i took apart an excal battery pod THANX KERED

[scrounger]

thanks again KERED, U have really helped me de mystify the vintage excal.charging system.

i unplugged the pod and removed the tiny set screws.tomorrow i will visit radio shack to see if they carry a battery

holder that hold 8 cells and will fit the pod. like other big companies MINELAB wants u to buy the special battery.

looks like their nicad system is a 5 cell setup. the old nicads were very bad. the pos teminal on the pack had

completely corroded away.and the packs was leaking brown fluid a little. so no hope of recovering it.

i bought this cheap used and i hope it all works ok once i get it in the water..

 

[kered]

Something similar to this is what you need if you go the AA rechargable way although the new refil pack i mentioned from onlybatteriesarus would be the best solution, that way you don't have to take the thing apart to charge it and could use the original charger, also you will get more detecting time per charge. Using the AA way it will work but for how long depends on the capacity, go for at least 2500mah. You may still need to get the refil pack

 

[skinard]

Scrounger

Radio Shack carries the ones like Kered's link on ebay. If they don't have them they will order them and send them to your door. I bought two and it cost me just over $4 with free shipping. They also have the 8 - AA packs for the whites surf model and some of the Fishers. Knobs of various sizes as well. Good luck with the battery pod.

skinard
http://twistedpens.com/

 

[normdiver]

I bored out my pods so now any battery fits in there without being too tight. Just make sure you dont bore out the first inch of the pod or you will lose your seal,,,I also use divers silicone grease from the dive shop on my o-rings,,Norm

 

[dbsmokey]

I am worried I have totally screwed up my excal 800 (not excal II) battery pod! The old NiCad battery pack was holding a charge for only 3 hours so I purchased this pack from onlybatterypacks.com (excal battery pack). When I installed it, the excal, EVERY 30 seconds would let out a HOWL that was deafening. I did charge and recharge the battery to ensure it was properly charged. I am worried I got the wrong battery pack for an original excal, but had assumed the excal I and II battery packs were interchangeable. I reinstalled the old NiCad battery pack, but did so upside down. It is soooo lodged in the pod now, I can't remove it and fear I will have to destroy it to get it out.

HELP please!

 

[Critterhunter]

Sounds like you got a pack that was a cell or two short for the proper voltage. Also, try spraying some cooking oil or something around that pack to see if it will slide out for you.

 

[dbsmokey]

I called the battery place today. The person answering was very helpful indeed. He told me that the charger I was using was tripping the built-in safety feature and thus, the batteries weren't charging. He told me to carefully smack the pod on an hard surface and the lodged battery would dislodge. He was correct on both accounts! Unfortunately, while messing around with coat hangers, etc trying to pry the battery out, I cracked the pod. i wonder if I can seal the crack with epoxy.....

 

[Dick from NC]

I have a question that maybe someone can answer. I had a Minelab Explorer for years but it finially died. I now have 2 Tecknetics T2 for relic hunting but they aren't really that good for the beach. I now have a used Excalibur 800 and it works very good. A little heavy but thats now a problem as I will modify it later. When I got it the batt. had a full charge and I hunted for a couple of days and started to get loud false signels so I thought the batt. was getting low. The batt. charger that came with it was an aftermarket charger and when plugged in it is surposed to show red while charging, but doesn't show anything so I dont know if it is charging or not. I checked the voltage of the batt. that is in the detector and it still reads 12 volts. My Explorer would normally last a good day before needing to be recharged. I've probably hunted maybe 7 hours on the batt. charge and expected the voltage to be lower than that. Any ideas?

 

[kered]

Battery voltage will be higher when not under load, plug it in about half way so you can still see the pins without screwing down the cap, turn it on and measure the voltage. You can use the explorer charger to charge the battery but you will have to make an adapter as the plug on the charger is smaller(make sure you get the polarity right)
At a pinch If the after market one is broken you could also cut off the plug and use that by putting one wire into the hole of the explorer plug and the other wire on the outside(making sure of polarity again and also that the wires don't touch) but it would be better/safer to make up a pigtail with a female plug to fit the exlorer charger and the other end the excalibur plug.

If the excalibur battery is still good you should get a lot more than 7 hours per charge, at least 10 if its an excalibur or more for the excalibur 11