BuddyRC Safe ParaBoard, vs FMA MPA board?

[RedOctobyr]

I'm planning to buy a bigger charger, likely dual channel. Since it will be handling bigger packs, I'd like to get a safer, fully-fused parallel board for it. Something to help protect me against things like accidentally plugging charged and discharged packs together.

I've been planning on the FMA MPA board, which has an excellent reputation. Downsides are cost ($65), and bulk. I don't need 8S capability.

Like this (though I'd be using with Power Poles, so I'd buy the one with bare leads, and add my own plugs):
http://www.buddyrc.com/fma-pma-board.html

I recently discovered BuddyRC's Safe ParaBoards. They're only 4 ports, vs 6, and they only go up to 6S. But 6S is perfect for me, and I don't have more than 4 of a given pack size anyhow. They also have female connector sets so that you can daisy-chain multiple parallel boards together, for safely charging more than 4 packs.

They even sell one with Power Poles already on it:
http://www.buddyrc.com/paraboard-v3-...ower-pole.html

The advantage is they're $26. So I could buy one for each channel of the charger, and protect both sides of the charger, for less than the cost of a single MPA. For cost reasons, if I bought an MPA, I was probably going to have to start with just one, and use a conventional setup on the other channel, for now.

I found a review of the Safe ParaBoard at TJin's site. It includes pictures of the insides. There are actually polyfuses for each connection of each balance plug (7 per plug). Some are just hidden inside the case, on the back of the PCB. The pictures on BuddyRC's site had made me wonder if each individual wire was actually protected.

https://sites.google.com/site/tjingu...board-micro-v3

Are the Safe ParaBoards as good/safe as the MPA?

[Gregor99]

The polyfuses on the MPA are on the top and covered with a heat sensitive color changing material. If you trip a polyfuse, you get a nice visual indicator. You would be surprised how many people trip the polyfuses and have no idea how it happened. With the BuddyRc board you are blind to this unsafe condition. With parallel charging, so is your charger.

The MPA also has sheaved 4mm bananas so they are safe if you disconnect them from the charger with a pack connected to the board. This feature requires a Powerlab with compatible female adapter. The MPA has two fuses per main output (one on the positive and one on the negative). The MPA additional charging ports for 1s and Rx packs. Also with 14s becoming more popular, charging 7s packs will be more common.

[RedOctobyr]

Thanks Greg. Good points.

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