Scurion battery charging 12v/Solar

[Hatstand]

Hi

One of the things that has suprised me is that there is no option given by the manufacturers for charging your Scurion battery pack with anything other than mains. Surely a bit of a handicap if on Expo? (Not that I have managed to get my thumb out of my arse and go on any - but if I did!)

Biff supplied the Little Monkey (we bought one for my Missus) with a 12v car charger as well as mains charger. I reckon this seems like a good idea as you can (a) use the car en-route to your domestic caving trip when you forgot to charge your lamp the night before and (b) use an off the shelf solar power system as many are designed to chuff out 12v if you are going anywhere more exotic or have broken down and have to wait a very long time for the RAC.

I asked the question on the Scurion discussion forum, and received a reasonably lengthy reply that included the line:

In a car: use 12V/230V inverter with our charger
              or use RC charger running from 12V directly.
But be careful with universal chargers! You need to set the correct parameters, otherwise you might damage the battery.

So my next question would be what are said magic parameters? (Stay tuned)

Having said all of that at Hidden Earth Mr Biff was selling what basically looked like the little monkey 12v charger with a Scurion plug on it... ...this would seem to have solved the problem for us??

 

[potholer]

So my next question would be what are said magic parameters? (Stay tuned)

Parameters could be one or both of
a) battery pack voltage or *effective* cell number - 7.4V or 2 cells (the 4-cell pack is still 7.4V, isn't it?)
b) battery pack capacity in mAh +/or charge rate

Having said all of that at Hidden Earth Mr Biff was selling what basically looked like the little monkey 12v charger with a Scurion plug on it... ...this would seem to have solved the problem for us??

Indeed.

However, I guess that, to be fair to the Scurion guys, only a relatively small number of people would probably be in the market for a car charger, and quite a few of those people would be able to sort out (or have a mate sort out) their own solutions (or, if a 12V charger was a similar price to the mains one, might just buy an extra battery pack if they thought that would be enough to last them).

 

[seddon]

Car inverter, plus a couple of spare batteries. Never caved out in the *real* boonies, for sure, but this combination does for most stuff in Europe - or indeed anywhere that you travel to base camp by car.

I'd have thought that Biff's charger is very good - while pointing out, as I'm sure that Rolf will if he reads this, that if a battery goes up in smoke for some reason, his stock of Swiss sympathy will be very, very small...

Cue Mr Biffin to explain why it won't go up in smoke... I'm only a user, and retailer, not a clever lamp maunufacturer!

 

[potholer]

I think lithium charger circuits are generally pretty good these days, with loads of chips around to do the things that the chemistry requires.

Also, when there's protection circuitry on a cell or in a battery pack (like Scurion and many others use), that can give another line of defence against charger problems.

 

[seddon]

Cue *another* clever lamp manufacturer...

 

[graham]

Also, when there's protection circuitry on a cell or in a battery pack (like Scurion and many others use), that means the replacement batteries are even more expensive.

:idea:

 

[potholer]

Protection circuits aren't that expensive, and a manufacturer of a multi-cell lithium pack who didn't include one would be putting a lot of faith in the charger and the light and the user not to do anything silly.
Charging a multicell-in-series pack without having some electronics inside the pack to do some kind of charge balancing or at least overvoltage cutting out is not something for the faint-hearted.

Unless there were compelling reasons I'd find it hard to imagine, I wouldn't buy an unprotected single regular lithium cell, let alone a multicell pack.

Someone can always try making their own battery pack, or getting one made elsewhere, if they think they can save time/money over buying one.
It's not as if it uses a proprietary connector.

 

[biff]

I?m selling chargers for proprietary 7.2-7.4 li-ion OEM packs, i.e properly constructed packs, which happen to have connectors in common with Scurion tm and Stenlight. I think that you can be 100% confident that both Scurion tm and Stenlight use packs that are constructed to the highest standards and the correct configuration.

The chargers will charge such packs to the correct algorithm. They are no more or less likely to damage proprietary packs, than a proprietary inverter might cause damage to a manufacturer?s mains charger. As it happens, I?ve used these chargers with both of the battery packs above and neither deviated from the charging algorithm.

Personally, I have found car chargers invaluable over the years on all types of cells and packs. You don?t necessarily need to be in the arse end of nowhere for it to be a convenient option.

 

[cavermark]

Am I right or wrong in thinking you could "get away" with a 9v disposable battery with a scurion/stenlight?

 

[biff]

You can. I sell a little lead for this. http://littlemonkeycaving.co.uk/accessories.aspx

They are ?5. You could probably lash one together cheaper yourself, and I expect Scurion also make one.
 

 

[cavermark]

Thanks Biff