Power Lab 6 Setup question
 

I am finally getting around to setting up my new charging setup and have a quick question.

I am running a powerlab 6 with a Mean Well SE-1000-24 Power Supply.

•Output power: 41.7A continuous, 1000W
•Output voltage: 24V DC (adjustable +/- 10% = 22-27.5V)

I just want to make sure I am getting the Smart Power Management setup up correctly. The default DC settings are:

Voltage Lower Limit: 10V
Current Upper Limit 25A

With my power supply when completing these settings I am doing the following:

Supply Current Limit? 41A (slightly less than the supplies max output current)

Low Sply Limit? 12V (Cutoff voltage should be 50% of the supplies nominal output voltage

These numbers sound about right, but just wanted to make sure I am correct?

Thanks. :tire:

Right. Id leave it around 15-18volts just to be safe instead of it dropping that low but thats your call.

I'm at work right now but when i get home I'll check what mine is set at for you. I have the PL-8 with the same PS. (:

Thanks for the replies and I will be interested in what you PL8 settings are!

PL-6
 

I have mine set at 21.9 V and 36 amps. I looked at some graphs from some past charge cycles and voltage drop was at most .5 volts, so I think I'm good at 21.9... If want you really to learn about what this charger is all about check this link out: http://www.rcgroups.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1176112
Both the PL 6 and the 8 are amazing chargers for the money..;) Keep in mind I don't charge at any where near the limit on this charger, I have quite a few 4S 5000mah 5C bats, a few 6S 3300mah 12C, 5S 2650mah 12C that I have put though their paces with no problems what so ever. I think if your into charging at high C ratings the powerlabs are pretty hard to beat, there a alot of good chargers out there now days but I would certainly put the Pl's at the top of the heap..

Enjoy
Pete

New question for any other PowerLab user. When setting up a User Preset I have the charge amps at 5.0. This preset is used for charging 4 of my 2s 5000mAh pack parallel.

When I run this preset as 4p it ends up charging at 20A or 1C. If I want to charge at 2C do I need just set the charge amps at the 2C rate per pack in the preset. So in this case it would be 10A which would lead to a 2C charge rate at close to 40A for what the PL6 sees as a 2s 20000mAh pack?

Or is there another way to get the preset to charge at 2C?

Ok..and now the silly question. From the CCS in the presets, how do I copy a user preset to an EMPTY user location. Can I do this from the CCS?

Thanks for any help ahead of time.

Charges my reedy 2s stick packs fine balanced.

I have a reedy 5200 saddle pack with no balance ports. Set charge profile for auto detect, no balance and I get bad cell node error trying to charge in series or just one cell.

What am I doing wrong?

Brand new charge lead from hard shell lipo case to new deans between charge lead from lipo and the powerlab charge output cable.
Brand new reedy balanced charge lead.

Plug the same charge lead into a cheap hobby king charger series or single and it charges fine :weird:

In CCS, click on whichever preset you want to copy and then click file on the top. From file drop down click copy preset **.
Then click on the preset number you want to copy to and click file then past to preset you are in.
You can set the preset to charge at a preset rate or 1c or 2c or whatever.

From memory, you can change the charge amp rate manually on the charger also.

The problem is that you're not balance charging it. Powerlabs don't like not balancing.

Can't charge a 1 cell lipo?

Yes. But not a 2S pack without a balance tap (you might be able to super slow, but I can't recall).

Won't charge single cell or two single cells in series.
Charges my two cell stick pack fine... balanced.

Kinda lame if I have to bring a $8.50 hobby king charger to charge my $100 saddle pack at the track when I have a $200 charger :confused:

Ok, so... copied 1s/2s small non balanced from library to unused preset and that charged the saddle pack. 1 cell by itself or two cells in series... no problem.

But now I need to get that up to at least a 5.2 amp charge at the minimum... 5200mah lipo. That preset is 2a max charge.

I've asked Tim at FMA how to get more from that preset... maybe a firmware update.

For anyone else on rctech looking for an answer on this, here's Tim's reply...


Glad you got something going. The PowerLab 6 can only do 2A on a non-balanced charge as you've discovered. For safety reasons, we don't let the user go above that using the non-balanced preset. Can you solder? What you need to do is pick up one of these:

http://www.usastore.revolectrix.com/...-10-9-Position

Then you need to splice the black wire of the above connector to the black wire where you are currently plugging the single cell into the PL6 black banana jack. Next, solder the red wire of the above connector to the red wire where you are currently plugging the single cell into the PL6 red banana jack. Then plug the balance connector into the balance port, choose any of the non-balancing presets, and charge away. The Accurate and Faster Charge presets allow up to 10A. The High Power preset will allow up to 40A.

Be sure to put heat shrink tubing or electrical tape over you solder work. If you solder, you can build up what you need in about 10 minutes I imagine.

If you want to get more creative, figure out a way to parallel the cells at the same time you connect up the balance pigtail. Then you can charge them in parallel at the same time. The PowerLabs were made for parallel charging and the user interface even asks you how many packs you have in parallel when you start an operation. The unit will automatically do the work for you to multiply the current preset's charge rate by the number of P you tell it.

Let me know if you have any questions.

Tim Marks