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Battery charger analyzer- possible?
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Grizzled Veteran
Join Date: Oct 2001
Location: Michigan
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Offline
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I have several NiMh batteries and a crappy charger. I was searching (in vain) for something that could hold a pack of aa/aaa NiMH batteries and plug them into the Mac's firewire port (hell I 'll settle for the USB port too) and allow them to charge AND get a reading on the screen of the batteries charging parameters and capacity. I could adjust the rate of charge :so as not to fry them and eventually know which ones will need to be replaced..
Is there such a product ?
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Pismo 400 | Powerbook 1.5 GHz | MacPro 2.66/6GB/7300GT
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Addicted to MacNN
Join Date: Dec 2000
Location: Maine
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Offline
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make one, the USB port is 5V, drop the voltage down to the charging level of the battery and, make sure you don't exceed the current limit of the USB port.
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I GOT WASTED WITH PHIL SHERRY!!!
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Banned
Join Date: Jun 2005
Location: Indy.
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There's a lot out there at 12V for NiMh. I could point you to a couple excellent chargers that would charge and discharge cells and tell you the mAh the cells are taking.
Why do you want to use the FireWire port? I admit it would be unique and different, but certainly not practical.
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Grizzled Veteran
Join Date: Oct 2001
Location: Michigan
Status:
Offline
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Originally Posted by Railroader 
Why do you want to use the FireWire port? I admit it would be unique and different, but certainly not practical.
I just thought that the FW would supply more power than the USB. Would any of these options you refer to actually be able to plot battery capacity and so forth?
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Pismo 400 | Powerbook 1.5 GHz | MacPro 2.66/6GB/7300GT
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Posting Junkie
Join Date: Oct 2005
Location: Houston, TX
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I don't know of any such devices. If one did exist, with that feature set, I'd estimate it would cost $100+ (due in large part to low volume).
As far as the FW vs USB argument goes for this hypothetical device, do you really need more than 2.5W to charge your NiMh batteries? What's the battery capacity?
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Banned
Join Date: Jun 2005
Location: Indy.
Status:
Offline
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Originally Posted by tkmd
I just thought that the FW would supply more power than the USB.
Actually, looking at this wikipedia page on FireWire, it states that Apple's devices can do 9~12V, but only pull about 7-8 watts. So if you wanted to charge batteries, you can only charge at about .5 Amps. Very slow charging.
Originally Posted by tkmd
Would any of these options you refer to actually be able to plot battery capacity and so forth?
Yes, but not on the computer. They are self contained and have the plots displayed on the chargers. This one: Team Checkpoint | TC1030 Pro Charger is popular with competitive RC racers who try to get as much out of their batteries as possible.
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