Battery Help

[mattk]

As some of you know, my friend matt owns a Beta Model Segway.... its basicly the same as the I series but has different batteries. He is going riding tomarrow and is worried about having them die on him.

Are there any tricks to keep the batteries at a higher charge?

Thanks,
Matt

[KonaSegway]

About 2 hours before you take off, unplug and re-plug it right back in again. May give you an extra boost .. also, tell him to only ride downhill :-)

Aloha,
Sam


http://www.konasegway.com

[MagiMike]

My suggestion is "go slow" Reports are that the slower you travel the farther you get. "right on down to two miles per hour" reported in a segway.com response to a question.

And when doing the unplug and replug thing. I think it helps me to bring the seg into the air conditioning for the final charge to help have the battery cooler for that final charge. ( its running in the 90's where I live)
Mike in Houston

* of course this is based on what I've heard from others about the current battery... no idea at all if it applies to his Beta Battery.

Mike in Houston TX.

It stops on a dime,
turns on a nickel,
and costs a pretty penny.

[Sleepy]

I think the batteries you're talking about are the original NiCad's. These have memory, and the charging characteristics are different than NiMH. NiCad's usually need to be drained completely before recharging in order to get a full charge. So from my experience, you should fully deplete the NiCad's, then fully charge them as soon as possible. This should give you the best range if it's a typcial NiCad.

-Alex

[W9GFO]

quote:Originally posted by Sleepy

I think the batteries you're talking about are the original NiCad's. These have memory, and the charging characteristics are different than NiMH. NiCad's usually need to be drained completely before recharging in order to get a full charge. So from my experience, you should fully deplete the NiCad's, then fully charge them as soon as possible. This should give you the best range if it's a typcial NiCad.

-Alex


As soon as NiCads power drops off, stop. If you try to drain the batteries completely you risk cell reversal. Cell reversal can damage the battery so that when it is recharged the affected battery is not storing as much as the others. The result is a battery pack that is deemd to be a victim of 'memory'.

An exception to this is a single cell. A single cell can be drained completely without risk. A battery with more than one cell should be discharged no lower than 1.1 volts (maybe 0.8, can't remember).

If a Nicad is repeatedly partially drained to the same level crystals can form between the layers of the cell. An example of this is sattelites that have very regular charge/discharge cycles. They are in the earth's shadow precisely the same amount of time day
after day. A battery that is affected in this way can often be recovered by going through a few full discharge/charge cycles.

For more info just do a search for "NiCad memory myth"

[citivolus]

Mattk, what's different about the batteries? I don't think NiCads were ever used for anything other than prototypes which would all be "in the museum". As far as I know all units sold shipped with NiMH. Sid?

--
swiftly flying

[SegwayUtah]

The original Segway.com website showed 2 models of the 'i', 'e', and 'p' -- one with NiCad and one with NiMH. I think it was the p90 and the p133 and the i113 and e113 or something like that for the NiCad's. Considering the ranges on the Segways, I'm super-glad that the NiCad's weren't released in favor of the NiMH's.

It's odd that one would *own* a beta-model Segway. I wonder if this person is a personal friend of Dean Kamen, or what . . . hmm . . . It could be fun to have the only released NiCad Segway in the world though!

Chris