Good charging setup for the lipo noobs.

dogman dan

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Here is an example of a decent, but simple and fairly inexpensive charging setup for a newbie considering lipo. Not the best way, or the cheapest way at all, but an affordable setup that charges 3x faster than an Imax b6.

I'm not saying get this particular charger, just trying to show how easy charging a 12s pack can be.

The Pack. 10s or 12s lipo. So either at least two 5s 5000 mha lipo packs for 36v, or 6s packs for 8 volts more. In this case, two 6 s packs connected in serial fashion gives a 5 ah pack that puts out 50v when fully charged. For a larger pack, additional lipo bricks are connected paralell for 10 ah, 15 ah, or whatever. Then the two paralelled packs are connected in series to get the final pack. View attachment 3

To charge, you seperate the series connection, and connect each pack to a charger. Or if only one charger, charge one, then the other.

The chargers. In this case, I chose two 150 watt turnigy chargers for the low price for this wattage. View attachment CIMG0203.JPG

The power supply. Supposedly a meanwell, but I suspect not, this ebay bought power supply is a 12v 30 amp power supply. Adjustable in voltage some, I turned it up to 14v. A 24v supply could be used, but not with this particular charger, that requires a voltage below 18v. When running both chargers at max output of 150w, the 300 watt draw did not drop the voltage one bit. So this supply is perfectly sized to run these two chargers full blast at the same time.View attachment CIMG0201.JPG

All set up and charging, it will charge a 5 ah pack in 45 min, or a 10 ah pack in 90 min approx. I just ran a fully discharged 72v 10 ah zippy 20c (20s) pack from 3.75v to 21 v in 2.5 hours. That was a non balancing charge, and the last 20 min could have been skipped if you wanted to undercharge a bit.

Running on 6s packs, you get about 6 amps of charging, the whole thing is using just under 400 watts measured on the AC plug. For those for whom this matters, it runs fine on a gas generator.
 
I have found that I wish I had paid a few dollars extra to get a faster (higher amp) charger. If your LiPo pack is big enough that you only have to charge once a week (I live close to work), I prefer to do it on a Saturday so I have plenty of time to keep an eye on it (I'm paranoid). I still want to keep an eye on it when its charging, but now I wish the charging was a little faster. Thanks for posting this.
 
Similar. This one doesn't have the right markings to be a genuine meanwell. But it is a close copy of S 350 -12. So 350 watt, 12 volt meanwell is what I thought I was getting. But the serial number on it is not right, mine is marked SP-350 watt. So it's a dang clone. But it's putting out a solid 14.6v at 300 watts, so no problem for this power supply to run a 300w charging setup. The one in the link is a S 350 - 24. So it outputs 24v. The more high powered chargers can run on 24v, while the lower watt chargers like my turnigy's take a max of 18v. So I needed a 12v power supply.

I paid 41 bucks including shipping. Others have the genuine meanwell for about 60 shipped.

On the chargers, I sorta figured that two cheaper ones gave me some insurance against one burning out. So now I have two slow B6's and two of the turnigy chargers.

Man, those hyperions look great. But higher powered meanwells to run em do get a bit pricy, plus the cost of the hyperion. For a guy doing a commute he can go both ways on 12s 10 ah, this setup would be plenty. Charge from dead in 90 min, balance in about 2 hrs. Not too bad. And the price of this setup is not too bad either, at around $100.
 
Links to the power supply.

Real meanwell S -350 12v 29 amp http://cgi.ebay.com/MW-12V-DC-29A-350W-Meanwell-Switching-Power-Supply-/350436012108?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item51979d304c

Where I got mine, that seems to be a clone. http://cgi.ebay.com/12V-DC-30A-350W-Regulated-Switching-Power-Supply-MW-New-/260472178091?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item3ca55a05ab
 
dogman said:
Man, those hyperions look great. But higher powered meanwells to run em do get a bit pricy, plus the cost of the hyperion.

They cost the same as you just paid DogMaN...I had my 24v Meanwel shipped for 43 bucks.. Granted you need two of them to utilise the full power of the Hyperion, but thats what lets say 85 bucks plus under 200 for a Hyperion shipped not too shabby for near ~10amp 14S charging/balancing capability..

KiM
 
That is a good price point AJ But his budget noob setup is 120 bucks so not too bad either. As little as I actually ride lately I am going to start with something small. The Hyperion is great for when I actually have 20 ah of Lipo to charge. Unfortunately it won't be right away.
 
I was refering to BIG power supplies, like you need to power a 1000 watt charger. Here is one example of what I mean. 1000 watts for $450.

http://cgi.ebay.com/Power-One-1000-Watt-Switching-DC-Power-Supply-/220731892231?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item3364a56207

Surely there are better deals, but to improve charging time will take more than 350 watts. This setup I'm displaying is just one way to do it fairly cheap, and still use a charger that balances the packs when you want to.

Can you paralell several of the 350 watt power supplies? That might be a bit cheaper for 1000 watts of power to send to a nice charger.

Edit... Backtracked to the Goodrum thread AJ linked and answered my question. Yes you can paralell the power supplies. And a good pic too of how to wire it. Great to know that, but for the noobs, mabye a bit much to take on. Also I was misunderstanding about that charger, and assumed it was much higher wattage. One 550 watt hyperion has got to be better than two cheap 150 watt ones. So even if you could only feed it 350 watts, buying that charger is a good idea.

The main thing I wanted to show in this thread was how a noob could buy two affordable chargers, a fairly cheap power supply, and fairly quickly charge a 12s or 10 s lipo setup. All he has to do is unplug a series adapter on his pack, and plug in two chargers. Not so hard, really. The idea behind two charges is to charge both halves of the pack simultaneously. If you had a 15s pack, you might want three chargers, one for each 5s section if you chose the 5s packs. This particular cheapie turnigy charger actually does 8s, so you could run a 16s pack and charge each 8s section at 150 watts. Not bad for $120.

I hate to keep recomending get a ping to everybody, especially those who don't have any reason to carry 25 miles of range. But with the 2c ping, you have to. This just shows how easy charging lipo can be, and might make a guy decide 12s lipo would be just as good, if not way better than a ping if his ride is only 5-10 miles or so.
 
@dogman - That's ridiculous!! Dont buy this 450$ and Just get 2 of the HP server power supply capable support 96A and 1150 watts for my iCharger 3010B 1000w no problem. It cost me only $44 dollars for 2 of the HP server power supply.

Here the link information. http://sites.google.com/site/tjinguytech/my-projects/diy-24v-47a

I charge 5s6p (30Ah) in parallel by iCharger running 30A takes less 30 mins most. I looked the logview and it showing 622 watts per hour during the charging.
 
I agree, $450 for a big power supply is ridiculous. That's why I was advising not to do that. I hadn't seen 1000 watts of power supply very cheap anywhere, but I had seen some nice expensive ones.

BTW, this thread did start as just showing noobs it can be pretty simple and cheap to charge lipo at a decent rate, compared to say, an Imax B6 that takes forever. I have no problem with it going mega technical after a few posts. I just wanted to put up a few pix of a simple setup, so the noobs can take it in, and decide how they want to go.

That server power supply looks great, just the ticket for powering a really hefty charger. Someday for me too, but right now charging a 72v 10 ah pack with this rig is pretty easy, and only takes 2 hours to get to about 4.1v per cell. Not bad for the money.

For super cheap, my first lipo charging setup is hard to beat. A 12v 6 amp car charger I had in the garage, an old sla, and an Imax b6. Got it done for 30 bucks. But cumbersome.
 
Even easier..
If you're gonna do 36v, an icharger 1010b+ or hyperion 14s charger will do two 5s packs still connected in serial.
One charger... one power supply.. and no regrouping of packs in serial needed.

The only easier setup possible is a ping battery!
 
Yep. Those hyperions are da kine. But you can't buy one for the price of two of the cheaper ones. I thought I did OK with my setup, charging a pack split into two sections at 150 watts each for $120. I don't think it's crucial that you choose the same charger I did, I just wanted to show that it's not a $500 cost, nor any super complicated thing to charge a 12s pack pretty quickly.

If you can't unplug a battery into two sections, and put it back into series after charging, you really do need to stay away from lipo. With some andersons, you can make adapter plugs for it that are idiot proof. Dealing with a 24s pack split into 4-5 sections, now that is possible to screw up and burn some fingers.

For the noobs, please post links to where to buy the hyperion charger you recomend, and also what to get for the power supply and where to get it.

The 1010b link too, I don't see them sold at HK.
 
You can get iCharger 1010b or 3010B from EPBUDDY, They have excellent reputation for the warranty and Here the link EPBUDDY HOBBY

They located in Ohio state and I got iCharger 3010B really very fast shipping 2 days from Ohio to California. AWESOME!
 
Thanks for that link. Looks like a good place to buy chargers. Prices not crazy.

One 1010b and one 350 watt meanwell is a great match of charger and power supply too! A bit pricier, but able to charge at the same 300 watts as my setup. What would be sweet is a pair of them, but then you are into $400 for it all. Charging a 72v 10 ah lipo pack in one hour would be very nice at the racetrack.

Edit, After another look, that's a really good place to get paralell jst harnesses, paralell balance and charging boards, and other needed stuff. Nice! I like that paralell harness without plug ends, perfect for the anderson users. Love stuff that makes it simple.

Ep buddy added to links in lipo noobs thread. 8)
 
Yea, Nice find. IF I could get ahold of HK I would cancel the backordered charger and go with EPBUDDY.
 
Yeah, the GT line of chargers looks pretty identical to the turnigy line. So there's good inexpensive chargers there too if you find the ichargers pricy.

Worth a few bucks more to have in the USA warrantee. And faster shipping. My last order from HK musta had the wrong thing in it. Despite being "in Stock" still took about two weeks to even ship. Grrr.
 
Yea my batteries won't ship till the chargers come in. :x The GT at EPbuddy is a few dollars more but 1 year warranty and ships from Ohio :D I am going to call them today.
 
@torker - Yep few dollars, Epbuddy is helluva excellent reputation and very helpful if you had any problem. They help you with anything. You will happy with epbuddy for sure. :thumbup: :D
 
THANKS FOR POSTING THIS .... HAVE 4 PACKS OF 6S 5a ON THEIR WAY .... NOW FOR A CHARGER ... AND MAYBE 4 MORE PACKS
 
I got my iCharger 1010B+ today and did a quick charge on a couple of 5s packs I have here and this thing works really good. I also ordered the Junsi 350W DC Power Supply P350 as it looked really good for transporting on bike with charger for charging at work til I can get second charger to leave there. Nice to be able to charge more than one battery at a time.

Also got a couple of Bare End charger cables and a couple of 5s balance cables. Put Anderson's on the charger cable and it works great.
 
which fitting will plug into the turnigy bullet connectors ? something like this ??

http://epbuddy.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=14&products_id=52

Para_XT60_1200px.jpg
 
Well close. Many lipos have 4mm bullets, but some have 5 mm.. Each pack will have a male - and a female +.

So you can solder up your own rig like that fairly easy, or crimp the connections like I like to when just connecting three wires.

You'd need a female - and a male + on the end with multiple wires, then the same thing as on the pack on the end leading to the charger or the controller.

The wire shown in the pic is for a slightly different application. Those two male plugs go into the charger, and all the others go to packs with that kind of plug.
I find it amazing, that the plugs on chargers aren't polarized.
 
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