What's inside the BLU PACK (pcc)

[CowboyGoggles]

So.. I don't like to throw things away, and Like a lot of poor fools I dropped $70 on a blu kit before i did my vaping homework.
I still have it and last night i took it apart. what i found inside was a spring loaded female connector, a board to regulate charging of batteries, and a lithium based battery cell of some kind.

the latter was what i was looking for b/c I noticed that the input to the pack was just a usb cable adapted to a coaxial plug.
so i knew that inside the PCC was a battery with sufficient voltage and amperage to rock an atty or carto.

BUT THEN>>>

when i looked at how the battery was connected to the board i saw that the terminals of the battery were in parallel with the coaxial input from the usb 5v source. no resistor, no diode, no regulator(except the charging board maybe?)

I'm left to assume that the battery is charging directly off the current supplied by the usb, OR that the board is somehow actively limiting its own load to buffer the charge.

Another odd note: the only markings on the battery other than a few strings of numbers is the batterys rating given in "Wh": 3.33Wh. watts per hour?

I would test the voltage with a meter but mine's broken.

I'm very tempted to just charge it up and hook it up to a carto and see what happens.
could be good could do nothing. if it burns the carto, I've got plenty.

what do you guys think?

 

[TomCatt]

amp = watt / volt


Thus, for the NP-FT1 battery:

Ah = 2.4Wh / 3.6V
Ah = 0.66

so Ah = 3.33/3.7 = 0.9Ah = 900mAh

 

[asdaq]

A pic from above that shows the numbers and the board would be helpful.

Technically you probably could tap into the battery and vape directly from it, but, the charging board is likely also the protection circuit, so you would need to use the whole circuit package which doesn't sound so appealing compared to a single 14500 which has the same capacity and likely better performance.

 

[DaveP]

If you use or charge ecigs from a USB connector on your PC, it's much safer to use a powered USB hub that provides the voltage and current instead of letting your motherboard take the load. There's a lot of controversy around that statement, but a burned out USB port can mean a motherboard change to repair. Powering that USB ecig device using power from a wall outlet is much cheaper if a catostrophic event takes out the USB port.

At the very least, a battery box passthrough is a good idea. The USB port charges the battery and the battery buffers the load of the atomizer/cartomizer. A plus is that you can detach the passthrough, once charged, and use it in a portable manner.

 

[CowboyGoggles]

special Thanks to tomcatt. this is what I thought, but I am just left to assume that the battery is 3.7 volts.

I found some good pictures in another thread on same topic here:
http://www.e-cigarette-forum.com/forum/battery-mods/38163-inside-blu-pack.html

will test it tonight and post the results.

 

[CraigHB]

I just made some comments about the Blu PCC in the other post, but you really wouldn't be able to use any of the existing electronics. You'd have to gut it and rebuild it to make a mod out of it. Probably not worth the the trouble when you can just build a AA box mod with a protected 14500 and be done with it. If you really want to use the LiPo cell, you can, but it's going to have the same current limitations as a protected 14500. Just no benefit there other than to make use of something that you might otherwise throw away.

Assuming you are intent on making a mod out of the Blu PCC, you may be able to use the existing charging circuit if it's totally isolated from the rest of the electronics. Without actually handling one myself, I wouldn't be able to tell you for sure. At the least, you'll need to remove any electronics between the cell and atomizer connector. Then you'll need to add a protection PCB at the cell before wiring anything up to it.

 

[asdaq]

Welcome back to 2012 Craig, thought we'd lost you there.

 

[CraigHB]

Hehe, thanks, didn't think anyone would ever notice

 

[TomCatt]

Hehe, thanks, didn't think anyone would ever notice

Not notice ? I see some of these threads pop up and think to myself "Well will just have to wait until Craig answers that"

 

[CowboyGoggles]

upon closer inspection I have discovered that the battery is protected and there was more to that cable than i thought.

I hooked the battery to a 2.0 Ohm carto and it worked very well!

I think I have found a safe method but I have already posted my further questions HERE:http://www.e-cigarette-forum.com/forum/modding-forum/253478-charging-question.html

 

[CowboyGoggles]

DONE

http://www.e-cigarette-forum.com/forum/battery-mods/256390-mods-i-built-over-weekend-l-k.html#post4980791

 

[CraigHB]

Great, glad it worked for you. Beats throwing it away. Looks pretty good too.