Duralite Support

[jjp]

Dear Flying Giants members:

We would like to inform you of a new support forum that we’re going to have on FlyingGiants.com.

We will be bringing you up to date with our latest products release and answer your questions.

Duralite has been providing their customers with very reliable and high performance products in various RC categories such as Airplanes, Jets and Helicopters. We have been a leader in customer service and this forum will further enhance this effort.

The forum is being lead by our friend Reza. He will personally help you or get us involved to answer your questions. Please don’t hesitate to ask him any questions that you may have.

In addition we’d like to thank Flying Giants for this opportunity.

Thank you,
Jack Price

[Reza]

Dear Flying Giant Members,

Any of you out there that charges Duralite batteries with other chargers? I'd like to start running some tests, charging Duralite batteries with Triton and Hobbico Elite charger and compare it with Duralite charger. I know there are some of you that charging Duralite batteries with other chargers, I would like to ask you to share your experience with us. I know best performance is achieved by using Duralite charger with Duralite batteries but some people use their own charger anyways, so I'd like to be able to provide those customers with more accurate info on how much they are under or over charging their batteries.

Thank you,
Reza

[accaptain]

Quick question,

I am running TBM 2800 LI packs and have been using the duralite charger flawlessly for about 10 months now. I have my new QQ yak ready and was charging the batteries last night. I noticed that one pack I was charging seemed to be taking a while so I reached in the fuse for whatever reason and checked the connection to the charger from the battery. Everything was plugged in fine but I noticed when I move the wire the light would go out on the charger and then come back on. In fact once it went out and I had to unplug then replug the charger cord back to the battery which turned the light back on. I pulled the connection and checked with my 8-ball checker and it said 8.30 volts. I figured it was close to peaking and stopped charging so I could go to bed. Anyways I am wondering about why the light would go out when I moved the charge lead? On this plane I had to extend my battery leads to reach the regulators. I have been charging through these extensions which I have never done before with this charger/batteries. Is it ok to charge through say a 6 or 12 inch extension on the battery? I am not charging through a switch but yet directly to the battery. When I plugged the 8 ball into the extension on the battery I jiggled it and the 8 ball never flashed or shut off. I checked the extension to the battery and it is plugged in good and the ends of the extension looked fine. Just acted wierd on the charger when I grabbed the charge lead. Any answers on this one?

Thanks!

[Reza]

Anthony,

Use Duralite charger with Duralite batteries only. Light going on and off has to do with connection. In the Duralite manual it clearly says that in cases like this you need to unplug and plug the leads to ensure a good connection. Running longer extensions will cause a drop in current to the battery and therefore it can take a little longer to charge. Once the voltage of the pack gets close to 8.3 the charger current drops to 0.035 amp to peak charge the battery. I would strongly suggest you either changing your charger for your batteries or getting Duralite batteries for your Duralite charger.

Let me know how the maiden flight goes.
Reza
Duralite Support

[juanes1969]

Reza:
I have all Duralite equipment and I use the Hobbico Elite to discharge them every once in a while.(about every 5 weeks) And for charging I use the Duralite charger ONLY.
When I am only charging the batts, the charger starts to act up on me. I connect the batts, and after about 30 to 60 minutes, the charger lights start to fade away, and then they`re off. Do the charger lights fade when the batteries get near full charge? Or does it have to just shut off completely?
When the lights are off, if I just barely touch the adapter, without any pressure and just with my skin, the lights come on again. This only happens if I touch the adapter on it`s face, the one with the specs sticker, it does not happen if I touch it on the rest of the plastic.
Any advice?
Thanks,
John

[Reza]

Hi John,

The light does start fading away when battery is near or fully charged. In some cases even after the light goes out, topping off continues for an extra half hour. What you are seeing though seem to be bad connection somewhere. What is the voltage of the pack when the lights go out? and what pack are you using? Which charger do you have, 3 output or one? You can also email me at reza@giantrcsupport.com anytime.

Let me know and I will help you with you problem.

Thank you,
Reza

[juanes1969]

Wrote you an e-mail.
Thanks, John

[Zeeb]

Well I seem to be having the same sort of problem with my Duralite charger...

I first noticed it when the batteries were not all coming up reasonably close to each other (I run three of the same batteries in my 33% Edge) and I couldn't figure out why.

I run the four output charger and it seems the #3 outlet does not consistently top off the battery it's connected to so I've gone to not using that port at all. There does seem to be some of the same problem with the charger lights going off and I can wiggle the plug going into the charger and that port will come back on.

It also seems that which ever battery is connected to the #1 port (looking at the charger, this is the port closest to the power supply) will charge any of the three batteries higher than the other ports will. Now this is not a significant difference right now, but is it pointing to a developing problem?

Thanks guys!

[Reza]

Hello Zeeb,

The difference should be within .05-.1 volt top. Leave the charger plugged in for about an hour or less after the light goes out. There might be a very small variation in the port output voltage or circuit on port #3 in your case but it is absolutely safe to use it. I think all your batteries in fully charged condition should show 8.27-8.4 with no load this is if the batteries are not old. If your numbers from port 3 are within the range, don't worry about it.

Thank you,
Reza

[Zeeb]

The batteries are about a year old but have not been used much before March of this year.

As I said all three are the same being the 2800 mah flat four cells, two for the airframe and one for the engine ignition. I notice the engine battery was not reading the same voltage under the 1 amp load test after charging and before flying. Usually this was a difference initially of .2 volts between the airframe batteries and engine ignition battery. Then as I used the batteries more, the airframe batteries came up more on the post charge loaded voltage check while the engine battery stayed the same but now it was about .3 volts. I had always used the #3 port on the engine battery, so just out of curiosity I change the charge lead to the #4 port and it resumed charging.

You're right about the minor differences with the ports as the #1 port will always charge a bit higher than the others but it's within .1 volts. So for now I've been rotating the batteries on the charge ports and not using the #3 port at all. I'm still kind of bugged about the apparently loose fit of the charge lead plugs going into the charger though. Is that accounting for me being able to wiggle that plug and the charge light will come back on for awhile in about 50% of the times I try it?

I've gotten to the point where I never unplug the charge leads without wiggling them now.

Thanks for the help!