LaCrosse BC-700 ?

carnage

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How is the bc-700 at charging Nimh battery? Does it over/under charge batteries? Is all the readout, information accurate? Is there anything bad about this charger?
 

ChrisGarrett

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How is the bc-700 at charging Nimh battery? Does it over/under charge batteries? Is all the readout, information accurate? Is there anything bad about this charger?

Compared to my Maha C9000, which I bought together, it's about 10% high and will shut down thermally at its highest 700mA setting and even at 500mA.

It's not a bad smart charger, but there are better out there.

It now serves as a spare, or when I need to charge a lot of batteries up quickly.

Chris
 

carnage

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Compared to my Maha C9000, which I bought together, it's about 10% high and will shut down thermally at its highest 700mA setting and even at 500mA.

It's not a bad smart charger, but there are better out there.

It now serves as a spare, or when I need to charge a lot of batteries up quickly.

Chris

When you said there better out there, were you referring to the C9000 or is there better than C9000?
 

Nev

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Compared to my Maha C9000, which I bought together, it's about 10% high and will shut down thermally at its highest 700mA setting and even at 500mA.

It's not a bad smart charger, but there are better out there.

It now serves as a spare, or when I need to charge a lot of batteries up quickly.

Chris

I have two , both mine have never thermally shut down ,it does a very good job ,but out of all my chargers ,( xtar vc4, Sky rc mc3000, opus 3100 v2.2)
The batteries gets warmer on the bc700.
 

hiuintahs

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I think the BC700 does a pretty good job as a dv/dt termination smart charger. I don't use the 700mA charge level though. I personally think that is pushing the charger (not the AA battery). If charging all 4 bays at the same time, just use the 500mA level. With the AAA's I use the 200mA level. I think you could use the 500mA level on those too, but elect not to get too rough on the smaller cells. I got all of my older married kids a BC700 a couple of years ago to get them into Eneloop rechargeable batteries. They were on sale at the time for $29. None of us have had any issues.
 

ChrisGarrett

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When you said there better out there, were you referring to the C9000 or is there better than C9000?

I wish that I had bought a second Maha C9000 at the time, since they were roughly the same price back in February of 2012 and IMO, it's a superior charger in just about every way.

That being said, the LaCrosse is much smaller and makes for a decent travel charger, so it has that going for it.

The SkyRC MC3000 is at the top of the heap, especially if you like tweaking with settings. While I don't mind 'knowing' capacities and the health of my batteries/cells, I'm not all that interested in fiddling with things to the 9th degree, but I'll probably pick up a MC3000 down the road, just to have 'the best'.

Chris
 

carnage

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I was also looking at the MC3000 but I figure at my experience level it will to much.

By your response I'll guess you recommend the Maha C9000.
 

ChrisGarrett

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I was also looking at the MC3000 but I figure at my experience level it will to much.

By your response I'll guess you recommend the Maha C9000.

Chargers are like potato chips. You can't just have one.

If you're only going to be doing NiMH, then the Maha is fine. If you want the best, the SkyRC is it, if you want good flexible multi-chemistry chargers that can charge up 4 slots fast, the Opus BT-3100/BT-3400 chargers are inexpensive, do decent jobs of charging both types and then the Liitokala Lii 500 Engineer is in the same boat as the Opus.

All of those are 12vdc and can run off a car's cigarette socket, or a 12vdc solar panel in emergencies.

Chris
 

carnage

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Chargers are like potato chips. You can't just have one.

If you're only going to be doing NiMH, then the Maha is fine. If you want the best, the SkyRC is it, if you want good flexible multi-chemistry chargers that can charge up 4 slots fast, the Opus BT-3100/BT-3400 chargers are inexpensive, do decent jobs of charging both types and then the Liitokala Lii 500 Engineer is in the same boat as the Opus.

All of those are 12vdc and can run off a car's cigarette socket, or a 12vdc solar panel in emergencies.

Chris

While I'm still learning about Lithium Ion, I'm going to stick with Nimh. The best options it seems like the Maha C9000, Opus, or the Lii500.
Which one, in your opinion is a better charger the Opus BT-3100/3400 or the Lii500?
 

MidnightDistortions

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I like the C9000. I don't have the BC700 but i do have BC1000 and i like them a lot. I usually use my older cells on them that don't quite charge on the C9000. Any HSD cells i could use with the BC1000 but i try to avoid using LSD with that charger such as Eneloops. In a pinch though, that charger will work fine. I"ll just take note of the voltage and pull them out if they reach 1.45v.
 

fmc1

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While I'm still learning about Lithium Ion, I'm going to stick with Nimh. The best options it seems like the Maha C9000, Opus, or the Lii500.
Which one, in your opinion is a better charger the Opus BT-3100/3400 or the Lii500?

Both those chargers are very popular here.

I'll try and point out the differences since I own one of them and a good friend owns the other.


The Opus is about 20-25 dollars more than the Lii-500


Opus has 5 modes charge, discharge, refresh, test and quick test. Refresh does C>D>C three cycles. Test does C>D>C one cycle and shows discharge capacity. Quick test shows internal resistance.


Lii-500 has three modes charge, quick test normal test. Quick test does D>C and shows charge capacity. Normal test does C>D>C and shows discharge capacity.


Opus displays one thing for example voltage for all cells. Pressing the display button will cycle through the other info such as time, capacity, current and so on. The Lii-500 is exactly opposite, it shows everything about one slot at a time. Press the slot button for whatever slot you want to see info. This is totally a personal preference thing since in the end the same info is available on both chargers.


Lii-500 has 4 current choices for charging 300, 500, 700 and 1000mAh, same no matter how many batteries you have in the charger.


Opus has 5 current choices for charging if there are 3 or 4 cells in the charger 200, 300, 500, 700 and 1000mAh. If there are 1 or 2 cells in the charger you get 7 choices, the above ones plus 1500 and 2000mAh.


Lii-500 has 2 discharge currents 250 and 500mAh.


Opus has 5 discharge currents 200, 300, 500, 700 and 1000mAh.


Opus supports LiFePO4, Lii-500 does not.


Opus supports LiIo4.35 and can charge to capacity. The Lii-500 will treat a LiIo4.35 like a regular LiIon and not charge to capacity.


Lii-500 can be used as a power bank for USB devices. The Opus can not.


That's all I can think of for now.
 

HKJ

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My take on Lii-500 and Opus C3100/3400 is:

Lii-500: Simple to use, but has the necessary functions to analyze batteries.
Opus: Much more advanced, but that also makes it more difficult to use.

There are more differences some significant if you look at the details, but the above is the initial question.
If you really want a analyzer that can do everything it is the SkyRC MC3000, but it is expensive and requires a bit of work to learn.
 

carnage

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My take on Lii-500 and Opus C3100/3400 is:

Lii-500: Simple to use, but has the necessary functions to analyze batteries.
Opus: Much more advanced, but that also makes it more difficult to use.

There are more differences some significant if you look at the details, but the above is the initial question.
If you really want a analyzer that can do everything it is the SkyRC MC3000, but it is expensive and requires a bit of work to learn.

How does the Maha C9000 compare to the Lii500 and to both Opus?
I'm looking for a charger that can charge Nimh batteries, without over or under charging them. Any suggestions?
 

Cekid

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How does the Maha C9000 compare to the Lii500 and to both Opus?
I'm looking for a charger that can charge Nimh batteries, without over or under charging them. Any suggestions?

it is totally overlooked charger, and i still don't know why, but if you are more into nimh only charger take a look at the opus bt-c2000...it is in fact opus bt-c3100 minus lion etc capabilities which you will never use anyway...and it should be cheaper...you cant find more complete nimh charger on the market for that kind of money...
 

apagogeas

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How does the Maha C9000 compare to the Lii500 and to both Opus?
I'm looking for a charger that can charge Nimh batteries, without over or under charging them. Any suggestions?
I have 2 C9000 and one Lii500. I don't have issues with both C9000 which already are 7 years old and are very useful and reliable (1.5 year Lii500), however I don't like the 2A PWM charge mode on all charging rates of C9000. I feel it is actually harsh trying to pump 2A shots especially on AAA format, another "minor" issue some may say it is the two hours top up waiting time to bring AA to full charge and still this is too much (+200mAh) for AAA size. On the other hand Lii500 uses CC charging, so if set to 300mA this is very good for AAA and still more gentle to AA overall. I think HKJ stated Li500 does a very slight undercharge, I don't think this is necessarily a negative or will be noticed in actual usage. Lii500 makes batteries slightly more hot compared to C9000, because of the smaller spacing between the cells and the top up part of C9000. A bonus to Lii500 is also the ability to charge Li-ion (the reason I got this charger) is you ever go that route too.
Overall quite happy with both, for the price I'd choose Lii500.
 
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markr6

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I don't like it. I could never charge my Eneloop pros on this...500 was too low, 700mA still seemed to miss termination. They just got hot and probably overcharged every time.

1000mA is the sweet spot for 2000mAh cells IMO. And good for 2500 cells too.

For $32, the Opus 3100 is hard to beat. The 1500mA or 2000mA rate will be handy for 2500mAh+ cells. Even if you don't use Li-Ion, the opportunity is there. And the AA/AAA cells are spaced further apart to possibly keep them cooler.

I still use my BC-700 on occasion but it's far from my first choice.
 

ChrisGarrett

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hiuintahs

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There may not be a perfect charger? When I was designing my own custom charger, I consulted HkJ (resident expert on battery charging) a couple of times and he referred me to this article that he wrote. This is worth looking over.
http://lygte-info.dk/info/batteryChargingNiMH UK.html

As you can see, lots of different ways folks use to get to the same place. Some do a better job than others. NiMh charging is a little more challenging than doing a Li-Ion charger.

For NiMh, I think we agree that dv/dt termination is the ideal way of checking for when an NiMh is fully charged or very close to it. I've seen dv/dt reached around the low 1.50v's very consistently............at least with the batteries that I have. I hold the charge steady for another 5 minutes and call it good. Seems to be about right. I guess the only way to know its fully charged is if you performed a capacity test right after charging it up.

As far as the various charge rates go, the dv/dt is less pronounced at a lower charge rate, but if designed properly you can still pick that up. At the 1 amp charge rate, the battery should only get warm at the tail end of the charge cycle.........not hot. Once dv/dt has been reached voltage doesn't rise further but the extra charge energy gets converted to heat.

I've always considered the BC-900 and then the BC-700 (which has been my only NiMh charger besides the Sanyo chargers that came with the Eneloop packs) to be my reference. I've always felt that it charged properly without over or under charge. The reason I say that is because of the many run time tests that I have done on flashlights getting a capacity out of the batteries that I thought was representative of a fully charged battery. I have felt that the BC-700 was weak with their power parts and could have used more beefy electronics. For that reason I only use the 500mA rate and have never had a problem.

I don't care for the 3vdc power supply of the BC-700 and would rather have a 12vdc powered charger which I think is more versatile for travel, solar, etc. But it works. There have been a bunch of new chargers coming on the market since the LaCrosse chargers were first introduced. I think I'd comb over HKJ's reviews to see how they work plus the accumulation of the various users comments on CPF to see which one I would go for if I was to get a new charger. Since I already have the BC-700, I'd opt for something else next time. But I wouldn't want to get rid of it because its been working good for me. I notice a lot of guys with many chargers still have the BC-700. If it was a bad charger, then I would assume it would make a lot more sense to unload it and convert those funds to something you prefer.........but you will notice, they still have them. ;)
 
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carnage

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What I do is go thru HKJ reviews and find good rated charger. Then I come on this forum, I'll ask question about them and see how they holding up. Since I'm new to chargers I'll rely on the forum for advice. I'm still learning and and learning a lot with every question I ask.

Basically I'm looking for a charger that have good protection, that doesn't over/under charge batteries. Something I can learn on before I get into Lithium Ion.
 
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