Batteries charger brain dead

grumpy1

Active Member
Man....its always something.....gotta get a new charger...lookin at a thunder ac680 pro dual power...any got any comments pro/con....had my charger in shop today on shelf about 25 feet away from work area..but today was welding on aluminum all day which requires the use of high frequency on welding machine to be turned on....guess the exposure to high frequency scrambled its brains charger want even come on now....one thing for sure it taught me a valuable lesson...just don't have charger in shop at all
 

murankar

Staff member
I dont know what you have for packs or how many. While I still use my thunder power ac6 dual power i would suggest something different. Personally I have nothing against the thunder power but 1 thing, its only 5 amps. It will take you forever to charge even a 3s pack. I would suggest a Power labs gt500. Its 169.99 kitted ready to go minus a 12/24v power source. You can get a 12v source for really cheap off ebay. On 12v this charger will give you about 250 watts at about 10 amps. This will half your charge times and get you flying quicker and get a lot more flights a day. I wish this charger would have came out in february of this year. I could have saved some cash because I ended up getting the powerlabs pl6 which is 1000w at 40 amps. I can charge 4 3s packs from storage to full in about 20 minutes. On the thunder power that will be about 4 hours. The gt500 would give you about 30 or 40 minutes on a 12v power source. The biggest pro to the gt500 is that it is a charger that will grow with you. It can handle up to 8s which is well beyond what you will need. From what I am seeing in the hobby for helicopters most air frames are going to 6s and 12s (which is 2 6s packs) so this solution fits. Now its not a true work horse charger but if your only doing 3s then it can be. The gt500 can give you a lot of data on your packs that the thunder power wont give you and if it does i am not sure how accurate it will be.

Now Junsi makes the iChrger which is a huge competitor to PowerLabs. In most cases you can get just about everything the Gt500 has in ah iCharger. If you want to compair the brands go to Home - ProgressiveRC and see what they have. Yes these chargers cost a bit more but in the end they will last a lot longer. I would get a charger that is a bit higher than what you need so you can grow into it.

Anyhow thats where I am at on this.
 

Lee

Well-Known Member
+1 on getting as good a charger as you can afford.
Powerlab and Icharger are the two front runners, as far as chargers go.
The new GT500 looks the business.
Nick on RC Heli Nation Podcast, just did a review of it in this weeks episode.
RCHN V 2.0 EP205: CWB? Time to Prepare! - RC Heli Nation

I have the 308 Duo from Icharger and love it.
Most chargers that run off the mains are only capable of 50 to 80 watts max.
This limits you charging capabilities to small packs and long charge times.

If you go the more powerful route, then you will need a power supply too.

By the way. What were you welding in Aluminium?
I work in a boatyard, building aluminium yachts.
 

grumpy1

Active Member
Thanks for the input guys...got my CLF lookin on ebay as we speak...thanks Lee..As for what i was welding on Lee had 3 aluminum heads to repair...it just amazing how much damage a blowed head gasket can do to heads mainly groves out the head between the inboard cylinders...rarely on the end cylinders..
 
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