Battery discharger?

[kingoli2003]

hi does anyone use a battery disscharger on their NiMH batteries? i heard its good to completely disscharge them when not in use. someone said i should hook my battery up to a 50w bulb to run it down. any info on this?

[screwdriver]

Re: Battery discharger?

firstly dischargers only for nicads, nimh do not need discharging and can be left for periods of time fully charged with no damage.
hooking up a 12v 50w dichrohic lamp to discharge a battery will seriously shag it very quickly as genuine dischargers / conditioners very slowly discharge the battery to a very low point then recharge fully.
the reasoning behind this is the batterys in the centre of the pack never fully charge/discharge and when a pack fails it usually these cells that cause the problem, the conditioner attempts to rejuvinate these cells to prevent failure.
its also a bad idea to leave a battery fully discharged for long periods of time

[The Keeper of Secrets]

Re: Battery discharger?

Very well said screwdriver, all good info. But don't buy a discharger, wire up some connectors to a light bulb or something.

[screwdriver]

Re: Battery discharger?

if your going to use a lamp to discharge (only neccissary for nicad) then make sure its the same voltage as the battery pack and a low wattage as a high discharge rate can cause damage

[jagillham]

Re: Battery discharger?

The discharger is £10 on ZeroOne.

Why mess about with a lightbulb?! lol

[Nine]

Re: Battery discharger?

Do not store NiMH batteries discharged. You'll get a nasty surprise when you next try to charge it - it wont hold charge.

The only use for a discharger with NiMH batteries is in conditioning them. That is charge/discharge/charge cycles.

Its not a bad thing to discharge before recharging them though.

[kingoli2003]

Re: Battery discharger?

fair enough lads. cheers

[Intervention]

Re: Battery discharger?

So you're saying that if I discharge batteris after every skirmish, i'm actually doing more damage to them, then good?! *lost* haha

[jagillham]

Re: Battery discharger?

Discharge them fully, then store charged. They'll lose charge in storage, so any more than a week stored. I'll do another discharge and recharge the day before skirmish.

[Nine]

Re: Battery discharger?

So you're saying that if I discharge batteris after every skirmish, i'm actually doing more damage to them, then good?! *lost* haha

Yes. Leaving them part charged is not as bad as fully discharged.

But discharging before recharging is good.

[magic_golem]

Re: Battery discharger?

i just use a 12v pc fan to discarge mine :P

[nabil]

Re: Battery discharger?

Discharge them fully, then store charged. They'll lose charge in storage, so any more than a week stored. I'll do another discharge and recharge the day before skirmish.

this is exactly hat I do bro , 100% agree