Guidelines for using a high power incan & Elite 2/3A Performance Graphs
I'm starting this topic mainly because I received several PM's asking questions about the recent Mac 7,000 lumen 15 cell (Elite 2/3A 1500mAh) NiMH pack in this sales thread, and didn't want to post all this general guideline information in his sales thread.
It is important to recognize that when you move into a 15 cell battery pack, powering a 10.5Amp custom hotwire (64458) light, that you are crossing into the land of the Radio Controlled ("RC") hobbyists in terms of battery pack size, voltages, current, performance, and charging needs....so it is useful to consider (if you can afford it) upgrading your charger and take better care of the batteries. Here are some general guidelines that may be of use to those from that thread, and others who may be interested.
To get more control of your charging, you are now moving into the so called "Hobby Charger" category used by the Radio Controlled crowd....such as the Triton-2 here or I have been using the Hyperion EOS-1210i (towards bottom of page). You have to ask yourself if you are likely to "grow" in this hobby to justify getting a better quality charger. This light has a 15 cell pack, and some of the cheaper "Hobby chargers" cutoff at charging 12 or 14 NiMH cells...so if you want a better charger, you are stuck paying $125 to $175 to get one that will work.
Most NiMH cells will charge up to 1.5V at their peak, and then when full, their voltage begins to drop which triggers the end of charging for the charger.....i.e. most NiMH chargers sense a drop in voltage of 5-7mV per cell as the sign that they are full, and shut off charging. They will get warm/slightly hot at the end of their cycle.
The drop from 1.5V per cell (15 x 1.5V = 22.5V) down to a more stable 1.43V/cell occurs in minutes (15 x 1.43V/cell = 21.45V). These cells will drop under 1.4V per cell in several hours until reaching a more stable "resting voltage."
When you look at my bulb testing here, and take into account the 150-200 milliohm resistance from the flashlight and batteries, you will likely end up dropping another 1.5-2 volts into the 19-20V range to put you in a safe non-flashing range if you wait about 30-45 mins after charge is complete before using.
The main thing to pay attention to when using "high current" cells is how they perform under load....in other words, how well do they hold a decent voltage, and for how long. These Elite 1500mAh cells have a testing profile at cheapbatterypacks.com listed here, which shows their voltage curve over time when subjected to a 20Amp load. The bulb in this light (Osram 64458) is using a 10.5 Amp load, so your performance will be better than this graph, but you have to be realistic in your expectations of run time. Here is how to figure that out.
If a 1500mAh cell can deliver (optimally) 1500mA (= 1.5A) for an hour, then it provides twice as much current 3.0A for 30 minutes. It would give 4 times as much current (6A) for 1/4 hour, or 15 minutes. If 6 times as much current (9A) was needed, the battery would only last 10 minutes....so in this example where the 64458 bulb requires 10.5Amps to light up properly, that is 7 times the nominal 1.5A rating, and will have that higher amp rate sucked out of it in only 60/7 = 8.5 mins.
Now realistically, you are not going to be able to get every last stored mA out of any battery, so a more realistic total run time would be more like 6 to 7 minutes. So this is a "WOW" light, rather than a practical, long duration type of light...and you should treat it as that.
It is also important to not run it continuously because the heat builds up from the batteries being stressed, as well as the light filament heat which in some cases has damaged the coating on some brands of reflectors. I recommend that you use this is 20-30 second bursts, and let heat be your guide (feel the head/body--and stop when uncomfortable). Also, to protect the batteries from over-discharging it is best to stop using the light when you see a noticeable drop in output...which should be at about 5-7 minutes of run time.
I'm starting this topic mainly because I received several PM's asking questions about the recent Mac 7,000 lumen 15 cell (Elite 2/3A 1500mAh) NiMH pack in this sales thread, and didn't want to post all this general guideline information in his sales thread.
It is important to recognize that when you move into a 15 cell battery pack, powering a 10.5Amp custom hotwire (64458) light, that you are crossing into the land of the Radio Controlled ("RC") hobbyists in terms of battery pack size, voltages, current, performance, and charging needs....so it is useful to consider (if you can afford it) upgrading your charger and take better care of the batteries. Here are some general guidelines that may be of use to those from that thread, and others who may be interested.
The cheapest is to use one of the chargers like this one which goes up to 18V (nominal voltage of your pack) although I would prefer a charger that you can set at a lower charging current than this 0.9 Amp rate for these cells. It will shut off when done, but with this "economical" charger, you will not be able to "bathe the cells in a low 0.1 to 0.2 Amp charging rate" which helps to equalize the voltage among each of the cells every 10-15 charges, resulting in a full, proper charge.A Buyer In This Thread said:
To get more control of your charging, you are now moving into the so called "Hobby Charger" category used by the Radio Controlled crowd....such as the Triton-2 here or I have been using the Hyperion EOS-1210i (towards bottom of page). You have to ask yourself if you are likely to "grow" in this hobby to justify getting a better quality charger. This light has a 15 cell pack, and some of the cheaper "Hobby chargers" cutoff at charging 12 or 14 NiMH cells...so if you want a better charger, you are stuck paying $125 to $175 to get one that will work.
Most NiMH cells will charge up to 1.5V at their peak, and then when full, their voltage begins to drop which triggers the end of charging for the charger.....i.e. most NiMH chargers sense a drop in voltage of 5-7mV per cell as the sign that they are full, and shut off charging. They will get warm/slightly hot at the end of their cycle.
The drop from 1.5V per cell (15 x 1.5V = 22.5V) down to a more stable 1.43V/cell occurs in minutes (15 x 1.43V/cell = 21.45V). These cells will drop under 1.4V per cell in several hours until reaching a more stable "resting voltage."
When you look at my bulb testing here, and take into account the 150-200 milliohm resistance from the flashlight and batteries, you will likely end up dropping another 1.5-2 volts into the 19-20V range to put you in a safe non-flashing range if you wait about 30-45 mins after charge is complete before using.
The main thing to pay attention to when using "high current" cells is how they perform under load....in other words, how well do they hold a decent voltage, and for how long. These Elite 1500mAh cells have a testing profile at cheapbatterypacks.com listed here, which shows their voltage curve over time when subjected to a 20Amp load. The bulb in this light (Osram 64458) is using a 10.5 Amp load, so your performance will be better than this graph, but you have to be realistic in your expectations of run time. Here is how to figure that out.
If a 1500mAh cell can deliver (optimally) 1500mA (= 1.5A) for an hour, then it provides twice as much current 3.0A for 30 minutes. It would give 4 times as much current (6A) for 1/4 hour, or 15 minutes. If 6 times as much current (9A) was needed, the battery would only last 10 minutes....so in this example where the 64458 bulb requires 10.5Amps to light up properly, that is 7 times the nominal 1.5A rating, and will have that higher amp rate sucked out of it in only 60/7 = 8.5 mins.
Now realistically, you are not going to be able to get every last stored mA out of any battery, so a more realistic total run time would be more like 6 to 7 minutes. So this is a "WOW" light, rather than a practical, long duration type of light...and you should treat it as that.
It is also important to not run it continuously because the heat builds up from the batteries being stressed, as well as the light filament heat which in some cases has damaged the coating on some brands of reflectors. I recommend that you use this is 20-30 second bursts, and let heat be your guide (feel the head/body--and stop when uncomfortable). Also, to protect the batteries from over-discharging it is best to stop using the light when you see a noticeable drop in output...which should be at about 5-7 minutes of run time.
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