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<font size=3>Mike,<br><br>
Assuming that the cells in the charger are NiCds, I think it is more
likely that one developed a short and drew too much current from the wall
charger, which has no safety equipment at all. Actually, this would
be even more true if they were NiMHs, since the NiMH normal failure mode
is short rather than open -- NiCds <b><u>tend</u></b> to fail
open...<br><br>
At 03:27 PM 5/5/2010, you wrote:<br>
<blockquote type=cite class=cite cite="">I am not an electrical guy, nor
do I play one on TV, but how about this theory:<br>
<br>
The battery itself has been showing signs that it might be at the end of
its life. After spending a winter in hibernation in the basement,
it was having trouble spinning the YS170 and a pair of LA40s in a Pica
Duelist after about 4 flights. Normally, 4 YS starts and a few
sport motor starts are not a problem at all a session or two in a row
without a re-charge. If the battery's resistance is higher due to
its age, can the wall charger be forced to work harder, heating up the
wiring until the plastic wire sleeve started to melt and a short occurred
finishing off the charger once and for all?<br>
<br>
<hr>
Date: Wed, 5 May 2010 12:10:47 -0700<br>
From: bob@toprudder.com<br>
To: nsrca-discussion@lists.nsrca.org<br>
Subject: Re: [NSRCA-discussion] What the heck .... starter battery
charging ouch<br><br>
The "built-in" circuit breakers are typically GFCI outlets and
don't offer any over-current protection, just ground fault protection.
Not sure this would have helped. All outlets should be protected for
over-current by a breaker in a panel somewhere. There are some newer
breakers that offer arc-fault protection, that may have tripped in your
case.<br>
<br>
It would be interesting to diagnose the failure and determine what
happened. Perhaps just a fuse in the charge jack would have prevented
this.<br>
<br>
I have a friend that replaced all his 3 pin charge jacks with 1/8"
mini-jacks since they were easier to mount in a plane (just drill a round
hole). I advised him against that, since those can short if not fully
inserted. He never had a problem, though.<br>
<br>
Bob R.<br><br>
<br>
--- On <b>Tue, 5/4/10, Michael Cohen
<i><precisionaero@hotmail.com></i></b> wrote:<br>
</font>
<dl><br>
<dd>From: Michael Cohen <precisionaero@hotmail.com><br>
<dd>Subject: Re: [NSRCA-discussion] What the heck .... starter battery
charging ouch<br>
<dd>To: "NSRCA" <nsrca-discussion@lists.nsrca.org><br>
<dd>Date: Tuesday, May 4, 2010, 8:22 PM<br><br>
<dd>Yeah, with LiPos and LiFe, I always stick around. For NiMh,
NiCd, and Pb, I usually plug it in, wait 30 seconds, and then I turn
away. The outlet did not have a built in circuit breaker either, so
guess what I will be doing before the next charging event.....<br>
<dd> <br>
<hr>
<dd>Date: Tue, 4 May 2010 17:09:25 -0700<br>
<dd>From: brett.terry@gmail.com<br>
<dd>To: nsrca-discussion@lists.nsrca.org<br>
<dd>Subject: Re: [NSRCA-discussion] What the heck .... starter battery
charging ouch<br><br>
<dd>IIRC it was a similar situation that took out all of Chip Hyde's
planes a few months back. The wall wart charger for his car
"jump starter" that he was using as a field charger
caught fire and destroyed the garage. <br><br>
<dd>It is a good thing you were there to witness it and prevent further
damage! I can't count how many times over the years I have plugged
in the charger and not looked back until the next day.<br><br>
<dd>i am glad to hear the only damage was the smoke in the air.<br><br>
<dd>Brett<br><br>
<dd>On Tue, May 4, 2010 at 3:58 PM, Michael Cohen
<<a href="http://us.mc11.mail.yahoo.com/mc/compose?to=precisionaero@hotmail.com">
precisionaero@hotmail.com</a>> wrote:<br>
<dl>
<dd>I was working on my Brio out in the garage after having plugged in
the wall charger for the (glow) starter battery about 10 minutes
ago. You know, us internal combustion guys need to do that once in
a while. All of the sudden, I was standing in a cloud of
smoke! I thought the Triton2EQ, that was also charging the Brio,
was the culprit but somehow, the wall charger's wire's were the one's
smoking! I quickly pulled the both plugs from the outlet and got
out of the garage ASAP. Never seen that happen before! I
guess you high powered LiPo guys don't have exclusive rights to smoking
batteries/charger excitement.<br>
<dd> <br>
<dd>Mike C<br><br>
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<font size=3><b><i>--></font>
<font face="Arial, Helvetica" size=3 color="#800000">There are only two
types of aircraft -- fighters and targets.<br><br>
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