digital piranha questions

[norcalracer_707]

I have some questions about my piranha charger and using it. I charge my battery at 3amps, it takes a while, but I seem to have good punch with it, should I stick at charging it at 3 amps, or should I get a power supply and charge at 5a? Also, is setting the mv/c setting at 4 pretty much a good baseline for charging packs, like packs between 3300 and 4500 mah?

[Duster_360]

If your batt is significantly larger than 3000mah (4000 or 4200) or you are racing, I would find a PS and charge at higher rates. If you're bashing and your batts are around 3000, I'd just stick with the 3amp rate. The batts will live longer charging at lower rates but will not have quite the punch charging at 5amps would give you.

I started with one of these chargers and 3-5mv/c did a good job for me. New batts was on the 3 side and as they got a little older, they charged better with a little higher peak setting. I'm still using mine (Emaxx) to charge two batts at once alongside my Ice charger running off a 25amp PS.

You can always experiment using a car batt as a PS - try a charge or two at the higher rates and see if the diff is worth the cost of a PS.

[norcalracer_707]

I plan on getting some 4200mah, 3800 and 4500 as well as some radio shack 3300 mah packs, so looks like i'll need to get a ps and charger em at 5amps. What would you recommend for a PS?

Edit:Anyone ever try this one? I might give it a try
http://www3.omnimodels.com/cgi-bin/woi0001p?&I=DTXP4300&P=7

[Duster_360]

If you're headed that way, I would get a PS with the future in mind - if you continue on, you'll want/need a better charger. This is the 20a PS I'm using -
http://www.hobbypeople.net/gallery/158301.asp

It supplies enough to run two chargers or one charger doing everything its possible to do with a charger, charge, motor breakin, truing etc. There is nothing wrong with the one you linked though, just allows no room to grow. Wally world sells one thats rated higher than that one, try a search on power supply in electric forum and you should turn it up.

[norcalracer_707]

This is a dumb question, but how do I hook up a PS to my charger? Do I just clip it the output jacks on the PS it's self?

[Duster_360]

You know the red and black wires with the clips? The manual calls them spring loaded terminals, you use those. On a PS like I linked, the black plastic on the PS terminals usually unscrew far enough that these spring loaded terminal can get to metal coming from straight on and make a connection.

Anyway, you will be doing opposite of what you've been doing, AC connection will be unplugged and those spring loaded terminals will be connected to the PS. These are also what you use to run the charger in the field off a car battery when you're away from a 120vAC source.

[guver]

The DTX power supply comes with a connector and wore length and an adapter with a large + and a large- connection. Use the alligator clamps on the input wires of the dig piranha to hook to this "connection block"

[timie1]

There are some not bad PS on ebay. Do a search for "12 volt power supply" or other similar searches. I have the exact same charger and I have experimented hooking it up to the real car battery. I have found it doesn't charge any better or worse with my gp3300 and IB3800 packs. It's certainly quicker though. If you have a car, or access to a car battery, try it for yourself and experiment. Maybe you may decide it's not worth spending the $60 odd on a PS including shipping. Just use the black and red alligator clips and hook it up directly to the battery. I also used an old computer fan and hooked it up to the alligator clips so it powered the fan to help keep the charger cool.

One word of warning, if you hook it up to the car, make sure you hook it up when the engine in the car is cold. The heat radiating from the engine in the engine bay just after it's been driven, can severly heat up your 6 cell packs, and that's not good, especially while you charge them.

[savagekid94]

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