Question on Excal Alkaline battery pod

[John(Tx)]

Can rechargeable batteries be used in the alkaline battery pod? If so, can you charge them up with the batteries inside the pod? Thanks, HH

 

[HawaiiMDer]

Store bought rechargables are all 1.2 v cells, so if you can fit 10 AA rechargeables in your Alkaline pack then your excalibur will work fine, otherwise it will give you a signal tone every 20 seconds and erratic performance. If you are referring to the battery packs you can get from ebay specifically made for the excalibur then yes you can use them. As far as charging them in the pod, i don't know that answer.


Ken

 

[John(Tx)]

Thanks for the answer Ken. I was referring to the Minelab alkaline battery pod but doesn't look like that would work anyway, I'll just stick with alkalines as my backup. Thanks, John

 

[kraelity]

I have the alkaline pod and the older rechargeable pod
I have tried using Nimh rechargeable.
No Good 1.2 volt each x 8 =9.6 volts total
I have been using Juice Brand Rechargeable AA Alkaline Batteries,Excellent!!!
Two years on the same 8 batteries 1.5 volt each x 8= 12 volt total.
I get over 8 hours of use before recharge.

I charge them out of the pod.
If you search there was some discussion last year on modifying the alkaline pod to fit a new recharge pack.
I'm not sure if it was in the Beach Forum or the Sov/Excal Forum.

HH

 

[kered]

There is a great misconception about AA rechargables, they are not 1.2v,(even though they are marked as so) when charged they are closer to 1.4-1.45, at 1.2v they are almost discharged. If you use hi mah it takes a long time till they get down to 1.2v and will last longer than alkalines in general, alkalines drop in voltage very fast. With the rechargables what tends to happen is that people charge them when they buy them and maybe a couple of weeks later try them and they don't last long, this is due to the self discharge that all nimh batteries have, they also need to be charged/discharged a few times to get to thier full capacity, the only thing i have seen that wouldn't work with them is a very old wall clock.

I now have a 1400mah onlybatteriesareus pack in my alkaline pod, works great but so do 8x 2800mah AA's(didn't time them to alarm to see how long though as i only hunted 4 hours)

 

[Critterhunter]

Skim down this forum a page or two for a thread asking about Excal batteries. You'll find everything you ever wanted to know there. Only using 8 rechargables instead of 10 in the normal holder should work just fine provided you buy high capacity cells, like 2500ma or higher. I have yet to use any device, regulator or not, that rechargables would not work in.

 

[HawaiiMDer]

Kered,

I bought 16 1.2 v energizer rechargeables from the store, the green color ones. They do not work like a 1.5 v cell does. They caused my excalibur to be erradic and would all false every 20 seconds on the dot. Am i just imagining that? Now when i attached 10 of these cells together making it 12 v the detector worked fine. As soon as i replaced them with regular alkalines guess what, my detector worked absolutely fine.

Ken

 

[kered]

All depends on the quality ken, i use mostly fujicel but also have duracel and energiser, don't know what make the green ones are. if you put cheap chinese alkalines in they don't work for long either

 

[Critterhunter]

Those "green" Energizers can be anything from like 1600ma on up to 2800ma or so. What size are yours? I've got 2600ma and 2500ma ones from Walmart and they've worked great in my detectors over the years using only eight. Most important thing to do is top off your nimhs or nicads before heading out. They slowly discharge sitting on the shelf and even as little as 3 or 4 days later they can be low enough not to supply the 10.5V the regulator in the Sovereign or Excalibur needs to see. Some brands and newer Energizers are said to hold their charge on the shelf better and might not be as much of a problem. Also, good quality nicads tend to hold their charge on the shelf better than at least the older nimhs did.

 

[HawaiiMDer]

Attached is the batteries i bought. They are 2450 mah batteries i believe, they didn't work for me but maybe my detector is just finicky. Anyhow, they belong to my kids now for their games.

Ken

 

[Critterhunter]

Did you peak then off right before going out to hunt? And, are you using a good charger that is for sure charging them completely? I bet one or the other is the issue.

 

[HawaiiMDer]

i actually left them in the charger for two days then used them. i used the charger i bought with the batteries. Maybe i did do something bad but i don't know. I'm not going to chance it again.

Thanks,

 

[Critterhunter]

Trying to run batteries in a detector with too low of voltage won't hurt a thing. There is no way you can damage the machine trying them. If the machine isn't work well or the low battery alarm is sounding off then just remove them. It's much more "risky" to try to run more cells to increase the voltage in my opinion. Linear regulators get rid of extra voltage by converting it into heat that is wasted via a large heat sink on the top of them. Try to run too high a voltage on a regulator that isn't meant to shunt that voltage off or is at it's spec limits and you stand a good chance of frying it. Some regulators have a thermal overload in that they will shut down once they get too hot, but it's never a good idea to rely on that. In fact, for the ESCs (Electronic Speed Controls) on RC electric planes I'll often add a larger heat sink to the existing one to help bleed off any heat. These units also contain a BEC (Battery Elimination Circuit) which is a linear regulator that drops the voltage down to like 5 volts to power the RX and servos. These ESCs have thermal overloads but what good does that do you when you no longer have control over the plane until it cools down and resets.