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Swallow Battery Charger

Old 12-28-2003, 07:32 PM
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Fliegenmong
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Default Swallow Battery Charger

Hi All

I just bought a swallow battery charger for charging a 350 (Milliamp?) 4 cell (?) battery for use in my new crazy sparrow. Can anyone point me in the direction or advise me how to best use this swallow charger?, I clips onto the car battery. Does a 350 milliamp charger mean I have to charge at 350 milliamp? For how long? It has a chrge - discharge - charge function, but the instructions are all written in some sort of code, that If you really knew what you were about you could probably understand, I however cannot figure out all the codes. Can someone help me out or point me in the right direction?, I have tried to google search for SWALLOW NICAD BATTERY CHARGER INSTRUCTIONS, but am unable to find any info

Kind regards
Old 12-29-2003, 08:40 AM
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Matt Kirsch
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Default RE: Swallow Battery Charger

There might be a few technical terms in the instructions that you don't understand... If you transcribe some of this "code" someone can explain what it means to you. With a couple of sentences translated, you can easily figure out the rest.

Here's a bit to help get you started:

A battery's voltage is expressed in terms of "cells." A cell is what most people mistakenly call a battery, like the "AA batteries" in your TV remote. Individual cells are connected together to make up a battery. You can usually count the number of cells in an electric airplane battery by counting the bumps in the shrinkwrap. The shrinkwrap on the battery is usually very tight, and will show the outlines of the individual cells, even if they're connected in a straight line.

A battery's capacity is expressed in mAh, milliAmp-hours. Theoretically, the mAh rating means that the battery can maintain that current in mA, milliAmps, for exactly one hour before it's completely discharged. In reality, things are not 100% efficient, and there is some loss of energy. You can use this figure to make very rough estimates of how long a plane will fly, or how long it will take to charge the pack.

You might see the term "C" being used quite commonly. C is simply the mAh rating of the battery pack, and is used in formulas. Wherever you see "C" replace it with the mAh rating of whatever battery pack you're working with. "Charge at 1C" means charge the battery pack at a rate equal to ONE times the battery's mAh rating. A 340mAh battery charging at 1C is charging at 340mA, or .34 Amps.

C is also referred to as the "one hour charge rate." That is, it takes approximately one hour to charge a pack at the "C" rate. In other words, if you apply a current of 340mA for one hour, you've put 340mAh into the pack. Of course, charging is not 100% efficient either, so there will be some variation.

Anyway, this sounds like a "peak detect" charger, meaning that it will automatically know when the battery is fully charged, and will stop charging. Unfortunately, I've never heard of the "Swallow" charger so I can't be of any more specific help.

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