who would be interested in NiMH battery packs for warps?

[sniper1rfa]

*EDIT* check dealers forum post. http://www.automags.org/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=64041






i finally got the guts to start soldering batteries together and ended up with a 700 mAh NiMH battery for my warp. well, i need some money, so im offering to make them for anybody who wants one.

The packs are 9.6 volts, and between 700 and 750 mAh, depending on the cells i settle on.

i would probably end up charging 35-40 bucks with a charger, again depending on cells and charger.

[sniper1rfa]

alright, ive found what i will use. the actual pack will 9.6 volts at 720 mAh, which is about 4.5 x the capacity of your average NiMH 9 volt, and about 7 times the capacity of an alkaline 9V.

it would be 45 bucks with a 5 hour rapid charger, or 30 with a generic wall transformer that will do it in about 10-12 hours.

post here if your interested, i will need like 5 orders to make it worth my time.

[Bulldog]

Flame me if this sounds stupid.:o ...but this would only be a good thing on an rt or regular mag right? It would just be redundant on an emag, cause you can run the warp off the emag battery, right.

[sniper1rfa]

well, not necessarily redundant, just unneccesary. but yeah, on just about any other warp fed gun it would be useful, as they dont have batteries larger enough in the gun to run the solenoid AND the gun, or they dont have a battery in them, period.

oh yeah, if you have any other pack you need, i can build it for you.

and i can sell just the pack (no charger) for 25 bucks. all prices are shipped.

[sniper1rfa]

nobody? :(

:)

[hostage]

good idea wonder where you got it from ;-)
-Hostage

[Aliens-8-MyDad]

im intested, just not now..... what do these batteries look like, would they workin a revvy?

[hitech]

I might, but I "made" my own battery pack to run my warp, revy and Hyperframe. :D

[sniper1rfa]

well, thy wont run the rev, not enough voltage (they NEED 18 volts, 12 volts will be all slow and stuff, and these are only 9).

its just a square pack, check AGDE's online store thing, they have something similar.

i got the idea cause i wanted a central battery pack. hostage, when we talked, i already had had the cells for like 3 months, i just didnt think i could do it.

now that i think about it, i could also do 10.6 volts you provide a charger) in 700 (AAA cells) or 800 mAh (4/3 AAA cells), or maybe even like 18 volts at 300 mAh (2/3 AAA cells, with 1 mm left over on the bottom. NO worky with a switch anywhere in there, it would run a rev though).

[RamboPreacher]

yes, I am interested. - no pictures? :)

[hostage]

Hey, hitech, you using the battery pack inside a emag battery housing, or using the warp battery area?

Though sniper, you need to be worried about quality control, are you using electronic tape to cover the leads? or did you get some shrinkwrap? Also, I would drop the price and put a disclaimer. That is why I am not doing that. I might do a battery for a custom mag, but thats it. That is unless they are put together well and done while following standards

also, btw many revys are 9v, mostlikely if you put less voltage required in a hopper than it will go slower, also if you put more than it should go faster, that is unless the motor and the board fry.

lastly how could you do 10.6 with a nimh? if you had 9 nimhs you would have 10.8v? unless you will use regulators and resitors
-Hostage

[RamboPreacher]

As I said, I am interested. I would want the battery pack to be in the warp, so that if my xmag ran out of battery (not gonna happen, but just in case) the WF would still work (since the mag will continue to work).
OR
I can also use the WF on my BTM too.

[hitech]

Hostage,
Neither. I have a "flat" 8 cell RC battery pack (from Radio Shack) that I have zip tied to the bottom of the warp adapter plate. It is positioned vertically (the shorter of the two dimensions) and takes up the space between the warp and my flatline tank. I have been thinking about building my own custom battery pack (I can always let the kid use this one in his RC car), but I'm going to wait an see how I like it the way it is. It fits fairly well at it is. :D

[FreshmanBob]

I'm very interested, 30 with the wall charger sounds good to me.

[Thordic]

Hmm, just a note.

I tried using a 9.6V 1600 mAh battery pack in my warp, and Pyro has tried it to.

Both of us fried our rectifiers.

On the other hand, Frausty managed to get the EXACT same battery that I used working with his warp. So individual results may vary.

Battery + charger is like $30 at Radio Shack though, and it lasts for around 3 months of playing :)

[hitech]

Originally posted by Thordic
I tried using a 9.6V 1600 mAh battery pack in my warp, and Pyro has tried it to.

Both of us fried our rectifiers.


I assume you are talking about rectifiers in your warp. Unless there is a design flaw with the warp, using 9.6 volts shouldn't hurt anything (as you know, it's rate to 12 volts) and 1600 mAh wouldn't either. It has a higher current potential, but how much current it draws is up to the warp. I would say that something had to be wrong with your warp. Unless it was somehow hooked up wrong (not much chance of that). Otherwise it just doesn't make sense.

[sniper1rfa]

yeah, that makes no sense. mine seems fine, ive played two full days with it, and it shows no signs of majick smoke (though i DID fry my guns board. but that was my fault...). current draw is up to the components, not the battery. the battery can only limit current draw, not increase it. also, i used to run 18 volts into it without a hitch...

hostage: though the one i made is wires an e-tape, i have shrink wrap on they way, and am using cells with welded tabs, and the 9V snaps will be integral to the battery, and will be strain relieved on both ends of the leads. quality control shouldnt be a problem. :D

i refuse to try to make one that will FIT in a rev though, unless its a nine volt revvy. An 18 volt would be no better than the 9V's your using now, or maybe even worse.

[sniper1rfa]

well, mine was running strong till today (the warp spins up faster, and just plain spins faster). of course, i forgot about it and put it on for three cycles on my cheapo 9v battery charger (instead of two), and blew it up. nickel metal hydride smells BAD. :-)

but anyway, i have the heat shrink and tabs for about 15 batteries, and cells and charger for a battery on the way.

anyway, i was VERY impressed with my old battery, the setup lasted for a long time, even though i had charged the cells in the beginning of september, and not again until today.


I will update this thread when i get the new pack made with the components i will be using on the ones I sell.




(The battery popping was MY FAULT, BTW, i was using a totally improper charger, and made a mistake doing it. :)

the board problem ended up being a short through solenoid two's transistor. though related to the batt, it wasnt CAUSED by the batt)

[hardr0ck68]

could you set up my hyperframe/warp/halo (if not halo how about rico?) all off one pack that i could recharge on gun? with some kind of assurance i wouldent be needing to replace $100+ in electronics in a month, (or years for that matter)?? thanks!!

[sniper1rfa]

hmmmm. i can do the warp and gun off one pack, but i think adding the HALO would overdraw the batteries, possibly damaging them. it wouldnt last too long, either.
BUT, what i could do is split the pack up. make a AAA pack in the warp, and wire it in parallel with a AA pack in the halo. this would split up the draw between the two packs, be chargeable from one spot, and last a REALLY long time. i could also just do the AA pack in the HALO. itd be expensive though, like 80-100 bucks.

PM me if your interested.

[sniper1rfa]

bah, anybody think im overcharging (or worse, undercharging?). its going to cost me almost precisely 20 for the cells and shipping, im absorbing the cost of heat shrink, 9V snaps, and tabs, and the charger is 18.00 (so 23 or so shipped).

hrm, methinks im undercharging something awful.


so we will do it this way. who is willing to pay what?



*EDIT*, im starting to think like 60 or around there is reasonable. i was kinda hoping i wouldnt have to charge too much, bummer.

[hostage]

Having to many devices might draw more amps than the battery can dish out. I'll ask some EE buds what they think about running a lot of things off one battery. BTW where did you get the shrink wrap?
-Doron

[sniper1rfa]

the way i figure it is, these cells are good for about 7 amps. the warp draws 3 and ill give 1 to the solenoid in the hyperframe. assuming the halo took two, it would really be pushing the battery. thats why i said i would do both the warp pack and one in the halo, both batteries working together would take the hit nicely.

im running my gun and warp off the battery, so i know thats isnt a problem.

im getting the cells and shrinkwrap from dynamo electrics (www.dynamoelectrics.com)
cells: HR-AAAU http://www.dynamoelectrics.com/Batteries.htm

shrinkwrap is the 90 mm: http://www.dynamoelectrics.com/Supplies.htm

im getting the charger from airsoftextreme.com (accessories>batteries>5 hour quick charger)

[hostage]

I got some AAA cells at 1.2v nimhs for pretty cheap on ebsy. I use the p.6v battery chargers for the race cars and the conectors, they had a clearence 1 buck for each charger, I have about 5 extra 5 or 7 hour charges.
They also have shutoff and can charge both 9.6v nimh and nicads.
-Doron

[sniper1rfa]

really? nice...

how much you want for them?

the ones im getting are pretty much the same thing, but can do 7.2V-9.6V

i never even thought of ebay...

[hitech]

For anyone who is interested here is my 9.6 volt battery pack mounted on my marker. It runs my hyperframe, warp and revy. It sits between the flatline and the warp. The flatline has been removed for clarity.

[BarryTolar]

I'm working on a Lion/Poly setup for myself

Barry

[RamboPreacher]

The NiMh setup that I got from sniper1rfa:

[RamboPreacher]

and installed:

[RamboPreacher]

closer up:

[billmi]

Originally posted by sniper1rfa
well, thy wont run the rev, not enough voltage (they NEED 18 volts, 12 volts will be all slow and stuff, and these are only 9).


The Revy only needs 12v, not 18 for optimal operation. It uses 18 as a source, because it's convenient to use a pair of 9v batteries. That voltage gets regulated down to 12v by the board. It can run an 9v, but then you have 9v Revy performance (which really might not be as bad as it sounds if you can provide more amperage than a standard 9v cell, but you'd have to try it to see).

See you on the field,
-Bill Mills

[sniper1rfa]

nope, not true (anymore). the only regulation the newer boards do is the 5V logic curcuits. "voltage" to the servo is controlled through PWM.

for those of you not in the new, PWM is Pulse Width Modulation. basically, its turning it on and off real fast, works by averages. for example, give the motor 18 volts, then run it for 2 ms, leave it off for 1ms, and repeat, and you average 12 volts (or at least, a simulation of it). there are several reasons why its better. the two most prominent reasons are that its easier to do, and voltage regs use a small amount of juice on their own (better battery life).

so, the modify my original statement, it will either be a 9V rev, or the servo will get 6V. either will work all right with a JMJ, but not neccessarily well. and since i have no way of knowing which it will do, my blanket statement is "no, it wont work."
:)

thanks for the pics, RP!

[billmi]

Thanks for the correction.

If the newer boards are doing the motor speed control with PWM, do you know what's up with the 9v boards? It was my understanding that at least before they were the same board, in a different mount, if that's the case now they'd be driving the motor at less than 9v (average) due to the PWM.

It's also my understanding that PWM delivers better torque at lower speeds than truly lowering the voltage, and it certainly is easier to control through varying rates.

And BTW, that's a pretty decent price on the battery packs, considering you're including the charer.

See you on the field,
-Bill Mills

[sniper1rfa]

board is proably the same, programming is probably different. specifically, i doubt they are using any sort of limiter in the 9V ones. also, the low-batter indicator is programmed differently. otherwise, there would be no reason to use a different board. just a guess, though.

im not really doing the packs for the money. its more because its fun. were I to meet, for example, airsoft prices, i would be charging 60 per pack, not to speak of chargers. and i definately wouldnt have a starting price of 40 for custom packs. :-)

[Cyberious]

Interested. PM me with the info if you make them.

[SqueegeeKid]

I'm interested as well.

[billmi]

Originally posted by sniper1rfa
im not really doing the packs for the money. its more because its fun. were I to meet, for example, airsoft prices, i would be charging 60 per pack, not to speak of chargers. and i definately wouldnt have a starting price of 40 for custom packs. :-)

Yeah, those prices were looking reasonable compared to RC aircraft too.

Looks like the next wave is starting in rechargeable technology though - Lithium Polymer (not to be confused with Lithium Ion).

I don't know enough about that yet to know how practical it would be for these sort of apps.

See you on the field,
-Bill Mills

[sniper1rfa]

dont know much either, but i know Li-Ion isnt very good for any sort of power curcuit (great for logic curcuits, though), because each cell is 3.6 volts, minimizing the range of voltages possible.

you fly electrics? balsa models, or kits?

[billmi]

Welll, I think it would be better said that I crash electrics.

I built a .40 cub that was a gift to myself and my wife's grandfather. We worked on the airframe together, with him telling me stories about working on Stearman trainers, B24s, and B25s in WWII (he was on the crew that built Dolittle's modified 25s to strike Tokyo from an aircraft carrier.) Anyhow, I moved to FL before it was finished, and last year brought it out here and finished it, then learned cubs are notoriously hard to learn to fly.

So.... I saw plans in Model Airplane News for an electric L19 (renamed O-1 during the Vietnam Era) which is a similar high wing, but this design was a trainer with good dihedral. I photocopied and blew up the plans and built it mainly from leftover scrap for the cub.

It's already had a couple of crashes one that broke the wing in half, and both breaking apart the nose. In both cases they were about an hour's work to repair, it's a pretty sturdy design.

Here are before and after pics:
http://www.corin.com/bill/rc/L19/birddog.jpg
http://www.corin.com/bill/rc/L19/first_flight.jpg

There have been a few references to Lithium Polymer in battery articles in Backyard Flyer magazine over the last year, but with not a lot of detail since it's a new tech. Sky Hooks and Rigging has some very light compact batteries. One of the plusses is that the cells can put out significantly higher voltage per cell, so weight wise they are more efficient (less weight spent on the containers of multiple cells to reach desired voltage) and as much as I've learned so far they're looking well suited to the amperage output needs of electric motors. Considering the E-Mag runs on NiMHs fine, which have typically poorer amperage peak output than NiCDs. I know of one helicopter design (read as weight critical) that runs 3 minutes on a NiCD pack, and a NiMH pack can't deliver the amperage needed to get airborne. The designer is expecting to release a Lithium Polymer pack and charger this spring, and from their tests they are talking about a 11 or more minutes of flight time.

See you on the field,
-Bill Mills

[shartley]

ouch.

[sniper1rfa]

11 minutes over NiCad? wow, that would make an AA of this chemistry like 4-5000 mAh. either that, or the pack have fewer and larger batteries. impressive.

i fly electrics with my grandfather. we have ammassed a ton of them. 3 pure sailplanes (a segita and two gentle ladies), 4 powered sailplanes(two lasers and two others), and 3 powered planes (a cub and two cessna scale models). very fun to fly. :D If you wanna get better, see if you can grab a Stick Trainer of some sorts. they can take a beating. ;)

NiMH are fine for anything but serious drain aplications. the AAA's i use in my packs are good for 8 amps. :) I suspect a chopper needs a little more than that, since eventhe gas ones have trouble getting off the ground.:rolleyes:

[billmi]

Well, the crashes on the L19 were all pilot error... Not having actually taken the time to find an instructor - first flight was a bit windier of a day than I should have flown, and I gave too much elevator on takeoff, stalled and rolled right - into the ground.

Second flight - wasn't intentional - calm day, but evening, and no time before sundown to get to the flying field - I figured I'd do some taxi runs up and down the street (as I'd done in initial set-up testing.) Good plan, since the tailwheel is fixed, taxiing is a bit to learn - it has to have enough groundspeed and throttle for the rudder to get that wheel to drag left or right. Anyhow, I have too much throttle, and got airborne - found it's nice and stable, but on my street there's not room to turn around in the air (too many trees.) I ditched in a bush, but there was a tree in the middle of it :-P So now, I'm waiting for a good calm day to coincide with me actually having time to get to the flying field...

Back to topic, on the Lithium Polymer batteries - I did a little web hunting today, and found a company selling them - their site says they are a Gel based Lithium Ion battery, but instead of metal, their casing is mylar saving on weight and bulk - which I would expect would make them more fragile, yet substantially lighter for the MAh delivered. With E-Mag's already having a battery housing of aluminum, perhaps a smaller housing could hold a Li Polymer battery with the same or more muscle as the current NiMH packs.

Be it NiMH or Li Polymer, I'm interested in eventually setting up a pack curved to a radius close to an HPA tank to fit in a pocket on a tank cover.

See you on the field,
-Bill

[sniper1rfa]

interesting. any info on charging or anything? that my current problem, i cant find decent chargers, and custom ones are too damned expensive.

curved? that would be hard, though i could make one that is flexible to a certain degree (enough to bend to a tank). the thing i would be worried about is fatiguing the connections and snapping them. even like 22 guage wire would go without suppost of some kind.

fly in the morning, like 7-9 AM. after the dew, and before the wind. thats one nice thing about electrics, there are no time constraints. The AMA (american model association) restricts gas flight to 9 AM- 5PM.

[hostage]

heh i was thinking about talking to you, I have a crap load of the charges that I got at a steal from rat shack, 9.6v. Mb we can do a trade.
-Doron

[sniper1rfa]

i have a supply of them cheap now. :)

actually thinking of starting to build them now. well see where that leads.

[billmi]

Yep, good chargers are not cheap.

A curved pack isn't hard to do, you need to make a pack where the cells are side by side in one or two rows, not predomenantly end to end. Lay the cells over the curve to be matched (i.e. the tank) and hit them with hot melt glue (That's what I've assumed the glue is on professionally built packs, it's what I use when building packs) and then solder on your leads. There's no bending or stressing of anything to do after that.

Unfortunately getting out to fly in the mornings is about the hardest time in my schedule - so it's up to openings in my schedule when I can, or for overcast days coinciding with me having time (low to no wind.)

See you on the field,
-Bill Mills

[sniper1rfa]

actually, i just thought of a better way. hold it onto the tank while shrink wrapping, with the wrap perpindicular to the long axis of the tank. i was just thinking in 2D, originally.