PILA IBC charger and Lenmar BCUNI3

[oreo57]

I bought a Lenmar charger because ut "seemed" like a good IC based charger..
AND it was dual use (NiMH or Li-ion)

Unfortunately I ran into a snag. It had problems detecting discharged Li-ion as Lithium. Testing the resting voltage of the batteries (3.5 V) I don't believe it should have been a problem.. But it was . I started early swapping so the bat's didnt run too low and this worked out fine. IF one mis-registered I would "pre-charge" it on a single el cheepo charger (I know they are el-cheepo because one fell apart so I proceeded to do what anyone would do.. Disassemble it.. .....

anyways back to the Lenmar. This week I bought some AR IMR 14500's to try out.. (The other batteries were ICR 14650's). Same probelm w/ mis-detecting..
THEN today I put a pre-charged 14500 in and the charger went "poof"..

Nedless to say I need a new charger (and will send a FYI to Lenmar on how I feel about their engineering )

So the PILA popped up. expensive and not dual use

Anyone one have any comments/ opinions??

 

[sailorman]

Yeah, the Lenmar is crap. I had one a while back and threw it away.
The Pila is good, but over priced and over hyped.
Check out the Xtar chargers. The specs are very good, they are reasonably priced and they get a lot of love from CPF who are into batteries and chargers probably more than anybody else.
They're referred to as the "Poor man's Pila".
The model WP-2 was about $20 and got good reviews a couple years ago, but I think there are other models out now that might be even better.

 

[oreo57]

Yeah, the Lenmar is crap. I had one a while back and threw it away.
The Pila is good, but over priced and over hyped.
Check out the Xtar chargers. The specs are very good, they are reasonably priced and they get a lot of love from CPF who are into batteries and chargers probably more than anybody else.
They're referred to as the "Poor man's Pila".
The model WP-2 was about $20 and got good reviews a couple years ago, but I think there are other models out now that might be even better.

I was wondering about them (Xtar)

Lithium Ion Battery Chargers
But then there was this one:
Intellicharge i4 Charger

another dual charger BUT I was told the old model had an issue w/ it's power supply. To me it looks like another version of the Lenmar.

too many choices......

 

[markfm]

Xtar wp2 ii is nice, I picked one up about six Weeks ago. It comes with a car cig lighter adapter, if you need to charge on the road.

Pick up a second pair of screw in spacers for it, $1, if you need to charge shorter 340 class batteries.

Very low discharge rate when disconnected from power. I use it with an outlet timer set to turn off after 3 hours.

It does only handle 3.6/3.7v batts, max charge voltage is 4.2 v. Near ideal charge characteristic. Switch set to 1 is 500 mA max current, while 2 is 1A max charge current, for high capacity batteries.

 

[oreo57]

Thanks.. fortunately or unfortunately I ordered a Pila.. came yesterday (ordered from TX on Fri. fasssstt).

I use an inverter in the car so cig plug is not crucial.

I keep bugging the engineers at Lenmar.. they keep tellingme not to use the "industrial batteries"

I still think it was a bit of bad engineering and execution.. Lenmar would recharge things like phone batteries ect.

A bit more "thought" and their product would be good.

Xtar.. I do like the larger charge rate.. not crazy about the lower level of output on the Pila.

Will contemplate xtar as backup (I prefer 2 of everything since you can't just go out and get anything locally)..