Reviving Truck that Ran on LiCd Battery?

[Wombat]

Hey all,

I have an old Radio Shack RC truck that I would like to get running again with as little money to spend as possible; It's for my son and he wont run it but once in a while. I had to recycle the two NiCd batteries it had because they were not charging.

What do you recommend as an inexpensive alternative to the NiCD with tamiya connector? If you recommend the NiMH battery can it be charged with my NiCD only charger? If not, is there a good replacement battery/charger combo?

 

[tntpoof]

If you look you can find Nicads online with the Tamiya connector. and yes you can use that charger to charge a nimh. there's some with the Tamiya connector also

 

[biggman100]

Hey all,

I have an old Radio Shack RC truck that I would like to get running again with as little money to spend as possible; It's for my son and he wont run it but once in a while. I had to recycle the two NiCd batteries it had because they were not charging.

What do you recommend as an inexpensive alternative to the NiCD with tamiya connector? If you recommend the NiMH battery can it be charged with my NiCD only charger? If not, is there a good replacement battery/charger combo?

Any NI-CD or NIMH will work in it, as long as it is 7.2V. You can get them cheap from eBay and Amazon. Here is a whole page of NIMH, which are easier to find, on eBay: https://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_fr...=0&_osacat=220&_odkw=7.2v+nicd&LH_BIN=1&rt=nc
Most NIMH's come with Tamiya connectors. I would recommend a newer charger though. That one looks to be from quite a few years ago, and is listed as strictly for NI-CD, so I'm not sure how well it would work with NIMH batteries.

 

[AClegg]

I use to have one of those. what ever you do, don't up grade the motor. I did that and fried the esc. Back then, I didn't think it made that much of a difference.

 

[olds97_lss]

You might want to measure the pack to see if it's sub-c or 2/3A cells in there. I know NiCAD's didn't have the capacity that NiMH's do (at least good ones), so I'm not sure if that is a sub-c pack or 2/3A pack by looking at just the capacity.

Then you can find NiMH packs that fit it pretty easily. You would likely want to pick up a new charger though as a NiCAD peak charger shouldn't be used with NiMH cells unless specified otherwise. They have different peak delta's and the charger will overcharge a NiMH pack if it's specific to NiCAD.

You could also go 2S lipo... would just need one of those cheap alarms on the balance plug while it runs so you know when to stop. Might be too much run time/volts though, then again, may just be too much run time. Volts would be 8.4V fully charged (4.2*2S) and you would cut it off around 3.3V (6.6V empty). A 7.2V NiMH charges up to 8.3V roughly when full.

I'd go lipo... but I've been running lipo trucks for a few years, so I have the time/charger for it.

You can get a 2S lipo and charger pretty cheap, likely not a lot more than getting a NiMH and proper charger would be.