Headway Group Purchase

What is the voltage at the charger connector when nothing is hooked to it? Open circuit voltage should be about 29v. If it is much lower than that, you have a bad charger.

Seems like headway cells are working good, but a lot of bad reports about the chargers.
According to Victoria, Headway does not make the chargers; perhaps they should find a better source since their reputation is suffering.
 
I get nothing on my multimeter and the Watts Up meter gives no reading either. Doesn't the charger need to be connected to a battery to give a reading?

Dana
 
i don't think their reputation is affected because of the chargers. but it appears that one is dead if there is no current flowing from the charger to the battery. unless the BMS has blocked the charging, but you have no voltage otput on the charger either.
 
A bit expensive ( ok.. alot expensive ) but it is so much more fun to use :

http://cgi.ebay.com/A123-Lipoly-Nicd-NiMH-PB-Super-Charger-TP1010C-TP-1010C_W0QQitemZ220368176667QQihZ012QQcategoryZ34056QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

( Ballancer and 12v supply not included !! 10S max)

Instead of waiting for a green light, you look at a display and know exactly what's going on. Or maybe i'm just a sucker for digital displays.. meh..
 
danam1 said:
I get nothing on my multimeter and the Watts Up meter gives no reading either. Doesn't the charger need to be connected to a battery to give a reading?

Dana
Click to expand...

I can't speak for all chargers but of the two cheap chinese chargers that I own, both put out maximum voltage when open circuit conditions (i.e., nothing connected but the voltmeter). If you get absolutely nothing, it might be something as simple as a fuse. You might try opening it up.
 
if current is not going backwards through the wattsup, it is not charging. i sure wish i knew something about how the chargers worked, seems like a lot of them go dead. don't discharge your pack more until you can recharge. maybe another charger. we can try to diagnose this one too, if you can open it up. but check the inrush fuse first thing when you open it, or did you have leds when you plug it in?
 
Many chinese chargers have a F#$%^ng stupid 3 amp fuse that is a non replaceable fuse soldered directly tothe board. Open it up and look for that first. You can replace it with a proper replaceable fuse with a little soldering work.
 
When I connect the battery to the Watts Up "load" side, before connecting the charger to the "source" side, the battery stats are shown. Then I connect the charger and the Watts Up shows an input of between 0.01A and 0.04A so the charger is feeding something (very little) to the battery. The charger blinks its red LED three times when I plug it into the wall. I've had the charger apart twice. There are a couple of heat sinks for some of the resistors as well as many capacitors a transistor or two, a couple transformers ... nothing I can call a fuse. There is an uninsulated 1/2" light gauge wire on the circuit board. Nothing inside appeared to have gotten hot.

I did yesterday's run assuming the charger behavior after the first day's run showed that the 5A it used was only enough to cause it to equalize cells. I now see I am about 3/4ths discharged :( .

Dana

I just popped it open again and lo and behold, there IS a fuse sort of thing labeled F1 on the board. It is stamped with what appears to be 3.15A. It does have continuity though.
 
since you had leds, that is the fuse on the input, so i figured it was intact. not sure why it cannot push current out. can you measure any of the voltages inside when it is plugged in? pictures?

you should be able to see if you have continuity from the pcb to the end of the charger plug also. but all this was originally working and then crapped out, no reversed leads or anything which woulda caused damage.

if the charger displayed a voltage on the output, that would help. so take more pictures, and of the traces on the underside too where the output wires enter the pcb, and on top where the wires connect to the shunt resistors. maybe you have the diode blown in the output like we talked about on another charger thread. or was that here?
 
First thing - my charger never showed any voltage or did anything until it was hooked up to the battery. It has two LED's - one is red and on anytime it is plugged in. The other comes on after it is connected to the battery and analyzes the voltage of the pack and then it blinks red while charging. It goes green when the charging is complete. My charger is a 48 volt 2 amp that came with the group buy. I posted pictures back on this topic about page 7 of the outside and inside of it.

Second thing is that someone else was asking about what the correct voltage is to run it. Mine is labeled 220v 50 hz but came with a regular 120v ac plug and runs fine on typical US wall outlet 60 hz .

Someone else was asking what how to connect all the wires - again look back at the photos I posted and notice at least on my BMS that there are two different places black wires come from but one is labeled charger. So I hooked that up to the charger connector . The red wire I used for both the charger and the load. I have put fuses on both the load and the charger positive coming from the battery.

Hope that helps . My system has been working just fine so far.

I would suggest that anyone test each cell individually with a meter and then also test the voltage of the pack and also as it charges.

As I said, no voltage or current detected from my charger until it is hooked up to the battery and charging and then again only a tiny amount once the charging is completed.

danam1 said:
When I connect the battery to the Watts Up "load" side, before connecting the charger to the "source" side, the battery stats are shown. Then I connect the charger and the Watts Up shows an input of between 0.01A and 0.04A so the charger is feeding something (very little) to the battery. The charger blinks its red LED three times when I plug it into the wall. I've had the charger apart twice. There are a couple of heat sinks for some of the resistors as well as many capacitors a transistor or two, a couple transformers ... nothing I can call a fuse. There is an uninsulated 1/2" light gauge wire on the circuit board. Nothing inside appeared to have gotten hot.

I did yesterday's run assuming the charger behavior after the first day's run showed that the 5A it used was only enough to cause it to equalize cells. I now see I am about 3/4ths discharged :( .

Dana

I just popped it open again and lo and behold, there IS a fuse sort of thing labeled F1 on the board. It is stamped with what appears to be 3.15A. It does have continuity though.
Click to expand...
 
see below for voltage info - multiply to by number of cells in pack to analyze your pack
ateene said:
I'm using the LiFePo4 charger that I got with the battery.

According to posts on the Yahoo Headway group fourm the cells at 3.3x V are fully charged.

3.65 v = Hot off the charger, end of charge
3.3x v = Sitting idle, no load, fully charged
3.2 to 3.0v = light load, 10 amps or less
3.0 to 2.5v = bulk of the discharge voltage under load
2.5 to 2.1v = empty, nothing left.

2.0v or less = Dead Duck.
Click to expand...
 
I have 3 chargers from Headway .

One is a 3a and the other two are 2a . All 3 of the chargers don't show any output voltage until connected to a battery.i put it down to being a good safety feature so you dont have a live male plug end floating around the place.They need to be connected to a load to get them to start up and push current.

Now I know your charger isn't pushing current because you measured it with your watts up while it was plunged into your pack and the pack seemed to be at a low enough voltage to kick the charger into full output.

But what I am thinking is check for a full loose of bad connection on the wires on the battery side of the charge plug. If one of them isn't connected the charger wont start up and push any current .As it wont see any load from the battery.You would still be able to drain power from the pack through the dischage wires but perhaps not charge, just an idea.

If its not this then it could be a dead charger. As for headway backing up there product and warranty I have found them to be very very good. You wont have any problems at all with headway if it is a genuine warranty claim.

Kurt.
 
This charger is 24V, has one LED that will show red or green, and has no fan. All negative wires were soldered together, so I'm assuming they are meant to be together for both charge and discharge.

I can't get to the trace side of the PCB as it must be glued to the box, so I don't have access to uninsulated wires other than those from, diodes, resistors, capacitors, the fuse, the heat sink. I poked around but only made the LED flash when I connected to its legs.

I will try to post a pic of the accessable side of the PCB. I'm not a whiz with the computer, but I can load pics from the digital camera onto the HD.

Damn, I just burned the PCB by trying to get a reading on a diode by a resistor. One end of the resistor is burned. Well, if it was operable before, I doubt it is operable now and Headway probably isn't going to be interested in talking about replacing it under warranty.

Where can I buy a dependable 24V 2A or so charger for LiFePO4?

Dana
 
Kurt, what you say makes sense. The one time the charger worked I didn't get a reading without connecting the charger to the battery.

The two negative connections to the BMS are good, and they are soldered together, with two others coming from the plate connected to the negatives of the last pairing of cells, to form one negative wire. The screws of all connections to the plates are snug and the positive leads do not go to the BMS. There are two positive wires attached to the plate connecting the first two cells.

Thank you all for your help. I hope I can be a help someday.

Dana
 
you may not have damaged it, but if the resistor burned up, then you can replace it too. i don't think it makes any difference to them if you damaged it trying to fix it after you knew it was bad. they will likely give you a new one. but i really wonder how it went bad since it worked initially from what you said. they don't fix this stuff if it fails, they just throw it away like they do here.
 
If the charger is toast I am just thinking how much would a 24v lifepo4 charger cost ? You could find that the airmial postage back to china is about the same as a new charger.Best to weigh up your options first.

Kurt.
 
It appears I "welded" through one of the wires that connected the "R32" resistor to the PCB and broken that connection.

I've sent an email to Victoria. I will see what she says before doing more.

I found a Tenergy charger, <http://www.all-battery.com/productimages/charger/01307manual.pdf> for $47 and wonder if anyone reading this has experience with either this charger or Tenergy products.

Dana
 
go to drbasses 18000 watt charger thread for the ecitypower.com chargers, they are cheap and powerful, but read what they say over there. i think having a second charger is a way to guarantee they don't break down.

i think there is force of nature similar to murphy's law. it goes like this, if you save spare parts or specific things like tools for a special job, you never need them, but lose it and next day you need it. or buy tools retail and next day they are 5% of retail on CL. i found a hand ax for splitting kindling on the freeway while driving home today because i finally bot one 2 weeks ago, AFTER the woodstove season is over so totally insane. i even found an identical if not the same lugnut which came off my honda car 2 years ago and i had used another from a CRX. i stopped at the light on the same street where i think mine came off. laying right next to the driver's door, was a lugnut sitting all by itself on the asphalt. i stopped for the red light, opened the door, picked it up and brought it home, identical to the old honda size, it really could be my original. 4 lane street for 2 miles-4miles, 2 years, what's the likelyhood?
 
That site looks interesting, and I'm going to fully take it in as soon as I get this chimney replacement project off the roof (literally) and can let my spotters go home. Just watered the neighbors plants and filled their hummer feeders ... hard to find a block of "hobby time" anymore. I didn't find prices in my brief look but the chargers look interesting. I'm living within the bounds of my fixed income so price is a consideration.

I agree I want to have at least one more charger on hand. I'm no stranger to Murphy's Law. Between that and the Deja Vue moments, I've no doubt there is something afoot.

Dana
 
i have lost track of the technical drawing of the 10Ah headway cell. can someone remind me what the diameter of the screw actually is. or can you measure one with a micrometer? i wanna order the lockwasher lugs from mouser and can't remember if they were 3.5mm in diameter or 4 mm diameter. the lockwashers are 3.55mm for the #6 screw and 4.34 for the #8 screw.
 
dnmun said:
i have lost track of the technical drawing of the 10Ah headway cell. can someone remind me what the diameter of the screw actually is. or can you measure one with a micrometer? i wanna order the lockwasher lugs from mouser and can't remember if they were 3.5mm in diameter or 4 mm diameter. the lockwashers are 3.55mm for the #6 screw and 4.34 for the #8 screw.
Click to expand...

JD said they were M6 screws -- thread OD 6mm.

PS - I also placed an order with ecitypower.com and they have provided good customer service so far. Their chargers look well-made (I haven't got batteries to test them with yet), and their prices are excellent.
 
I'm just going by what JD said.
http://www.endless-sphere.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=9&t=9824&start=180

One technical drawing is on that same page, but is incomplete and doesn't cover screw specs.

Doing an unscientific measurement of JD's photograph seems to support the 6mm size. The cells are 38mm, and on my laptop screen the cell diameter in the photo measures 11.75cm, and the screw thread OD measures 2cm. 38mm / 11.75 * 2 ~= 6.4 so 6mm is probably right. It's gotta be bigger than 4mm
 
I have been using the 2 amp 48 volt charger that I purchased in the group buy and it has been working fine. I am curious - how high an amperage can you put into a Headway 48 volt 10 Ah pack ? Is the limiting factor heating of the battery pack ? Or what the BMS will handle ?
 
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