Question About NiCad Batteries

Madman

Madman

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I'm looking at this excavator and it comes with one 7.2 Volt Ni-Cad battery. Experience has shown that Ni-Cads don't have a long life, especially compared to Li-On batteries. I could try to get a second battery for the inevitable time when the stock battery needs charging. Or, why couldn't I buy a Li-On battery with a similar voltage rating ?


https://www.ebay.com/itm/Remote-Con...765000&hash=item3d62a88e83:g:6R4AAOSw~JRazIM0
 
Madman said:
I'm looking at this excavator and it comes with one 7.2 Volt Ni-Cad battery. Experience has shown that Ni-Cads don't have a long life, especially compared to Li-On batteries. I could try to get a second battery for the inevitable time when the stock battery needs charging. Or, why couldn't I buy a Li-On battery with a similar voltage rating ?


https://www.ebay.com/itm/Remote-Con...765000&hash=item3d62a88e83:g:6R4AAOSw~JRazIM0
Click to expand...
Hm well NiCad do have poor life due to the well known memory effect. I would personally swop for NiMH. I have found these to have good life expectancy, just today I started up one of my Battery Conversions that has not been recharged for just over a year and if burst into life with a happy hello.

I personally am not a fan for some of the newer type, exploding in Boeing Dreamliners etc. But others will venomously agree to differ with me!

Hey ho your choice.
 
You would probably be better going for a NiMH pack..
Same physical form-factor, and you may well be able to use the charger that comes with the model.

2100mAh - 2400mAh Low-Self-Discharge should be easily obtainable.

If you go LiPO, you would probably need to go 2S2P to get the endurance, and would need a suitable Smart Charger to handle that configuration. - Else you are into removing the battery-packs and charging them individually.

<edit> Jon and I obviously typing at the same time..
 
PhilP said:
You would probably be better going for a NiMH pack..
Same physical form-factor, and you may well be able to use the charger that comes with the model.

2100mAh - 2400mAh Low-Self-Discharge should be easily obtainable.

If you go LiPO, you would probably need to go 2S2P to get the endurance, and would need a suitable Smart Charger to handle that configuration. - Else you are into removing the battery-packs and charging them individually.

<edit> Jon and I obviously typing at the same time..
Click to expand...
No worries, glad we concur!
 
Agreed that in this case a Lith-Ion might not be the simplest solution, from the viewpints of cost, charger etc....... but don't be afraid of them from safety concerns - if you buy a proper industrial-grade pack with built-in protection, a matched charger, and you don't abuse it the way certain other branches of the modelling hobbies sometimes do, it should be just fine.....
I'm sure you carry your mobile phone in your pocket, next to your valuables.....? ;)

Jon.
 
Madman said:
I'm looking at this excavator and it comes with one 7.2 Volt Ni-Cad battery. Experience has shown that Ni-Cads don't have a long life, especially compared to Li-On batteries. I could try to get a second battery for the inevitable time when the stock battery needs charging. Or, why couldn't I buy a Li-On battery with a similar voltage rating ?


https://www.ebay.com/itm/Remote-Con...765000&hash=item3d62a88e83:g:6R4AAOSw~JRazIM0
Click to expand...
Ni-mh are perfectly OK, particularly if you go for ones with Low Self Discharge (LSD)

Should last you a good while :nod::nod::nod:
 
Properly charged, NiCad will have more charge discharge cycles that NiMih or Li-ion/Li-po....

The rub is "properly charged" since cheap, "stupid" chargers can be used on nicads.

Use a stupid charger on lithium batteries and you have a fire, so all lithium chargers are "smart"

If you already have a smart charger, and the batteries are in good shape, you should be able to get 1,000 cycles from them.

Greg
 
Ni Cads are now banned here. The memory problems with them apparently was because dendrites of cadmium would "grow" and internally "short" the cells. The dendrites could be burnt off by an over voltage burst charge of a minute or so but even then their capacity is limited.
I've never had any problems with NiMih I had some that had not been charged since 2014 and only recently they were good to go...

Lions are good too I make up my own packs using tabbed batteries and charge/protection boards that are an inbuilt "smart" charger and short circuit protection board. I had doubts that for the price they would be any good but they work very well in my experience and they come for a variety of cells and outputs... I would not advise soldering wires to untabbed cells though, 99.9% of the time you may get away with it...
Get an Imax charger, it will be able to charge just about any type of battery.
A link for the boards I'm waffling about; https://www.ebay.com.au/sch/i.html?...p=15&_osacat=0&_odkw=Li-Ion+charge+protection
 
I agree with Greg.

Get a smart charger then use whatever battery is the cheapest and fits in your loco (or excavator).
 
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