Im a total noob and here is my first post of many im sure.
I purchased a polycharge4 charger for my LIpo batteries and was confused when i took it from the box expecting to see a plug to connect it to the mains supply. it only has crocodile connectors. the manual says i need a 12V, 14A input. I considered adapting a household adapter, but i cant find any within that range. Should i use a car battery? I'd rather not as i consider this to be expensive and a bit messy. Any advice would be great as my plane aint going anywhere without power.

I love my poly charger. Bad thing is.. it's only 12 volt DC current, but you can charge 4 lipos at a time. I store my boat battery in my garage during the winter with a trickle charger hooked up, and I use that. During the warmer months I use my car battery. If you use your car be sure to either check and make sure your car will start after charging a few packs or let it run while charging the lipos. Also I would suggest getting the balancers for it.

A car battery will work when you are at the field.
At home you can use a power supply, Some people use old computer power supplies. I bought one from the hobby shop.
This is the one I have, there are cheaper ones if you look around:
http://www3.towerhobbies.com/cgi-bin...&I=LX3609&P=ML

thanks for replies.
i have an old computer transformer ill look into using it. otherwise ill use my car battery, how long does it usually take to charge a 2000mah LiPo?

one more question,
What are balancers?

A lipo battery should be charged at it's mah rating for one hour. Converting MAH to amps is easier.
Example: a 1000 mah pack should be charged at 1 amp. 1500 mah charged at 1.5 amps.
So your 2000 mah battery charging at 2 amps will take approximately 1hr.

A balancer regulates the charge on multiple cell batteries so each cell is charged to the same voltage
when charge is finished. This way if all the cells are equal the battery is balanced.

When looking at power supplies remember to look at amperage, If you are using a polycharge 4
and charging 4 2500 mah packs at the same time you will need a minimum of 10 amps from your
power supply. 2.5 amps charge current per pack x 4 packs.

It depends on how empty it is. I would say roughly 30-45 min. It also seems to take longer with a cell [link=http://www3.towerhobbies.com/cgi-bin/wti0001p?&I=LXMGS7&P=7]balancer.[/link] When charging a lipo the cells can charge unevenly, sometimes shoterning the life span. Balancing will distribute the charge evenly.

thanks again guys for the advice.
i have the charger hooked up to my car seems to working fine. i got myself a multimeter to test my old PC transformer and see if its suitable.

i think one of my batteries is malfunctioning.
i put it on charge and after the initial pre-check with a solid green light the light turns orange with three flashes indicating no battery present. my other batteries are charging normally. any ideas?

Re: Battery

You may have a battery that was over discharged.

Sometimes this happens with a good battery when it was sitting at the vendor for too long. The battery self discharges lower than the minimum voltage the charger will deal with, and it refuses to recharge the battery as it ( rightly ) thinks it is bad.

I've resuscitated a couple of batteries that were borderline by using my ICE charger, to bring them back up.

Knock on wood, they have held up OK, though this is not advisable.

Re: Transformers

Most "wall wart" transformers cannot output enough current for your charger.

As stated make SURE that the supply you use well exceeds the total draw from the charger.

thought so, thanks