Just some shrink and other battery q's

[GerGa]

Well, its winter so its finally completely necessary to shrink wrap my battery pack. Its an 8-cell side-by-side hump pack, 7 on the bottom and one on top(and not on the end of the pack), sub-c, http://www2.towerhobbies.com/cgi-bin/wti0001p?&I=LXDA13&P=7 will that work? I'm concerned with the length, though its 12 inches long and I know, 7 cells is like 7 inches but something tells me someone has told me before it wont work?
Also, the pack sat in my garage for ah maybe a month or more and it was cold in there at least for the last week or two, and I know, BAD. And guess what I didn't charge it up to be stored either, yea, BAD.Not sure how I got so lazy and had the Idea that I was going to run it in my feigao 380c rustler soon. So anyway, I brought it in from like a 50 friggin degree garage and let it sit for a few hours in the house, there was even a tiny tiny bit of condensation on the ends on the cells at first bringing them in which I wiped off, and so after sitting for a few hours I charged them up at 3.5 amps and 40mv cut off and ran it. Which yea I probably really shouldn't have done when thinking about it now. It didn't quite have the power it should of but maybe that was more because I charged them lower than usual. So what should I do now to bring them back to best condition possible at this point? I have an MRC SuperBrain 959 which has amp settings from .5-4.5, .5A increments and mv cutoff settings which is in 5mv increments and I have an old brake light bulb discharger which I think is 2amp discharge each bulb(they are 1157's). Also should I set the cut-off on my mtroniks genesis pro?(It has .625, 6, 9 and 12Volt settings)


Thanks in Advance, Greg

[guver]

Hmm, I use 2.5" wrap for regular subC so I think the 3" will work for your pack, but you will only get one pack wrapped per length. Some will be wasted.

If you had a way to charge at 300-400 ma for 15 hrs it would be the best to balance the cells, but your probably good to go anyways because it sat dead and is already balanced and you have used it already. The best thing you can do is to leave it on the 50 minute trickle charge for the first few times.

can't help w/ the other.

[GerGa]

Yea well that shrink wrap is for a 7 cell hump(6cell sid by side and 1 on top) so I know it will work for the height of the hump but just length. And also its not two 4 cell packs, its 1 pack, 8 cells one hump and 7 cells on the bottom. What should I do for settings if I let it trickle charge? Any input on this from other people?

[guver]

The shrink gets a bit longer when shrunk so it will do a 7 inch battery and maybe even 2 - 6 inch batts. The trickle charge is not adjustable in any way, just have to leave it on after the peak charge and when all the data diappears it is done trickleing.

[GerGa]

I know that, I wasn't clear though, I meant what charge rate and and mv should I do when I set it for the normal charge.

Thanks

[guver]

You didn't mention which battery, but it can be charged at 1C rate and if it's a nicad use 10 mv per cell and if it's a nimh use 5 mv per cell.

[GerGa]

Oh ok well they're gp3700s and I'm not sure but would 1c be like .37A charge rate? My charger only does .5-4.5A charge rates in .5 increments. I heard somewhere about using light bulbs during charging to lower the charge rate? Is that true or just some obscure myth?

[guver]

You can use 4.5 amps and 5 mv per cell. I don't know anything about the bulbs.

[GerGa]

Oh and I forgot I also have a gp3300(nimh) pack that sat in the house for like 2 months unused and uncharged. What should I do to bring this pack back to condition instead of charging it normally?

Thank you

[guver]

It should be charged at 300-400 ma for 15 hrs or so. (150% capacity at a slow rate)

If you don't have a wall charger then leaving it on the 959 trickle charge after it has peaked charge is the next best thing.