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Old 04-16-2014, 12:12 PM   #7 (permalink)
CT2007HCH
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Grid Charging

msantimanzano,

The power supply you bought looks like it would work as a grid charger not as a battery conditioner. I like the specs on it, I may get one as a grid charger.

The charger/conditioner will cycle the batteries (charge/discharge). It will discharge to a voltage and will keep track of how many milli amp hours have been removed from the cell. This is important to determine the capacity.

The charger also has a circuit that will automatically detect full charge when the voltage starts to drop. It also has a temp sensor to abort charge when the temp of the cells gets to high.

Grid chargers. Well in my opinion it depends on what is wrong with your pack. My pack had 2 problems.

1) Fast self discharge. The cells are very old. For example when we left the car at the airport for a week the IMA battery was 100% dead. Grid charger won't help this. I also saw this on the cells after I pulled them out. I may do an experiment where I charge some and let them sit, then measure the voltage every day.

2) 1 or 2 cells in my pack were bad. Since the cells are in series current has to flow through every cell to charge or discharge. Because I had a few bad cells the total charge was limited. Grid charger should help this by forcing charge through the bad cells at a very low current. I ordered some part to build my own grid charger but the one you bought looks much better.

Here is the video that shows how to remove the pack in the civic.

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