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Can I charge my lipo pack right after the run while it is hot? Is that going to decrease the performace and life?

Turbo Joe

iTrader: (41)

Mr. Black would know better, but my experience with the 4800s is that they cool down as they charge. I charge them hot all the time and they either don't get hot as they charge and cool down on their own...or they actually get cooler because they are charging.

Either way, I have hundreds of runs on mine and they still kick ass.

We just used them last weekend for the Enduro at Tamiya and we were getting 15.5-16.5 minutes with a pretty serious Hacker BL setup and they weould take 4200-4300 on the charge...so they weren't even dumped yet. I bough them from the very first batch when they first came out and I run them nearly every week.

kuzo

iTrader: (11)

I totally agree with Turbo Joe's response to this. Every time I charge them when they're warm (I can't even say hot with these) they cool down as they go.

Steve B

I also agree.
I am running two of these (1, 5 min practice & 3, 5 min rounds).
The Lipo comes out of the car warm only and goes on charge straight away, by the time it is charged it i s cold.
These bats are cheaper and a lot less trouble than Nimh (Only need 2 packs not 4), fit in my xray fk05 with only a slight change and with the time I save not having to maintain them it got to be good for the hobby.

r0adrunn3r

iTrader: (3)

I run LiPo's as well (see my signature). 2 packs between 3 cars. I will be getting a balancer too as soon as one is available.

Not having to maintain the packs as you do with NiMh is the real plus for me at club meets.

Steve B

You dont really need a balancer as long as your charger can do single Lipo cells.

Turbo Joe

iTrader: (41)

To balance them on an ICE, just change the voltage to 3.7 and charge it with the (+) and center post, then the (-) and the center. Whichever side of the battery you're charging, just use the opposite polarity lead on the center post.

All you're really doing is charging the cells individually.

I just did mine for the very first time...one of the batteries (my oldest one) took maybe 100MaH more on one side than the other...but the other two batteries were all within 5-10 Mah between the sides.

Mr. Black: How does a LiPo charger sense that the battery has reached capacity?

kuzo

iTrader: (11)

Orion has already put one out - Orion Balancer
You'll also need this for the balance port - 2mm plug

Got mine in but it's only told me I don't need to balance yet.
You'll also need to alter the connector from the balancer like in the attached image that I stole from Mr. Black from a few pages back.

MrBlack

Yes you can as you will see below charging the battery produces very little if any heat and they actually cool for the most part as they charge.

Turbo Joe

iTrader: (41)

I just used a large body clip (with thinnish wire) in the balance port. The smooth part was in the terminal and the 4mm charge lead just clipped under the wire, against the case.

Probably not ideal or anything, but it worked fine.

flying G.E.O.

iTrader: (4)

Thanks for the quick answer guys. I'll probably cycle mine after 100 full runs. Its because I'm just noticing that my lipo in my heli is going down in runtime when I dont balance. Haven't noticed any changes to my platinum lipo yet.

To be sure again. The balancing port can accept + and - from ice.
I connect the lipos positive terminal to my Ice's positive wire and connect the small plug to the Ice's negative wire and charge at 3.7amp. After finishing that cycle I connect the lipos negative terminal to my Ice's negative wire and connect the small plug to the Ice's positive wire and charge again.
I saw the wireharness and the mods you have to make I dont think I could get that kind of stuff in my lhs.

Turbo Joe

iTrader: (41)

Sorta...the connection part is good. It's basically two batteries in there and the balance port is the connection between them. They're arranged (+ - * + -) with the "*" being the balance port at the connection between the two cells.

Just change the voltage to 3.7v That's only one click less and reflects the voltage of the individual cell(s).

The charge current will be the same (4.8A).

MR JOLLY

MrBlack
spoke to mirage 2 things they suggested
1)try re balencing
2) shove it in a freezer over night

balencing
is there a machine for this ??
or just shove a metal bit in port !! & charge it

i`m going to volt meter tonight @club

MrBlack

Be very careful when doing this and check each cell with a volt meter as some chargers can provide a different amount of charge based on temperature and other outside factors so it is possible to actually make your cells more out of balance then when you started.

Just like a traditional charges they sence how much of the current that is going out has actually been taken in and some chargers base the end point by Voltage others by Voltage and Capacity such as our Advantage Advanced and Flight Chargers this is why it asks for both perameters. Usually a battery will input about 80% of the batteries voltage and then do a ramp down based on the voltage. This is why you see many chargers begin to drop voltage as they near the end of the charge and why some chargers claim they can achieve 80% percent charge in such a short time what they are not saying is the other 20% can take a little time depending on the cells and charger used. Balancers monitor this and cut off current to the cell that is higher until the others catch up or if used on there own safely discharge one cell until it reaches the same point as the others allowing it to then charger both cells equally. In short today's balancers are actually more of an equalizing device as Li-Po cells do not self equalize like NiMH do. (For those that wonder if you wire up several NiMH they will all equalize to the weakest cell if not discharged individually)

MrBlack

This technique is not one that I would use as freezing these batteries is not recommended and can actually dmage them. I am not sure why this keeps popping up from time to time as if it worked you would here people doing it all the time , which they do not.

[QUOTE=MR JOLLY]
balencing
is there a machine for this ??

Yes - http://www.teamorion-avionics.com/Ce...lancing+System

You will need to do this to it: