$8 6 cell NiMh 2000 mAh pack

[BigSki]

I was at the Harbor Freight store last weekend and I saw packs of 4 NiMh 2000 mAh AA size batteries for $4 per pack. I bought 2 packs, went home and laid them out for a 6 cell pack. I wasn't expecting very much from them, but to my surprise it seems to work really well. I got about a 1hr run time in my sportsman rig with the home made pack.

The pack is smaller than a 3s LiPo so it fits perfectly on the front servo tray. It has a bit of weight to it, but since it's on the front of the crawler it can only help the crawler climb better.

Just thought I'd pass this on. It didn't cost very much to build and it works pretty well, for what it is.

[Robb]

Or even if used simply as RX/TX pack batteries, that is a helluva price. Nice find!

[47willysbuggy]

What brand? I might have to check those out, what voltage does it read?

[JeremyH]

That sounds like another good excuse for me to head over to HF this weekend!

[BigSki]

Originally Posted by 47willysbuggy

What brand? I might have to check those out, what voltage does it read?

Harbor Freight brand. There are no indications as to who actually manufactured the cells, other than 'made in china'. After a 6 hour, .5 amp charge at 130%, when the charger peaked, the pack was reading 8.2 V. I ran it for at least 1 hour in my backyard, maybe a little longer. When the pack fizzled, I rechecked the voltage and it was down to 5.8V.

I did another slow charge last night, it took about 3 hours to bring it back up to a full charge, the data readout on the Onyx charger said it took 1800 mAh to bring it back, so that wasn't too bad. I mean, for $8 for the batteries, 1 hour of my labor and reused some old battery terminal lugs and a small piece of shrink tube, it turned out pretty well.

I don't want to disassemble the shrink wrap, but I'll try to get a pic of the pack on the rig to show it's overall size. It works great for my sportsman rig because it was assembled from all of the left over 'stock' AX-10 pieces from each upgrade that I did to the comp rig. The ironic part is, the stinking sportsman rig seems to work better than the comp rig! ( at least in my garden)

[hairba11]

I had got some 2400mAh AA's from Big Lots for about $4 a 4 pack. I'm using them in my t/x now, they top out at 11.0v and give me about 6-8 hours in the t/x. good since it is a 3pks and I have about 5 or 7 models on it I use on a regular basis.