A Battery Myth Mistake?

Hello all,
Back from the "dead",

I've watched a SciShow video titled "How Do I Make My Battery Last Longer?".

However something caught my attention. NiCad (as well as NiMH!) is "better to let them all the way down before recharging them". I think that shouldn't apply to NiMH. Probably in fact, fully discharging Nickel-Metal Hydride batteries will hurt the cycle life.
The person in the video also said "stop charging as soon as soon as they're fully charged else crystals can form on the electrolyte and the batteries break or at least not hold as much charge as they should". I believe this is false to NiMH batteries as overcharging will just buildup heat, but may be true on NiCad.

I hope someone can reach out to SciShow that these battery myths are not applied to NiMH batteries.

Considering the low cost of modern batteries, and their availability, I guess, wasting time on watching cycles, holding breath, etc. is not a good idea at all.

nicad which now are pretty *beep* compared to lithium options, dont like being topped off regular. As they suffer with memory, generally they like to be used down then charged up again. Short uses and regular topping off=short life.

nimh's are pretty hardy and you can drain down and recharge or top off. As curious one states, life is too short to monitor every single charge for what they cost(of course no short cuts on safety). But nimhs are a good option for lower output lights and no need to monitor voltages closely each time...................just use, enjoy.

iirc a lot of nimh chargers trickle charge once completed, so ideally you want to remove the nimh cells once charged rather than leave there for hours at a time. No doubt being continuously subjected to over charging will shorten their cycle life..............by how much over 100's of cycles i dont know.

ven said:

iirc a lot of nimh chargers trickle charge once completed, so ideally you want to remove the nimh cells once charged rather than leave there for hours at a time. No doubt being continuously subjected to over charging will shorten their cycle life..............by how much over 100's of cycles i dont know.

Click to expand...

The NiMH charger/analyzers I use don't really "trickle" - they might charge at about 0.5 ma or less after "terminating." You can't really call it a trickle charge when it barely counteracts self-discharge or leakage. To me, trickle charge means 0.1C.

I have used NiCd and NiMH quite a bit. It is easy to under estimate what you can do with a NiCd and still have quite safe, reasonably decent power levels. Yes you can kill them, but a well designed one can take a real beating. I still use NiMH packs in my son's R/C car, because the risks are so low and performance is good enough for people that aren't into serious racing, just having fun.