How long does it take charge your battery?

[czynot]

I been charging my batteries at 1C. Charge my 6s 4200mah charge at 4.2A. do a full charge it take 45mins each battery with icharger 208b and 12v 30A power supply.
Forget about Discharging. Full charge pack discharge to storage (50%) take all day! Discharge rate is 0.80A. If it wasnt midnight? I would just plug in the battery and run the heli till it hit 2000mah. LOL
Question:
1) So question is how long it take you to do a full Charge?
2) What is the lowest voltage remaining in the pack (4200mah) WITH the 80% rule?

[Chris Sexton]

I run my 4200s down to 75-78% with 6 minutes of sport flying at 2300 headspeed.

I charge my packs at 3C and takes about ~23 minutes. I have a Hyperion duo 720i charger and a featherlight 1000watt power supply. I can charge 2 4200 6s packs at once.

I could charge a bit faster, my charger has a 500watt pet channel max but I don't want to toast my packs. 20 minutes is fast enough. I have several packs. I can chain fly if i wanted to.


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[gbidwell]

20% is 840mA for a 4200mAh pack. I use flight times and check the estimated capacity after the flight using both the charger and a hyperion lipo checker. I say estimated as I have found the remaining capacity estimated by the charger to not be inline with the true remaining capacity.

During a recharge from storage mode I put 1900mAh back into the pack. 4200-1900-840 =1460. 1460 is the maximum I can put back into the pack after a flight to bring the pack back to storage mode. If i put more than 1460 back in, I have exceeded the 20% remaining capacity rule.

I usually put 1200 back in. Its better to be safe than sorry when your paying $200 a pack.

I would strongly recommend you get a new charger. A 20w discharge rate (0.8A from full voltage) is very low. you need at least 50w, ans even thats not enough, as it will take an hour to discharge a full pack to storage mode. Or, always make sure you fly the packs to 50% before putting them away.

[czynot]

Originally Posted by gbidwell

20% is 840mA for a 4200mAh pack. I use flight times and check the estimated capacity after the flight using both the charger and a hyperion lipo checker. I say estimated as I have found the remaining capacity estimated by the charger to not be inline with the true remaining capacity.

During a recharge from storage mode I put 1900mAh back into the pack. 4200-1900-840 =1460. 1460 is the maximum I can put back into the pack after a flight to bring the pack back to storage mode. If i put more than 1460 back in, I have exceeded the 20% remaining capacity rule.

I usually put 1200 back in. Its better to be safe than sorry when your paying $200 a pack.

I would strongly recommend you get a new charger. A 20w discharge rate (0.8A from full voltage) is very low. you need at least 50w, ans even thats not enough, as it will take an hour to discharge a full pack to storage mode. Or, always make sure you fly the packs to 50% before putting them away.

I have the icharger 208b. I think it is a 350w charger. Good enough for now. I dont do any parallel charging. I charge all my battery the night before flying. I charge it at 4.2A and take like 30-40mins each battery. It will be a problem when i have more batteries. The problem is that i charge all my battery night before and sometimes i dont get to use up all the batteries. Discharging the used battery take way too long. I can always hook up a series of 12v bulbs to discharge. That is another option for fast discharge. The charge discharge is just too slow.
I dont think larger or better charger will increase the charging speed. We are limited to the 1C charging rate.

After using the full 80% of the mah. WHAT IS YOUR VOLTAGE?

[akamullen]

Originally Posted by czynot

I have the icharger 208b. I think it is a 350w charger. Good enough for now. I dont do any parallel charging. I charge all my battery the night before flying. I charge it at 4.2A and take like 30-40mins each battery. It will be a problem when i have more batteries. The problem is that i charge all my battery night before and sometimes i dont get to use up all the batteries. Discharging the used battery take way too long. I can always hook up a series of 12v bulbs to discharge. That is another option for fast discharge. The charge discharge is just too slow.
I dont think larger or better charger will increase the charging speed. We are limited to the 1C charging rate.

After using the full 80% of the mah. WHAT IS YOUR VOLTAGE?

After a flight, I like to have my voltage about 3.7-3.74 per cell after the battery has sat for a couple minutes to normalize after the flight. 3.7v is the limit I like to put on my packs at resting. dont know the exact % I take out, but I do know that the 80% rule was made a few years back before batteries were even close to what they are now. I would imagine I usually use about 90% which I think is about right for today's 45 and 65C packs as they are newer technologically speaking and can take much more abuse than the older 10-35C tech. was only 3 years ago when charging over 1C was taboo, now 5-6C is not unheard of.

I actually have charged some of my 5000mah 6S 65C packs at 5 and 6C when I am in a rush. Takes a little more than 10 minutes to charge at 6C or 30A. I dont do this a lot but every once in a while when its getting dark and I want to squeeze out a couple more flights.. Also the charger im using has over a 2A discharge rate for 6S packs which make discharging a lot faster.

[gbidwell]

voltage is around 3.75v.

Why are you limited to 1C? a 350w charger will easily charge at 3C.
You could set your charge to 13A if you liked, not sure what lipo brand you are running though. Better still, parallel charge 3 packs at once at a 1C charge rate. Its easy to do, will save you time and stop you from charging packs the night before, which really isn't the best thing to do if you can avoid it.

Cant help with the discharge though....but if your charging before flying you will have an idea of how many packs you will fly that day, so you will have to charge what you need.

I only ever charge at 2C when im in a hurry and 1C normally. I can charge 4 packs at once at 2C...ready in 25min. At 1C its about 40 min....depends on the balancing time.

[P.I.Engineer]

i charge my 4000mah at 15 amps, takes about 15 mins

[czynot]

Originally Posted by gbidwell

voltage is around 3.75v.

Why are you limited to 1C? a 350w charger will easily charge at 3C.
You could set your charge to 13A if you liked, not sure what lipo brand you are running though. Better still, parallel charge 3 packs at once at a 1C charge rate. Its easy to do, will save you time and stop you from charging packs the night before, which really isn't the best thing to do if you can avoid it.

Cant help with the discharge though....but if your charging before flying you will have an idea of how many packs you will fly that day, so you will have to charge what you need.

I only ever charge at 2C when im in a hurry and 1C normally. I can charge 4 packs at once at 2C...ready in 25min. At 1C its about 40 min....depends on the balancing time.

I have Hyperions. I thought you always charge at 1C rate.

The JST board that come with the icharger 208B only have one 6S connector. 208B can charge up to 8S. Does this mean i need to buy a Y-cable to parallel charge? what is the limit on how many battery i can charge at one time? i read somewhere that you should not parallel charge a batteries is in different state of capacity. true?

[fusionsx00]

nope hyperions can charge up to 5c ,,says on there website http://www.hyperion-world.com/produc...-LG345-4200-6S

i charge my 4200 45c ex packs at 21 amps constant which is 5c , i think its around 12-13 min , the balance sometimes take a little longer,

now i did buy some new ones a month ago, and those are only getting 1c , to see if it matters or not.

here is a nice calculator http://2bfly.com/tools/

[gbidwell]

Originally Posted by czynot

I have Hyperions. I thought you always charge at 1C rate.

The JST board that come with the icharger 208B only have one 6S connector. 208B can charge up to 8S. Does this mean i need to buy a Y-cable to parallel charge? what is the limit on how many battery i can charge at one time? i read somewhere that you should not parallel charge a batteries is in different state of capacity. true?

yes you will need to either make your own y leads and buy more balancing boards and cables (to y-lead with) or use one of these (best option for you I think)

http://epbuddy.com/index.php?main_pa...1jnkanp81rruu3

note you can different buy ones that suit your plug style. What connectors do you use?

In regards to the voltage...the cell difference between packs should be no greater than 0.1V/cell. buy yourself a lipo cell checker to confirm this before charging, alternatively you could plug in the lipos individually into to the charger to check cell voltages before parallel charging. you cant check three packs plugged into the paraboard, as you will only read the average cell voltage of the three packs.

If you get you flying times down packed then you will never see cell difference greater than 0.1v. I always parallel charge packs out of storage mode, so I dont have an issue. And I have my flying times down packsed, so I can return them to storage mode using parallel charging.

[Mike A.]

Built my first 6ch heli last summer and recently built a 500 clone so I'm pretty new to all of this. I'm still using cheapo turnigy batteries so I'm not too concerned but wanted to understand more about charging for storage.

How long of a time frame do you all consider warrants a "storage" charge? I usually just charge my batteries after I get back from flying and they sit until next time I head to the field. Of course I'm using $40 3000mah 6s batteries....not $200 ones!

Slowly learning everything for when I decide to jump into a quality heli and equipment.

[Chris Sexton]

Originally Posted by czynot

I have Hyperions. I thought you always charge at 1C rate.

The JST board that come with the icharger 208B only have one 6S connector. 208B can charge up to 8S. Does this mean i need to buy a Y-cable to parallel charge? what is the limit on how many battery i can charge at one time? i read somewhere that you should not parallel charge a batteries is in different state of capacity. true?

I have lots of Hyperion packs, they are rated at 3c charge warns to not exceed 5c.


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[trexpro]

I charge my lipo's with a Hyperion 1420i net3 charger and a 18volt 540watt 30amps power supply.

I charge parallel. 4x 6s 5000mah in 45min to 100%
and 6 x 3s 2200mah in 38min to 100%

I always leave about 30% remaining capacity in the lipo and back home i charge al my lipo's to storage mode

This is the max charge speed at the moment, if i want to speed thinks up i need a 1000watt 24volt power supply, but at the moment this is quick enough for me

a slower charge at 1c or 2c is better for the lipo

[stevenfox905]

How long of a time frame do you all consider warrants a "storage" charge?

Personally, I storage charge (60%) if I'm going to be leaving the packs for more than a week or so.. Only thing worse than leaving them sit fully charged is letting them sit dead... So I'll charge to storage as soon as I get home from flying, then bring them all up to full charge the night before I plan on flying. Doesn't take too long because they're already all at 60 percent...

[fusionsx00]

Originally Posted by cdsexton

I have lots of Hyperion packs, they are rated at 3c charge warns to not exceed 5c.


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why do they list on there website 5c?

http://media.hyperion.hk/dn/g3lipo/

[Chris Sexton]

Originally Posted by fusionsx00

why do they list on there website 5c?

http://media.hyperion.hk/dn/g3lipo/

Well mine say 3c recommended never exceed 5c.

[czynot]

Originally Posted by gbidwell

yes you will need to either make your own y leads and buy more balancing boards and cables (to y-lead with) or use one of these (best option for you I think)

http://epbuddy.com/index.php?main_pa...1jnkanp81rruu3

note you can different buy ones that suit your plug style. What connectors do you use?

In regards to the voltage...the cell difference between packs should be no greater than 0.1V/cell. buy yourself a lipo cell checker to confirm this before charging, alternatively you could plug in the lipos individually into to the charger to check cell voltages before parallel charging. you cant check three packs plugged into the paraboard, as you will only read the average cell voltage of the three packs.

If you get you flying times down packed then you will never see cell difference greater than 0.1v. I always parallel charge packs out of storage mode, so I dont have an issue. And I have my flying times down packsed, so I can return them to storage mode using parallel charging.

I have the EC5 connector. Just order one. good price. Thank you. I needed that.