Battery help

calvary3a1 · Post by **calvary3a1** » Wed Dec 07, 2005 6:29 pm

I found this old battery

i have no charger for it. Is there a way to make my own charger?

Sorry, the pictures kindof small, but its a 3.6V/1200mAh NI-MH cell phone battery.

daleighan · Post by **daleighan** » Wed Dec 07, 2005 6:34 pm

just find a NIMH battery charger and hook it up to that

timmeh87 · Post by **timmeh87** » Wed Dec 07, 2005 6:41 pm

it cant just be a normal "AA" charger, as it will only be trying to output ~1.4v to charge a 3.6v pack. unless its some sort of current-regulated charger... to be honest i have no idea how commercial Ni-MH chargers work.

what does that board underneath it do? is it by any change a charge controller?

at any rate, remember to hook positive to postive and negative to negative when charging (i made the mistake of putting it in series once. lol. its not good. not good at all)

Post by **Skyone** » Wed Dec 07, 2005 6:45 pm

http://www.radioshack.com/family/index. ... cp=2032056

Any of those work. Notice they ethier say NiMH or nickel-metal hydride. Hook the plus and minus up to any slot.

Wanna DIY? I'll make one within 5 minutes and post again with a guide.

EDIT:
http://www6.head-fi.org/forums/showthread.php?t=103847

Just follow that actually, better than mine.

timmeh87 · Post by **timmeh87** » Wed Dec 07, 2005 7:25 pm

of course you'll have to use a different voltage reg

also, as far as i can tell, that charger has no overcharge protection, so you'll have to time it so you dont damage your battery

[edit. i actually read the part of the article about tricle chargin... so... n/m about that]

calvary3a1 · Post by **calvary3a1** » Wed Dec 07, 2005 7:25 pm

Thanks a lot for the help.

what does that board underneath it do? is it by any change a charge controller?

Heres a better picture.

I have no idea what it is. The thing at the top is the connector for the phone, i dont know what the other board does.

Skyone: thanks for the links. I might try the DIY one or i might just buy one, but either way im gonna keep looking around that site to learn some stuff.

daguuy · Post by **daguuy** » Wed Dec 07, 2005 7:33 pm

holy freakin crap on a stick that's a huge image

! please crop it!

timmeh87 · Post by **timmeh87** » Wed Dec 07, 2005 7:35 pm

that board underneath looks SUSPICIOUSLY like a charge controller of some kind. it looks like if you apply proper voltage (sorry, couldnt tell you which direction) to the middle two pins, that it will charge the batteries for you. see if one of the middle pins is common to the negative termnial of the battery (use a multimeter). if i had to guess id say its the black one.

does anyone agree with what im saying here?

calvary3a1 · Post by **calvary3a1** » Wed Dec 07, 2005 8:00 pm

hehe sorry about the picture, i fixed it.

I think i see what you're saying. How do i go about applying power to the two middle pins?

timmeh87 · Post by **timmeh87** » Wed Dec 07, 2005 8:07 pm

heh. thats the challenge now isnt it.

do you still have the original cell phone? if so. stick it in the charger, and see what voltage is coming out of the middle two pins.

actaully, i was looking at the picture some more, and i change my mind. its not the middle two pins. its most likely the left red one and the black one.

the "charger" is inbetween the battery and the seond terminal from the right, and then the far right one is common. the middle red one appears to be for communication between the phone and the pack. the yellow one is the unswitched access to the same end of the pack that the "charge controller" is on.

for all i know, that could just be a battery meter, and not actaully have any charge control on it. it would help if i could see anything i can identify as a MOSFET or at least a transitor. im starting to think that that little board might just be to tell the phone how much battery power is left.

at any rate, the pinout is probably something like this

Positve Terminal || Charge Negative || One-wire communication || Negative Terminal

theres no way for me to tell if i have my negatives and positives backwards. im really just guessing at a lot of this.

Turbo Tax 1.0 · Post by **Turbo Tax 1.0** » Wed Dec 07, 2005 8:10 pm

that is only a 3.6 volt battery, your gopnna have a hard time running a portable with just that

timmeh87 · Post by **timmeh87** » Wed Dec 07, 2005 8:12 pm

you can use a step-up dc-dc

calvary3a1 · Post by **calvary3a1** » Wed Dec 07, 2005 8:13 pm

haha, i wish. It was from like 1999. Its long gone. If I had it i would've done that in the first place. Any other options beside buy a charrger from Radio Shack? I think i have antother cell phone charger for a phone with a 3.6V lithium ion. Could i rig that to work somehow?

that is only a 3.6 volt battery, your gopnna have a hard time running a portable with just that

I know i wasnt planning on it. Im just trying to get it to work so I can use it for whatever. I might use it plus others on a portable one day but right now thats not what im thinking about.

timmeh87 · Post by **timmeh87** » Wed Dec 07, 2005 8:16 pm

you COULD just pay 20 bucks for a decent RC pack. lithiums are dangerous.

alternatively, you could rig up a slot to stick the li-ion battery in, then use it, and when its dead stick it in the phone to charge it.

calvary3a1 · Post by **calvary3a1** » Wed Dec 07, 2005 8:42 pm

Well if the picture is why you cant tell what it does look at this

What i was asking is can i use the charger from the lithium phone battery to charge the NIMH battery. I thought that maybe since their both the same voltage i could use the same charger. The NiMhs were in a big plastic case with the pins sticking out so i had to rip that open to get them. Thats why I cant jsut use a charger meant for the phone. The lithium is from a newer phone, (its gone too) so id have to cut the charger plug off cause its way different. I dont really know much about any of this though so ill probably jsut end up buying something.

PostPosted: Wed Dec 07, 2005 8:12 pm Post subject:
you can use a step-up dc-dc

i have a dc/dc 5v to 12v chip, is that what u mean? please explain