over charged battery

c-90

ive accedently over charged my battery for twice as long as i should have and dont know if it is safe to use because when i put it in i got an extreamly high rate of fire is there any thing i can do to lessen its power or sumting?

zero19

Are you positive you over charged it?

Cheeky monkey

Chances are if its over charged it would have exploded so I'd say its grand

Evolute

Dont forget the smoke if its over charged:p. Nah it will be grand man if anything was going to happen it probably would have happened already. Or possibly you have had it at a low voltage and you've only just fully charged the battery for the first time???

bullets

Charging it more or less would not effect the Rate of Fire
or am I wrong ? Thought it was the voltage that did that.

I've heard of batteries exploding if over charged or if they go faulty
even after the power has been removed from the charger.

If ya really want to be safe I would have left the battery be
for an hour or so to be careful.

I am very aware when charging my Batts as they are the cheap clone
batteries that came with my AEG's I tend to stick the charger in another
room while charging them and check it every few minutes to make sure
the battery is not over heating. (Just in case anything does go BOOM!
it lessons the chances anyone may get hurt by exploding battery shrapnel)

~B

Puding

Are you using a smart charger that will switch to a safe trickle charge when it detects the battery as charged? If not i would recommend investing in one.

Hivemind187

Depending on the battery you can sometimes get a higher rate of fire for the first few bursts of a fresh charge. No idea why but the 3000MaH Intellect battery seems to do it.

NakedDex

Charging does increase the voltage, that is the point of charging.
An 8.4V battery will only actually be at 8.4V for a short period of time. A dead 8.4V battery will be somewhere around 7.2V and a fully charged one would be closer to 9V. This is why a fresh battery will give you a high rate of fire. It's also why you can hear your battery die as the motor will struggle and the rate of fire will drop considerably.

Get yourself a multimeter, Maplin do them for about a tenner for a basic one. Put the probes against the battery connectors and take a reading from it (switch the meter to VDC and to the 20 mark). If it reads above about 9.4V you're likely dealing with a slightly overcharged battery.
Anything below that is fine really.

If it is above that, you can get a discharger unit from many airsoft stores. If you're tricky with a soldering iron at all you can also make one, the plans are readily available online (essenitally it's just a massive bank of resistors and a control circuit).

I would hazard a guess that your battery is indeed fine. If it's NiCd (Nickel Cadmium) then you can be almost assured as much if your charger was a trickle charger. To check this, look at the plug and see what it's mAh rating is. Anything below 250mAh/300mAh would usually be considered a trickle type. NiCds on trickle chargers can't really be overcharged unless you leave them on for days/weeks due to their chemical nature under charge. Usually when they do, they're on a fast charged and have become subject to something called "thermal runaway", they become exceptionally hot doing this and often explode or at least go on fire. Again, it's something you'd notice so if your batteries aren't a smoky charred mess then they're probably fine.

NiMH (Nickel Metal Hydride) are more finnicky and generally like to be fast charged anyway. NiMH's tend to overheat to the extent that your battery's plastic wrapping would melt/burn (causing thick noxious smoke) so if you didn't see that then you're fine.

For those wondering why the mAh rating is important if voltage varies this way, mAh is the rating for the amount of time the battery will stay at an operable voltage. For example, a 3000mAh battery will stay at the 8.7V mark for twice as long as a 1500mAh before dropping.

ED E

bullets wrote: »

Charging it more or less would not effect the Rate of Fire
or am I wrong ? Thought it was the voltage that did that.

I've heard of batteries exploding if over charged or if they go faulty
even after the power has been removed from the charger.

If ya really want to be safe I would have left the battery be
for an hour or so to be careful.

I am very aware when charging my Batts as they are the cheap clone
batteries that came with my AEG's I tend to stick the charger in another
room while charging them and check it every few minutes to make sure
the battery is not over heating. (Just in case anything does go BOOM!
it lessons the chances anyone may get hurt by exploding battery shrapnel)

~B

Yeah, as you use a charge, the voltage goes down. If it an 8.4v its actually empty at 8.4 and fully charged at about 9.6-9.7(least my ones are). If he did charge it for longer I beleive it could get it up nearer to 10 thus incresing the ROF but possibly causing damage.


Hope its not a Li-Po:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lCFUGDcSuLw

I'd guess the best thing would be to let it sit for a while, or if you have a meter check the voltage.

NakedDex

An 8.4V battery isn't dead at 8.4V, I know we posted at the same time but if you read above it's dead around 7.2V. The general rule of thumb is the battery is dead 1.2V below it's nominal voltage (the rating it's given, eg. 8.4V, 9.6V etc) and charged at 1.2V above. This does vary a small bit based on the load requirements and battery type so it can fluctuate by .2/.4V either way.
Lethal I'd be a tiny bit worried if your batteries are charging to 9.8 and dying at 8.4V. I reckon it's time to invest in a new set.


Oh and I've seen this mentioned a few times, leaving a battery for a while won't do anything for it apart from letting it cool. Batteries do lose thier charge after a while but you're talking weeks/months, not minutes/hours.

ED E

NakedDex wrote: »

An 8.4V battery isn't dead at 8.4V, I know we posted at the same time but if you read above it's dead around 7.2V. The general rule of thumb is the battery is dead 1.2V below it's nominal voltage (the rating it's given, eg. 8.4V, 9.6V etc) and charged at 1.2V above. This does vary a small bit based on the load requirements and battery type so it can fluctuate by .2/.4V either way.
Lethal I'd be a tiny bit worried if your batteries are charging to 9.8 and dying at 8.4V. I reckon it's time to invest in a new set.


Oh and I've seen this mentioned a few times, leaving a battery for a while won't do anything for it apart from letting it cool. Batteries do lose thier charge after a while but you're talking weeks/months, not minutes/hours.

Well over 24hrs there is a small drop off. My batts come off charged at like 9.69 and drop to like 9.57 in 24hrs. One sec....

EDIT: What I meant by dead was they drop below a usable level. I think you shouldn't completely drain them though. I'll test them all later.

NakedDex

Your batteries should still be giving you an operational voltage right down to at least 7.4V though. Motors in aeg's are usually rated from between 6/7.2V upwards as far as 12V in some cases. The usual though is 7.2V to 10.8V capable. So unless your motor is funny and only goes from 8.4V to 10.8V (or maybe higher) then I'd think the problem is with your batteries.

And that voltage drop that you saw in 24hours is actually the safe form of thermal runaway. When batteries are hot or even warm they produce a higher voltage. Leaving them to cool right down to room temp or outside temp before testing them will give you the same end result

c-90

thanks for the help lads i left it over night, seems to be ok

Fiach Dubh

If you charge a battery untill it's quite hot and then use it right away the resistance will be lowered in the battery, it's called thermal runaway. Just make sure you leave the battery to cool for at least an hour after charging. As you said leaving it overnight and it was fine.

o1s1n

Moved to troubleshooting.

fayer

Hi guy's

Gave a new battery an 8 hour charge today and then fired off 2 mags mags. Had an insane rate of fire and but the batt heated up so much it melted the plastic covering.

The Batt never heated at all whne chargeing and was not used for about 30 min after the charge.

Any one seen this before ?

Steve

Masada

8Hrs is a bit too much charging, also you should never fit the battery straight into the gun and start using it, you have to allow it to cool off for a little while.,

Beast ASI

vtec wrote: »

8Hrs is a bit too much charging

All depends on what rate your charging it at and the size of the battery.