have 2 chargers and they will not balance charge , even a 2 cell comes off after 90 mins at 4,20 and 4,19 ,my 6 cells are even worse they range from 4,16 to 4,20
the charges are the mega 400w ( hobby king ) and a basic 4 button 50w charger I cant remember the make
twice to day I tried to fly my Goblin 630 comp after fully charging the receiver pack and optipower back up kicked in after only 2 mins flight so when I got home I charged the 2 cell as single cells ,cell one took 225 amps and cell 2 took 210 amps after this the battery managed to do its flights as normal
I cant trust any of my chargers to do a full balance charge or a full charge as the cells read all different
 
Tony

Tony

Staff member
Have you thought about upgrading to a better charger? I'm using the icharger 306b and it does pretty well. Never had an issue. I'm also using that DP6 charger and again, works pretty well.

As for why yours are not balancing, I'm not sure. Unless you have a bad cell in every battery. Which is unlikely.
 
Smoggie

Smoggie

Well-Known Member
Neil,

Bear in mind that the difference between 4.2 and 4.19V is one hundredth of a volt, or about 1% of the batteries capacity... i.e. it's insignificant.

The problem with balancing taking forever is twofold:

  • First the internal resistance of the battery cells won't be as close to one another as when the battery was new. This is a normal part of a batteries aging process but if it gets too bad balancing becomes a problem. The different cell resistance puts a great load on the batteries balancing circuit as it tries to compensate.
  • Second your chargers have low 'balance drain current' rating. Balance drain current is the current that the charger can drain from the high cell so as to allow the low cell to 'catch up'. The Mega 400 charger has only 0.2A drain current. For comparison a Powerlab PL6/8 has 1A and an iCharger Duo has 1.2A per channel. This wont be a problem with a new battery but as the battery ages and cell resistances drift it becomes a real issue and balancing often will time out before completing.

There isn't really a simple answer other than 'throwing money at it' and getting a better charger with much higher balance drain current rating. Taking good care of your batteries delays the onset of the problem. How do you store your batteries?.. Leaving them charged for any length of time does damage that will cause the internal resistance to increase, it's best to only charge on the day you fly.

Remind me....What are you using for the receiver pack?
 
holtneil

holtneil

Active Member
Hi Steve well the receiver pack is a zippy compact 2200 mah 20c , the main flight packs are zippy compact 4000 mah 30c they are all new , so looks as I need to change the chargers
at the moment I charge them then do each low cell with a lead I made to charge as a single cell
 
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Admiral

Admiral

Well-Known Member
Hi Neil, please don't be offended, but are you selecting Balance Charge? I have a friend who's batteries were getting out of balance with an iMax B6, when I went to watch him charge he was plugging the balance lead in but not selecting Balance only pressing the button to charge. Turns out he had been just charging for two years not Balancing.
 
Smoggie

Smoggie

Well-Known Member
Tony said:
I have done that before. Gotten in a hurry and just hit fast charge lol.
Click to expand...


That's fine as long as you do a balance charge every few charges. If I charge at home I usually balance but when charging in the field I don't bother as the balance part of the charge cycle can take quite a bit of time.
 
trainrider06

trainrider06

Active Member
i have rarely had a battery outta all my batteries charge level out at 4.20 per cell My chargers are a Thunder Power 1010
and an I Charger 3010B Usually its coming out to 4.20/4.19/4.19/4.20/4.18/4.20 or something funky like that. I have only had 2 chargers that were spot on every time an old Imax B6, and I can't remember the other one LOL but i got a short one time in one of those multi lead charge leads that came with it, and the thing never worked right again! broke my heart....:(
 
Smoggie

Smoggie

Well-Known Member
Mine never end up at 4.2V, the voltage on my batteries falls back to around 4.17V per cell.

This is deliberate because I've set the charge end current to cut off at 10% of starting current. Trickling in the last couple of hundredths of a volt takes an inordinate length of time and I'm too impatient for that. It's actually better for the batteries not to charge all the way to 4.2v, and the effect on flight time is insignificant.
 
holtneil

holtneil

Active Member
Hi guys all it is for some reason if the receiver battery is not right the backup kicks in ,if this was not fitted I may no know there is a problem ( this problem may not be a problem but back makes you think it is ) ok so I won't worry about it lol
 
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