18650 Batteries

[FrankT]

The battery is still fully charged said 1 and on charge full after about 6 hrs on discharge...so I don't know..take too long to do all this, i will just put it back in the box and forget about it...I like my Elusive Wildlife charger better anyway, I never have a problem anyway.

 

[DaveABQ]

Try again Frank. Its easy to use

Put in a battery and let it do its thing, without touching a button, it will start charging at 500ma.

Then use the 'display' button and cycle through the menu's to see what it is doing, I don't remember the order, but it will show the charge rate of approx. 500ma, the voltage that the battery is at currently and will show capacity in mah.

That capacity screen is what shows you how many mah you have. if when first putting in a battery the screen starts flashing, that is when you can select discharge, charge, refresh or test. Say if you wanted to charge and you stopped when it says charge, then you can select 'current' button to change the ma you want to charge or discharge.

Too easy and a very useful charger/analyzer in knowing what capacity you batteries have, when its time to refresh or replace.

 

[FrankT]

how do you know when they are through discharging? and then read the mah reading?

 

[DaveABQ]

If you use the 'Display' button, each press will cycle through the data.

The 'Display' button will show either 'mA' for milliamps, that is the rate of charge or discharge. Then there is 'V' for voltage that the battery is currently at. Then'mAh' for milliAmp hours, this is what you want, it is the capacity of the battery .

You will know when it is done discharging by looking at the 'mA', it will show zero.

And when charging a battery, the bottom of the display shows 'Full', also the 'mA' will show zero as it is no longer charging, but don't really care about 'mA' when charging because the screen will show 'Full' When done.

When discharging a battery, if it had some charge to it, or it was fully charged and you discharge it, then the 'mAh' will show the capacity that battery had once it finishes discharging. And if you then charge it, when it finishes the 'mAh' should be close to what the discharge 'mAh', assuming the battery was fully charged to start with.

 

[DaveABQ]

If toy want me to do a video if it, I can post it up on youtube.

 

[DaveABQ]

Here is a pretty good video on use of the C3100, which will be the same as the 3400

He goes in to more detail than I did, using the 'slot' button to change each slot, each press if the 'slot' button will select a different slot in case got want to do something different with each shot.

He also talks about the 'test' mode which will discharge and then charge a battery which will show capacity of the battery at the end, this is easier than manually doing a discharge and then doing a charge to see capacity at the end.

 

[FrankT]

OK new batteries, never used blue 5000MaH, typically run 6 hrs or more in a flashlight

Charged to full then placed on discharge overnight

Reading this AM then switched to charge..2 batteries

V 3.73-3.72
MaH 643-668
H :39- :41
MA 0-0

 

[DaveABQ]

That was your reading after discharge and before you charged? If that's the case, your batteries are only getting 643 and 668 mAh, not the rated 5000.

Now if you charge, see what they say at the end if the charge cycle, If it's similar, which it should be, time to switch brands.

 

[Hard_ware]

Chinese must have accidentally added a zero, meant to put 500mah.
Now they exceed the 500mah rating

 

[DaveABQ]

The discharge voltage looks a little high on your numbers Frank. Charge them and see what the numbers look like at the end.

 

[FrankT]

it went to Full in less than an hour, teses are new batteries, never used them before.

 

[DaveABQ]

Run a refresh on them. It will go through a cycle is 3 discharges and 3 charges. Will take a day. See what they are after.

 

[FrankT]

ok, got a white and blue in there now, to test different batterise

 

[FrankT]

OK, clearly this charger is not working right or is broken, back in the box for return
White - Blue battery
V 3.77-3.96
MaH 22-578
H :02-:35
Ma 0-0

 

[DaveABQ]

Was that for a charge or discharge?

 

[FrankT]

discharge of full charge batteries, I have it on charge at 2000

 

[FrankT]

discharge of full charge batteries, I have it on charge at 2000

 

[DaveABQ]

Yea something isn't right. Try a refresh if those same two batteries before toy send it back. Or the batteries in, as it is flashing, select 'refresh' with the mode button. When it's done they will say 'full', then check all the data to see what they are at.

 

[FrankT]

would the batteries in 1-4 slot and set to 2000 affect the readings?

 

[DaveABQ]

I got a 3400 charger sitting in the mailbox, will give it a try today.

 

[FrankT]

10-4, I should have sent you mine!