RunRyder - Align RCC-3CX Balance Charger

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e-Align T-REX 450-500-600 > Align RCC-3CX Balance Charger

geoelectro
Heliman
Location: Pasadena, TX - USA

I bought this charger based on it being a balance charger and the price. However, it hasn't worked very well.

It has three lights, one for each cell. When it's red, it's charging. When the charge is finished, it turns green.

After a while, a couple of lights would start blinking from red to green and back and nothing seemed to happen at that point. I could unplug it and it would seem to "start over" and work until the blinking started again!

I decided to carefully open the case and take a look.

You can see three seperate chargers, one for each cell. These are switching power supplies and look nicely made.

The only problem is the Darn blinking.

I came to the possible conclusion that these power supplies are over heating. I believe the red to green to red blinking indicate an overheated condition. For an experiment, I tried to charge two battery packs in a row with it open and a fan blowing on it.

Now it is working as advertised.

So...I will attempt to install a small AC fan inside the charger, (if I can find one small enough) or relocate the electronics in a larger case with good a fan.

Seems like a decent charger otherwise. I hate to waste it you know...

George - Trex SE

05-19-2006 Over year old.

HOMEPAGE

White cat
Heliman
Location: Pasadena, CA

Hmmm.....no wonder my grey RCC-4CX has a tiny PC fan inside.

05-19-2006 Over year old.

smartguy
Senior Heliman
Location: los angeles, CA

so the black align charger has no fan?

05-19-2006 Over year old.

TRex888
Veteran
Location: Monmouth, UK

Interesting. Let us know how you get on. I have the same problem put I was concluding that the NEW type Align charger did not have a sufficiently high voltage to overcome the internal resistance of some cells.

What about dilling some hole on the on of th casing and attaching a PC type fan to pull air out (air will be sucked in from the slots around the base). You could power the fan from a small AC/DC plug in PSU.

05-19-2006 Over year old.

wsame
Heliman
Location:

Align RCC-3CX Balance Charger

I have the NEW RCC-4CX and been having same red/green lights blinking problems too and thought it was also heat related. I noticed that the fan is mounted on bottom of unit so that when I charged it with unit upright, the floor would block some of the heat being pulled out by fan. When I used it with unit sideway (no obstruction on fan), it seemed to charge (stay red) longer. As most people have observed, unplugging it after it started to blink, then plugging it back in initially had reg solid lights, but starts blinking almost right away. If left unplugged for a few minutes (to cool down unit), then plug it in again, it would charge (stay red light) longer. Other people thought that blinking was because battery would not hold its charge when near full charge but I don't think this is correct. I think George is correct.

BTW, how did you open the charger unit? I couldn't find any screws anywhere, unless they're hidden under small round rubber legs on bottom of unit.

--Wayne

05-19-2006 Over year old.

geoelectro
Heliman
Location: Pasadena, TX - USA

I carefully pried it open on the seam. I have opened wall warts built in a similar fashion. Just take your time...go slow. There are no screws, it is glued on the seam.

I have sucessfully charged several batteries now with no problem having it open and some air blowing on it. Still trying to decide how to make a fan upgrade permanent.

George

05-20-2006 Over year old.

HOMEPAGE

Tintin
Veteran
Location: Akershus, Norway

Quote
As most people have observed, unplugging it after it started to blink, then plugging it back in initially had reg solid lights, but starts blinking almost right away. If left unplugged for a few minutes (to cool down unit), then plug it in again, it would charge (stay red light) longer.

In doing so you will also let your battery rest and possibly drop further = red will stay on longer.

Just measure the batteries, if all the cells are charged when it's been blinking a while then just stop charging. If the battery is charged then all is ok. It seems you guys are chasing solutions without really knowing if you really have a problem, has any of you actually measured voltage on each cell straight off charger + after lets say 5 and 10 minutes?

Lipos aren't like NiXx batteries. Lipos don't have any memory issues so there is no big deal about chasing that final 0.1 volt...

Supposedly a leftie :-)

05-20-2006 Over year old.

geoelectro
Heliman
Location: Pasadena, TX - USA

I have measured the cells. This blinking problem happens before the cell reaches full charge. If you un-plug the charger and let it cool, when reconnected, the cells that were blinking will show charging. (meaning not fully charged) If any lights were green, they stay green. So, it's not fully charging.

I have charged a couple more batteries now without any fan, just the cover off. No problem. Perhaps just more vents are needed.

BTW...I did my first flip this morning!!!

WOW! was I shaking...

I practiced on the sim for about 5 minutes, went out and did it withen 2 minutes of flying. Man, that felt good!

George - Trex SE

New pilot...9 weeks!

05-20-2006 Over year old.

HOMEPAGE

TRex888
Veteran
Location: Monmouth, UK

Congratulations George on the flip.

You know what the next test should be don't you? Tape the lid back on and see if it mis-behaves as original.

05-20-2006 Over year old.

wsame
Heliman
Location:

Tintin,
I also measured each cell after the charger started blinking red/green and just like George, they are not fully charged (3.81v, 3.81v, & 3.82). After all 3 lights were blinking, I removed charging battery and tried plugging in 2 other lipos that needed recharging and all 3 lights started blinking almost immediately. These other 2 lipos could not have charged fully in 5 seconds...but I measured voltage on these and they measured 3.7v for each cell. This is why I am more inclined to think that it's the charger overheating. I haven't tried opening it up and using with desk fan blowing above charger yet. Will try and let you know.

Double congrats to you George on your flip. I've been flying 6 month and started forward flight (finally). Am slow learner. Took me 2+ month to comfortably hover. Crashed my TRex 3 times so back to hover on that. But have been flying many aggressive forwards figure 8's with Blade CP. Most people would think I'm crazy to be able to fly Blade CP easier than TRex... :>

05-20-2006 Over year old.

H0ndaJunkie
Senior Heliman
Location: Bowling Green, Kentucky - USA

Yeah, I'm almost certain that this is a cooling problem in the RCC-4CX.

I kept getting the flashing LEDs, and kept pluggin the battery back in, or unplugging the charger, but it was no good.....after a minute or two, the LEDs would start flashing again.

The thing is that the fan shuts off when the LEDs start flashing also. The thing completely stops charging. This is obviously a problem.

So I placed the charger on my AC vent, where nice cold air was flowing through and fired it up again. It's been about 10 mins and it hasn't flashed yet.......

we'll see I guess.

05-21-2006 Over year old.

Tintin
Veteran
Location: Akershus, Norway

Ok then your chargers have a completely different behaviour than mine do. Mine only blinks at 4.1-4.15 volts/cell and above and charging is being switched on/off in sync with the flashing.

Supposedly a leftie :-)

05-21-2006 Over year old.

wsame
Heliman
Location:

H0ndaJunkie, did you open yours up before placing it in front of AC vent? How interesting that Tintin's charger behaves differently. Another guy I know who also bought this charger uses it all the time and has never seen this flashing red/green lights. He puts it in ammo bunker and has it tipped sidways where balance connectors are on top. Even though it covers the vent holes in back bottom, his doesn't exhibit this flashing problem.

George, can the fan be switched to use bigger fan for cooling somehow. I wonder how many volt fan it uses.

05-21-2006 Over year old.

geoelectro
Heliman
Location: Pasadena, TX - USA

The RCC-3CX doesn't have a fan

The RCC-4CX does.

Since the input power is 120Vac, it would be handy to find a small 120Vac fan. I wouldn't want to connect a fan to the output (charging) side. One could get a 12Vdc fan and when using the charger near a 12Vdc source on like in my case, in my car with an inverter, have a second plug for the fan.

As I mentioned earlier, I have sucessfully charged several batteries with just the cover off and no fan. I may try a large vent...

However, in a hot car, a fan be required.

George Trex - SE

05-21-2006 Over year old.

HOMEPAGE

H0ndaJunkie
Senior Heliman
Location: Bowling Green, Kentucky - USA

No, I didn't open it up first.

I just placed it on the AC vent, and it charged the whole battery just fine. When it was done, all four LEDs were solid Green, just like it should be.

The cold air blowing through the case kept every part of the charger perfectly cool during the entire charge cycle......whereas before, it was quite hot to the touch.

I don't think the fan helped the heat problem on this model, do you!?

05-22-2006 Over year old.

Tintin
Veteran
Location: Akershus, Norway

Hm, I use mine on 230 volts, maybe it's the unit that should detect AC voltage that is causing trouble?

Supposedly a leftie :-)

05-22-2006 Over year old.

TRex888
Veteran
Location: Monmouth, UK

I'm running on 230V and have the same issue. I think it may be poor quailty components or a batch issue. More likely poor quality issue as BOTH the 4CX and 3CX are being reported being this way. I'm going to try taking the lid off and then adding a little fan on the outside my 3CX if the experiment goes well. This is all pending on the stupid weather front that's been with us for the last 10 days (and maybe all this week too)

05-22-2006 Over year old.

geoelectro
Heliman
Location: Pasadena, TX - USA

I replaced the cover and started a normal charge on an Align 2100Mh battery. Within 20 minutes, blinking. I removed the cover while still on, and within 5 minutes, one light stopped blinking and went back to charging, 5 minutes later, the other blinking light did the same. No doubt, it's a cooling issue.

Lookin' for a vent and a fan.

05-22-2006 Over year old.

HOMEPAGE

TRex888
Veteran
Location: Monmouth, UK

I think you guys have hit the nail on the head. I made a temporary modification to my 3CX tonight using a small PC fan and lots of Bluetak. The modification did not require me to open up the unit at all. The fan was position over 2 of the 4 slots on the back of the unit (the other 2 slots were tape up in order for air to be drawn from the holes in the base of the unit, the fan was sucking air out).

I had a badly out of balance worn 3S pack at 3.9, 3.8 and 3.7V, and placed this on charge. All lights turned green at 55m, 1h10m and 2h respectively, and the end voltages were 4.19, 4.2 and 4.18V respectively. All LEDs were RED or solid Green and NO blinking. The case of the unit was much much cooler than usual.

For those wanting to try this on the 4CX I would suggest you either disable the internal fan (I beleive the air is blown out of the bottom) or make your new fan suck in air and hopefully the original will blow it out the bottom better.

I will report back after some more charges and may be using hot glue instead of Bluetak to clean up the mod.

Great job guys.

05-22-2006 Over year old.

wsame
Heliman
Location:

TRex888, how did you power that small PC fan? Was it separate power supply powering git? It's surprising that Align hasn't fixed this issue. Maybe they heard about this heat problem on the 3CX so tried solving it with small fan in 4CX, which would run hotter charging 4S batteries I bet, but this didn't solve the problem even charging 3S lipos. I also don't understand why the 4CX has fan blowing air out on bottom of unit, not side. It's very low to ground so it can't blow much air out with small fan. I'm wondering if moving small fan in 4CX to back like where TRex888 would help better than on bottom of unit. The current location of this fan is also bad because it only draws heat out from one side of unit. The other side of unit is much hotter (i.e.: between cells 1-2, 2-3, 3-4, & other side of cell 4 electronics).

05-23-2006 Over year old.

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e-Align T-REX 450-500-600 > Align RCC-3CX Balance Charger

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