This project has been on the to-do list for far too long. The weather here in Sydney is pretty crappy today so it gave me the perfect excuse to finish the battery warmer.

Now I must give credit to Chris Swain for the original idea of using a car fridge/warmer. The warmer is made by Waeco and its model number is TB-08G. It's able to heat and cool. The controller used is a $15 eBay special. The controller runs off 12V and comes with the sensor. Unfortunately, it only has one relay inside so I can only control the heating side. Still, it seems to work ok.

The cup holders in the warmer make a great place for the controller to be mounted. Time for a Dremel party to get rid of the cup holders. I made a trick carbon fibre plate to cover the cup holder cut-out and mount the controller.

As you can see from the photos, it works quite well.

By warming your packs in winter, you can see a 20-30% increase in power. This is because warming the packs actually lowers the internal resistance of the cells. Some LiPo manufacturers actually recommend warming prior to use to prevent pack damage under load.

Cheers,
Jason.

I just put them up on the dashboard in the sun. This works great also. Never had an issue in the cool/cold weather

We have used similar contraptions here in Norway for years.
Works a treat when flying off frozen lakes in the winter.
Magne

Yes, well it doesn't quite get that cold down here. The coldest I've seen here in Sydney on the Blue Mountains is -6C.

I used the warmer yesterday and it worked great. I ran it off the battery charger O/P from my Honda generator. The generator was also charging packs off the mains outlet.

Cheers,
Jason.

Jason, thanks for posting your information. I need to put one together and you have given me a great starting point.

The coldest I have had outside my home here i Norway is - 36,5 C 2 mornings when I was going to work....you dont fly on this days..... but down to -5 is ok

Rune, you are just having to much fun. Glad to see it.

I have used a baby bottle warmer for doing this. The 10s pack just fits in nicely and the warmer runs directly off the car 12v socket.these days I tend to put them under the windscreen.

thats not fun, just problems!

I generally use a nuclear fusion oven with vitreous silica amplification. Works well in most cases.
(translation) - I place my packs on the dashboard of the car facing the sun. Works very well even in relatively cool weather. When it is cold out I put them on the floorboard on the passenger side and run the heater on the way to the field.

Guys,

There are a number of ways to warm batteries. I used to employ a hot water bottle (for the bed) in an esky or cooler bin. That worked very well too. The electric warmer can be powered by the car power source on the way to the field or by my Honda generator while charging packs. Whatever floats your boat.

Cheers,
Jason.

Very KEWL Jason.... I'll try one, as I like new gagets.

Thanks for the post.

Bill

You're welcome Bill. I made a number of adaptor plugs to power the thing from just about any source. It only draws a few amps too in the heat cycle and once warmed, holds its heat very well. I've actually run the thing off a 12v starter gel cell all day...

Cheers,
Jason.

I think I'd need to run the waeco as a cooler rather than a heater at the moment, we clocked 36°C (96°F)on sunday, and it's not even summer yet :|

About what temp are we looking for ?

I've set my controller to 37C.

Robbe here in Europe sells a LiPo heating box also:

http://www.robbe.de/lipo-heater-box...._from_store=de

/Bo