Converting to a hump back. I have a few questions....

[mcvickj]

OK. Well I decided to covert my Savage over to use a hump pack. The items I purchased for the coversion are....

1 - Expert TX/RX AC Charger
1 - Ernst Charge Receptacle Hitec/Jr
1 - Hobbico Switch Harness w/ Charge Plug JR/Hitec/Z
1 - Trinity 1100 mAh Receiver Pack

I have two questions.

1. This RX pack has this little piece of plastic on its side and it won't fit into the switch harness. I am guessing I could just use an exacto and trim this off?

2. Now I should be able to leave my 2100 mAh double A batteries in my radio and charge them via the plug now correct? The charger I purchased has a 50mAh charge rate for both the TX and RX. The input is 120V 60Hz and the output is TX: 9.6V 50mA
RX: 4.8-6V 50mA. I should be able to plug this in and let it charge over night. All of the batteries are Nickel Metal Hydride and the charger can charge Ni-Mh.

I just want some one elses input before I roach anything. I am mostly a little nervous so I don't toast my XS3.

 

[RobH]

I think the little piece of plastic on the receiver's battery pack (the new hump pack) is the futaba or 'Z' style connector. They have this little flap of plastic that typically goes into a keyhole slot. This keeps people from accidently putting the connector in wrong.

Originally posted by mcvickj
1 - Hobbico Switch Harness w/ Charge Plug JR/Hitec/Z

Since it sais JR/Hitec/Z, I would assume that you have have the hardware to plug into your JR style (bevel edges) plug. I would think it's just a matter of changing the plugs (if you have the extra plugs). You can take those plugs off by taking a needle and liting up the tiny little plastic flaps that hook on the copper leads. Lift up all the little flaps and the plastic cover slides off the copper leads. Then you just stuff the leads into the proper plastic plug. They click into place and you're ready to go. You just have to make sure that black leads to black and red leads to red.

If you don't have the plugs or if the copper leads wont fit (that happened to me once), you can modify the Z-type plug. Hobby knife would work. I used the cut off wheel on my Dremel to 1.) take the notch off and 2.) add the beveled edge.

It's pretty cool that they have an NiMh charger for the XS3! I didn't buy JR's charger because it only charges NiCads.

I, however, am still running on Alkalines. I can't really comment on the charger & battery questions.

-Rob

 

[mcvickj]

First off welcome back Rob.

Well step one is complete. With a couple of slow and firm passes with a sharp exacto I was able to remove tje lil flap of plastic. The plug that comes with the Trinity hump pack already has the bevel edges! I just plugged the pack into my receiver and tried it out and it works great. Good by alkalines! I hope.

Now if I could just find out for sure about being able to charge the double A's in the TX and I will be good to go. I have never seen a battery pack for the XS3. I might have to contact JR directly on this issue.

I purchased the charging setup from Savage Central's store.

Here is a link to the charger I purchased.
http://store.savagess.com/product_info.php?products_id=313

Here is a link to the JR charger
http://store.savagess.com/product_info.php?products_id=312

Besides the price difference the only other difference is the mA rating. I am guessing the JR charges the packs faster than the Expert.

 

[Error401]

As a general rule of thumb, a good deep cycle charge should be 1/10 of the capacity of the pack (ie. 1000mAh pack charge at 100ma for 10 hours). Fast charge can be variable but the time x rate should not exceed the total capacity of the pack. In other words, don't charge a 1000mAh pack at 200mA for 10 hours, this will destroy the pack.

At the same time, if you have a 1000mAh pack and charge it at 50mA, it would take 20 hours to reach full charge. If you charge it for 10 hours at this rate, you will not get a full charge and the runtime will suck.

I use the Ace DDVC (dual digital variable charger). It has 2 independant charge channels, with a variable charge rate for each. This is handy when I need to fast charge 2 packs at once. The charge rates go from almost 0 to 500mA and works on 4 to 10 cells (pretty sure).

Bottom line, I don't know if the charger will work properly with the pack you got (it will charge it, but not real fast). Also, check the polarity of the charge cord for the Tx, alot of Jr plugs are ass backwards from everyone else (- center pole, + jacket for Jr).

Hope this helped.
Whitt....

 

[mcvickj]

The RX pack I have is the Trinity 1100 mAh pack. It was mistyped in my original post. I do own a charger. It is a Dynamite Prophet Plus.

Here is a link to the charger. Could this work to charge my RX pack?

http://www.dynamiterc.com/Products/Detail.aspx?ProductID=DYN4036

The reason I didn't consider this is because the lowest setting is 1 AMP. I was told you want to charge RX packs at .5 AMP max.

The pack also came with a female plug with bare leads. So if this charger could work I am guessing I could cut the wires on the charger and add these?

This charger is also a peak charger. I have read on RC Car Action that you don't want to use a trickle charger on Ni-Mh packs.

 

[robriguez]

Trickle charger or not you want to make sure your charger is capable of charging NiMh batts. The main different is the way that the batteries drop in voltage when near peak charge. The Charger has to be able to detect that drop properly or you will mess up your batts.

Never use a Timer on NiMh batts. Just dont. As long as your charger is built to handle NiMh batts it doesn't really matter if they are AA, A, C, sub-C, whatever......all that matters is the chrging amperage. The smaller the battery the lower the amperage. NEVER charge a single cell AA unless your charger specifically says this is ok.