guver

My Feedback: (325)

3Good resources here


Wiring diagrams http://www.scriptasylum.com/rc_speed/_lipo.html
Configuration Guide http://www.rcaccessory.com/pdf/Batte...on%20Guide.pdf
I like to call them XH,HP,TP,EH http://www.allerc.com/Pictures/BalConnApps.gif

If there's any mistakes,changes,requests,additions,ideas please let me know (I can'tgo beyond 6sright now)

guver

My Feedback: (325)

These are all 6S , but each balance board has 2-6S so you can see the difference. The female connectors have the male pins, the batteries have the male connectors and the female pins.

As seen, EH and XH use a "cell +1 config" It is easy to understand. A 3S battery uses a 4 pin connector, A 5S uses a 6 pin connection.

guver

My Feedback: (325)

XH uses a rectangle connection in "number of cells +1" configuration that has a pair of tounges on the connection , no latch, and the width of these tounges gets wider with each increase in cell count. Uses 2.5 MM pin spacing or .1" Popular connections are Align or Electrifly.

guver

My Feedback: (325)

HP (sometimes called PQ) 2s-4S uses the 5 pin connector and then a cell+1 config. The two end pins are always used on the rectangle connector with latch. 2.5 MM pin spacing or .1 " Male connector Kinda looks like a rectangle with teeth on one long side. Polyquest and Hyperion are popular.

guver

My Feedback: (325)

TP uses the narrow 2.0 mm pin spacing and a latch on the male connectors. 2s uses a 3s plug, 3s-5s uses cell + 1 , and 6S uses a 4 and a 6 together. It will not interchange with any other taps. Female connector kinda looks like an I beam or an H beam. The male looks like a rectangle with two extra long ends and the latch. The pins are centered on the body of the connector from top to bottom.

The 6S plug pictured isn't used on balance taps, but I call it TP 6S anyways. It is used on many charger/balance boards/adapters. Popular ones are ThunderPower, FlightPower.

guver

My Feedback: (325)

EH uses 2.5 mm or .1 " and many times the female housing isn't a complete rectangle. It has one open side. It uses the cell + 1 configuration and each cell added adds width to the plug. Rectangle plug with 4 small wings protruding from the narrow sides. Kokam is a popular one.

Dialed_In

Great info guver! It really helps because I'm about to get into Lipos and just bought a used charger. Your info also makes a great bookmark and would make a great sticky!

I have just one question. Are all of the connectors the same that connect the charger to the balance boards?

Regards

guver

My Feedback: (325)

Thanks, and I'm afraid not. The chargers do not use all the same style or number of pins. I know very few of them. Balancers can use varying connectors as well. Which charger do you have? Maybe someone knows it.

Dialed_In

Thanks for your reply. I have a Triton2 EQ. I was wondering if the included triton charger to balance cable would work with the boards from hobbyking. http://hobbyking.com/hobbycity/store...idProduct=8820

I was wanting to pick up a spare set when placing my battery order.

OT: Will the promatch racing squid work with the Triton2 EQ? http://www.promatchracing.com/proddetail.php?prod=2011

guver

My Feedback: (325)

Yes, the incuded wire will work with the Hobbyking balance boards. The Triton2 EQ charger has EH connection and the included balance boards use the TP type.

The squid will swim fine with the Triton since it has female banana jacks for the main charge output.

Dialed_In

Thanks once again guver. You've been a great help.

P.S. If you want I can upload slightly clearer pics of my TP and XH (Flightpower) balance boards (no plugs). I can size them the same as yours and you could use them if you like. If interested send me a PM.

guver

My Feedback: (325)

sure, just post them here. I think it will be helpful. Thanks.

Dialed_In

Here are the XH and TP boards.

guver

My Feedback: (325)

tjinguy Has some very well laid out info for balance taps (and more) http://sites.google.com/site/tjinguy...nce-connectors

deadstick8409

My Feedback: (2)

Just got a an a123 pack form hangtime for a rx pack. You would think that the balance connector would be wired neg, cel one, and pos. (Two cell of course). Nope. So when I hooked it up to the charger, it kept *****ing cell voltage too low. (triton 2eq). Had to take apart the connector (standard servo connector) and rearrange the pins into the "right" layout like the other batteries.
SO is it wired that way because 1) it is a LiFe pack, 2) error, or 3) just the way that hangtime or maybe cell pro does their pack?

guver

My Feedback: (325)

Hmm, I don't have any servo type connections for balance taps. I do prefer cell 1 to start out on the negative side , but have seen them reversed I think.

fordman86

I have an lrp quadra pro 2 with an ehr type on charger all my packs have jst-xh {turnigy} is there an adapter board or a plan adapter I can buy?

Swift427

Got a question about TJinTech article entitled ... All about lipo balance connectors
Here is an excerpt that implies under certain conditions it is OK to charge cells individually ...
Is it ever OK to FIRST charge just one cell of a discharged LiPo pack to equalize cell voltages within 0.01-0.03 volts of each other? Then just charge through main discharge connector ... as you mentioned on another thread you're in the minority when it comes to not balance charging(or balance discharging) when it's not necessary. And may even do more harm than good or at the least take longer.

Also, would you recommend always fully charging to 4.2 volts per cell with a good quality pack or is it OK or possibly even better to only equally charge each cell to 4.15v per cell or even 4.10 resting volts.

It seems most everyone in the know says we should never balance the cell voltages before charging ... and that any balancing should preferrable be done toward the end of the charge, say 4.00v to 4.20v. So for example if the resting 3S cell voltages before charging are 3.63v, 3.59v, 3.65v would it make the most sense to: (1) Charge Cell2 to 3.64v resting volts first, then charge only thru the discharge connector; (2) Balance Charge the entire time, using both discharge connector and balance tap; (3) Charge through the discharge connector only until reaching 12.00 volts(3S), then connect balance tap and balance charge until each cell is equalized at 4.20 volts; or (5) other options like varying charge rate, etc.

guver

My Feedback: (325)

Yep, it is fine to charge just one cell. I would only do it at the full mark though OR something over 4.1 volts. Many users like to use 4.1 . 4.15 and is perfectly acceptable. My "full" mark is 4.25 and will commence testing soon to verify the actual number on a few test packs. I have an idea that is is much higher than we think.

In your scenario , option 2 is best if the pack is an unfamiliar pack. 1 and 3 work just fine too.

maddmatt02

ok, I read this but am still having a problem. a while back a battery shot a flame that took out my balance board. it might have been salvagable, but I figured it would be easy to get another one from hobbyking or something. well I know my batterys balance plugs are the "JST-XH" style, but the input on my charger for the balance boards harness has 8 pins, charger is a dynam supermate dc6, I found a picture of the setup and it does indeed have 8 wires going from the charger to the board...

any ideas on where I can get a board to work for this?

the whole setup is only 24 bucks so I am about to just buy a whole new charger, that way if anything happens to the charger I will have a brand new spare... but in case something happens and I need ANOTHER replacement board, I would like to not have to keep buying a bunch of chargers...

*edit* well, was only googling things like "dynam balance board", etc... didnt think to search "8 pin balance board" until right now and found this - http://www.rcdude.com/servlet/the-15...or-LBA6/Detail - so sure I got something to plug into my charger, and I can easily find a board that will work with my batteries, question is, how will I wire it up? is it possible my charger has a plug that will accept 7s packs, but only charges packs up to 6s? so I would assume I would buy a regular 2s-6s balance board with 7 wires coming off of it, then buy this 8 pin plug and wire them together?

I will read some more on that part, but off the top of my head I would expect to do something like I show in my "fancy" diagram I did real quick in paint? another pic shows how it is labeled on top of my charger, I started with cell 1, then just kept splicing, but when I got to the end I figured Id skip the 2nd to last seeing as I assume the last one is where the charger goes to get the total voltage of the pack, and the one I skipped would be for the 7th cell I dont have on my board?

guver

My Feedback: (325)

Would this help? I sure don't know why they use an 8 pin wire because the boards themselves still only use 7 pins. Go figure. http://www.dynam-rc.com/products/battery/charger.htm

Pin 1 shares with pin 2 (negative post) Strange.

maddmatt02

well, the board does look like the input plug from the harness to the charger is wider than that 6s balance plug so it just might have 8 pins, but one I dont know how I would get that board since there is no part number or anything with it on their page, and two, it still doessnt come with the harness.

I still think I need to find out how to adapt a standard 7-wire harness board to the 8 pin plug I found. I just dont know which wire I would eliminate, and I dont know what end to start at when connecting wires. I guess I could always just do it like I think, fire up the charger and read the voltages on the display, and then test em with a meter on the battery to see if I have the charger reading the correct cells like it should, I only deal with 2s packs anyways for now, so maybe I should just get that 8 pin, a few 3 pins to make a parallel charge harness and tape/heatshrink off the 5 wires I dont use... it would be better than the big balance board I dont need anyways since I only use the 2S packs. might go 3s some day but it would be easy enough to just add those to my harness... and I actually JUST remembered I do have a real small 3s form a heli I used to "try" and fly that I can test with making up a 3s harness?

what do you think?

also, not sure what you mean "pin 1 shares with pin 2"

guver

My Feedback: (325)

I'd call that place and see, meanwhile I will look up Bob's info for you because He can make up any adapters we need. He looks thru mouser and ID's the housings, pins, wire, ect. and makes them up custom.

maddmatt02

ok, I was able to download the manual to the charger "supermate dc6 doublepower" which I am under the assumption is just my charger but with an ac/dc converter built in, because its larger, has a place to plug in a laptop power converters cord, and has the same specs as far as charging as mine does.

it has this in there (see pic) so I see now what you mean about it sharing the pin, so I am now thinknig I can just buy a easily available balance board (or 7-wire lead) and just dremel off one of those little notches and plug it into the 7 pins and not have that last pin doubled like that? or would I need to get a pair of 4 pin plugs, dremel off the right notch of one, left notch of another, tape em side by side and wire it according to that diagram? I wonder if the charger would throw a fit if it didnt see the volatage it is monitoring at both terminals?

maddmatt02

also, do you know what category he would go to to look for the plug? I just went to the site and without even knowing what category to go to it will take me YEARS to find it... Im tempted to just buy that charger again especially since that 8 pin plug from that site I linked to is 6 bucks to ship. twice the price of that and I have the WHOLE setup again. plus I still need to buy the banana plug harness as well... I mean if I could find a cheap plug to make my own that would be one thing. I doubt I could pay someone much less than 20 bucks to make me up a harness...