Can you custom a battery pack for camcorders?

[Gran Nismo]

Hello. I am not sure if this is the proper forum to post this subject, or if it belongs in OT.

I am really in a bind. Unfortunately my HD Camcorder does not offer high capacity batteries in the States yet. To get one of those high capacity battery and its proprietary battery pack kit would cost about 40 percent of the camcorder itself.

I have read from the camcorder forum that some people had customized some AA rechargeable for this application.

I am getting assistance from my friend to build one. He is an electrical/electronics guru.

My question is. Do anybody here knows of anyone that had a custom battery pack work successfully with camcorders? What type of battery configurations would work? I was thinking 6 D NiMH, but its too heavy, especially them 10000 mah

I am planning on either getting 12 AA NiMh in series (assuming the 2500 mah) to get 5000mah, or 6 C NiMh in parallel with its 5000mah. 6 Nimh is the choice to get 7.2v. That is what the stock Li-ion battery that came with the camcorder uses (7.2v 1300mah). Camcorder is a Panasonic SD5.

I know many custom modders here build battery packs for their custom flashlight configurations can chime in.



- Granni

 

[TigerhawkT3]

You might try building an external battery pack. For example, if it has a 12V car cigarette lighter adapter, you could make a 12V batt and just use that.

Twelve 2.5Ah AA NiMHs in series would not be 5Ah; it would be 14.4V and the same 2.5Ah. Six 5Ah NiMH in parallel would not be 5Ah; it would be 1.2V and 30Ah. Putting cells in series adds the voltages, and parallel adds the capacities.

Which model is your camcorder?

 

[paulr]

The stock pack is 7.2V 1320 mAH according to bhphoto.com. You need to check the specs of the ac adapter to see if you can power the camera from an external battery pack instead. I'd probably try to use a Sony NP-F970 style pack if I could. This is a large (7.2V 6000 mAH) pack that you can get pretty cheap from ebay dealers.

 

[LuxLuthor]

Is this $80 replacement battery too expensive to get as a spare (vs. trying to find the higher capacity model)? Depending on the space inside, it seems like you could make an upgraded version if two packs won't work for you.

 

[Gran Nismo]

Is this $80 replacement battery too expensive to get as a spare (vs. trying to find the higher capacity model)? Depending on the space inside, it seems like you could make an upgraded version if two packs won't work for you.

I believe that is the same as my stock Panasonic SD5 battery. It only lasts about 90mins. Their 4-5hrs one cost $255 from Ebay. No dealers in the states sell the higher end model yet. That friggin OEM battery price is RIDICULOUS!

Again, my camcorder model is Panasonic HDC-SD5.

Thanks for all the help here.

- Granni

 

[LuxLuthor]

Likely you would just have to rebuild it yourself then with high capacity cells.

 

[VidPro]

Likely you would just have to rebuild it yourself then with high capacity cells.

we rebuild with high cap batteries, it can be a real pain for some reasons.

sometimes the "info" chip doesnt go beyond some set milliamps, so say a pack used 1500ma cells, and you stuff 2600ma of cell in it, the stupid info might not function beyond 2000ma, so the cam says "empty" and still runs for hours after with the dang battery light blinking.

one pack i couldnt get the info to retrigger, and i cant find the microcontroller "RESET" pads, so i changed that batteries but the pack was useless :-(.
i searched the web to try and find sony "unlocking codes" to try and figure out what went wrong, or if I just failed (which is very possible).

i will (of course) not stop trying, but those are some of the caveats of trying to mess with these overcomputerised nightmares.

 

[bill_n_opus]

we rebuild with high cap batteries, it can be a real pain for some reasons.

sometimes the "info" chip doesnt go beyond some set milliamps, so say a pack used 1500ma cells, and you stuff 2600ma of cell in it, the stupid info might not function beyond 2000ma, so the cam says "empty" and still runs for hours after with the dang battery light blinking.

one pack i couldnt get the info to retrigger, and i cant find the microcontroller "RESET" pads, so i changed that batteries but the pack was useless :-(.
i searched the web to try and find sony "unlocking codes" to try and figure out what went wrong, or if I just failed (which is very possible).

i will (of course) not stop trying, but those are some of the caveats of trying to mess with these overcomputerised nightmares.

I was just thinking ... electronics engineers hang out on the internet too I would imagine.

The trick would be then threefold:

1 - find out where these guys (and gals) hang out
2 - communicate with them (that's tough if we're talking mandarin, japanese, cantonese, korean etc...)
3 - gain trust so that they may offer insight or information on how to effectively approach an electronic problem.

I know this is far fetched ... but I have a friend who's a battery guy who works for a prominent company that manufacturers consumer battery packs, chargers, inverters for home, work and RV use and so forth. He hangs out on a particular deal site and he always offers insight to the rare person who asks questions about the inner workings of an inverter problem for an RV and such. He helps cut to the chase when it would take a regular layperson some time for him/her to research a problem or get in touch with the right people.

Anyways, it's late and i'm rambling ... ignore me. :wave:

 

[Gran Nismo]

Fortunately for me my friend is an electrical/electronics guru. He has never failed me. Whatever happens I will post it here. I just basically posted the thread to see if this has been done before.



- Granni