LifeP04 Lithium Battery For Ham Radio

@100

I bought a LiFeP04 from Hobbyking, it's a 4S 8.4 Ah or 8,400 Mah battery.

I also had an old RC battery charger and power supply that came in handy.

The battery has a 2C charge rate which will mean it can take a 16.8 amp charge current, that's pretty amazing for such a tiny battery, you will get an idea of it's size from the pictures below.

It has a "constant" 30 C discharge rate or it's capacity x 30 = 252 amps which could run many 100 Watt radios at full whack on SSB because you would not really see more than 16 amps max on SSB voice which means you could run 15 radios at once. It has a 60C burst rate. Obviously you wouldn't run that amount of radios for long but it's enough to keep a 100 watt rig going on SSB Phone for many hrs.

It managed to charge almost 7 Ah in 30 mins, it's amazing how much current can be dumped into this battery and that's not even the best of what modern RC LiPo can take.

I chose LiFeP04 over LiPo because it's a much more stable chemistry and because the voltage of the LiFeP04 matches the requirements of HF radios. 3S LiPo voltage is a tad too low and 4S too high, 4S LiFeP04 is perfect.

It cost around 90 Euro's inc shipping from Hong Kong. They had no stock in the EU or U.K store.

I was working off a 45 ah car battery I got in halfords, I wasn't sure how much juice I'd need when out portable but it turns out not much at all on SSB @100 Watts. I never worked far from the car so the 45 Ah car battery isn't that inconvenient until I want to work inside the house in the sitting room, lugging around a big heavy battery is inconvenient.

I'll post the pics in the next post.

Below is the little battery charging at 15 Amps !



Working the brilliant little Xiegu G90 in the sitting room.

Malmsteen

How do you find the G90 Mad_Lad is it quite User friendly??? as was looking at them online but unsure as cant find many reviews..

Malmsteen

Malmsteen wrote: »

How do you find the G90 Mad_Lad is it quite User friendly??? as was looking at them online but unsure as cant find many reviews..

Hey Malmsteem,

yeah it's great little radio, my plan was to use it mostly for digital modes I'm just starting to get in to, it's got a very good receiver I would say is quieter than the IC-7300 without any filtering or noise reduction which the G90 doesn't have , yet.

The Receive audio quality is really good but the transmit quality is not so good due to the supplied mic, there is a mod to change 2 capacitors in the Mic that makes it very good but I can't be bothered trying to solder surface mount components, they might add a transmit EQ in a later firmware release, I don't know. A different mic can be used too I suppose.

The tuner on it is fantastic, I managed to get good SWR with my 20 meter long end fed Half wave on 160- meters and got good signal reports from the Boys on the 1933 Net with just 20 Watts, that's pretty amazing. There's no way my 7300 tuner would tune that.

It does get quite hot when using say, PSK31 which I only recently got into but I probably don't need to run the full 20 watts using digital.

User friendly ? once used to it it's fine, people say the FT-891 isn't user friendly , it has tonnes of menus but most are set once and forget. I find the G90 very easy to use, the buttons are not the best but it does the job, Xiegu are on the right track, I think they'll be giving Icom and Yaesu a good run for their money in another few years.

The G90 is similar size to the 100 watt FT-891 but the G90 has a fantastic tuner.

icom

Malmsteen wrote: »

How do you find the G90 Mad_Lad is it quite User friendly??? as was looking at them online but unsure as cant find many reviews..

This looks interesting:
https://www.radioddity.com/collections/hf-transceiver/products/xiegu-g1m

Good review:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9RH3GUlyqo4

icom

icom wrote: »

This looks interesting:
https://www.radioddity.com/collections/hf-transceiver/products/xiegu-g1m

Good review:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9RH3GUlyqo4

Nice little radio, no tuner or battery like the X5105 which is a great little rig and lasts ages on it's internal battery.

If your budget allows the G90 is much better in my opinion, I'm sure the G1m is a lot of fun though too, compact and light , the X5105 fits in a Tecsun PL-660 Pouch, that's pretty compact.

icom

Deleted User wrote: »

Nice little radio, no tuner or battery like the X5105 which is a great little rig and lasts ages on it's internal battery.

If your budget allows the G90 is much better in my opinion, I'm sure the G1m is a lot of fun though too, compact and light , the X5105 fits in a Tecsun PL-660 Pouch, that's pretty compact.

Just had a look at the X5105 and a few reviews on YouTube and I have to agree it's a better option. Love the idea of the internal battery and the auto atu.
Would make a good backup rig for my 7300. I have a Tecsun PL880 so I have a pouch that would suit too !

icom

icom wrote: »

Just had a look at the X5105 and a few reviews on YouTube and I have to agree it's a better option. Love the idea of the internal battery and the auto atu.
Would make a good backup rig for my 7300. I have a Tecsun PL880 so I have a pouch that would suit too !

The X5105 is a fun little radio to use but the receiver isn't as good as the G90 nor does it sound as good, limited speaker size.

Still I had plenty of fun with it and when I took it to Germany in July. I must have worked for 5 hrs and it was still going when I turned it off.

5 Watts can be limiting of course, that's one reason I got the FT-891 but the X5105 is great to bring on the bike for instance with a EFHW and some thin rope. I use the 4 band mini 100 Watt from Hyendfed and it works well with the 5 Watts. Finding suitable trees is another matter but it can be done.

If I bring the car I just bring the 891 because with the limited time I have the 100 Watts is handy and so is the Superantenna MP1 when I don't want to mess with trees, and of course now I have the LiFeP04 it could even run the 891 for 4-5 hrs on SSB. Even 20-50 watts makes a big difference.

I remember when I got to Canada on 20 Meters with the Mp1, I was amazed, 100 Watts into that little antenna, you could imagine the feeling .

For the plane, you just can't beat the X5105 and an EFHW, fits into a backpack with plenty of room to spare, of course you need the charger, I bought a 4 amp 15 volt LCD monitor PSU on Ebay, works like a charm.

icom

icom wrote: »

Just had a look at the X5105 and a few reviews on YouTube and I have to agree it's a better option. Love the idea of the internal battery and the auto atu.
Would make a good backup rig for my 7300. I have a Tecsun PL880 so I have a pouch that would suit too !

The more I think about it in your situation, the more I'd probably steer towards the G90, it has a great receiver, 20 Watts which will be useful from time to time, great Audio and it's not that big a deal to carry a small battery like in the pic above.

Unless of course the compactness of the X5105 is a priority, it is a neat travel radio.

icom

icom wrote: »

Just had a look at the X5105 and a few reviews on YouTube and I have to agree it's a better option. Love the idea of the internal battery and the auto atu.
Would make a good backup rig for my 7300. I have a Tecsun PL880 so I have a pouch that would suit too !

Sorry Mad_Lad, I meant to say I had a look at the G90 (not the X5105) and it's a much better option, all bands, battery, auto atu and runs down to 9 volts.
I'm 90% CW, and the G90 seems better for that too.

When I get my new eNiro sorted out, I'll definitely be looking more into the G90.

icom

icom wrote: »

Sorry Mad_Lad, I meant to say I had a look at the G90 (not the X5105) and it's a much better option, all bands, battery, auto atu and runs down to 9 volts.
I'm 90% CW, and the G90 seems better for that too.

When I get my new eNiro sorted out, I'll definitely be looking more into the G90.

Yeah I think the G90 would be a better choice, while the X5105 is a cool little rig the G90 is a lot better.

I'm experimenting with digital modes now and I just can't get the G90 to work with JS8call. But I'm dying to try make a few QSO's on JS8call, it looks really cool , I'm not a fan of FT* because the computer does everything but with JS8call you can actually communicate with he person.