18650 Mega Cell Charger and Capacity Tester
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- Опубликовано: 14 окт 2024
- Brief overview of my experience with the Mega Cell Charger. I found the programming difficult. It needs an external power supply and connection to wifi. I don't have wifi in my garage and won't be keeping this charger. If I have another project with 18650 cells I'll buy some simple charger/testers from Amazon. I linked to one below.
18650 Lithium Batteries are from Modem packs from Battery Hookup. The cells all tested great. I had no heaters and no dead cells. These are new-old stock, never cycled. I think they will work great for my upcoming project.
Use coupon code "davidpoz" for 10% off.
Battery Hookup Affiliate link: batteryhookup....
Huge Thanks to LithiumSolar RUclips Channel. I'm sending him this charger because he really understands how to use it. • 16-Bay 18650 MegaCell ...
Amazon Affiliate link:
Simple 4-slot cell tester/charger: amzn.to/3aF5Ob7
5v Power Supply: amzn.to/3cvyXae
Cord: amzn.to/39vvOVZ
“As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.”
Hi David, thanks for your time reviewing our product! We will be working on improving the usability of this device. About bay 2 and 9, we will be testing to see if that's something that happen because of software problem or was something wrong with your device. We usually test with a capacitors bank to keep things precise.
It's always good to see the problems users have setting things up so we know what to work on. So thanks again for your time to document your journey, that's how good products arrise, with feedback and with the willing to solve those issues.
All the best with your projects!
Does this require wifi? To test batteries? Seriously? That literally eliminates 100% of my desire to use this.
@@duronboy2 I'm guessing the software signs you up for a botnet or steals processor power from your computer to mine bitcoins or something like that.. It should not require internet to charge a frigging battery.. google Megacell and you'll get more hits on indiegogo and crowdsourcing than how to spend a week getting one of these things up and running...
@@tntring It requires Wi-Fi to get connected to a computer to gether data from the devices Terry. There's not enough processing power on these to mine bitcoin.. :) .. Anyways, jockes asside, we have made a full documentation page and video series on how to use these devices. The workflow it's indeed different from what people are used to, but that's to speed up the process when processing thousands of cells. If you are only processing a couple, then Opus or other similar devices will make more sense. Checkout the documentation page in case you need more info on how to get the devices setup and to understand what's going on with the WiFi thing.
www.deepcyclepower.com/megacell-charger-documentation/
All the best!
@@duronboy2 have you found one for bulk testing?
@@duronboy2 I need one for both 18650 and 21700 capacity testing but i have over 100 cells to test🥲
I'm a tech guy (I fix and rebuild computers for a living) so I understood what you were saying as far as being told what to do by the "experts". That thing is barely a prototype, and certainly shouldn't be a product that people are being charged money for. Flashing new firmware isn't something an end user should ever have to do just to get a product to work, hell I'm a pro and I've bricked stuff when firmware flashes went wrong. Thanks for taking the time to make a video warning people before they end up wasting their time and money.
You're a good man. Thank you for all of your assistance in learning.
Kudos for jumping in the deep end, trying and documenting everything - sounds like they still have some debugging to do.
I was going to say exactly the same thing then I saw your comment.
It's quite scary to see that cells are getting charged passed 4.2v which is very dangerous
They need to start by providing proper documentation for their product.
@ LithiumSolar: Yes please on the documentation.
@@joshuabest100 taking them slightly past 4.2 isn't particularly dangerous, but it will exponentially reduce the cycle life of the cell. I have seen these used from 2.5 - 4.35 in an application where capacity was a far greater priority than cycle life. I would say that any higher than that and you'd start running into the hazard area. There are other factors too, such as chemistry, temperature, charge / discharge rate.
For someone like me all what you were explaining to us is simple and easy but this video is a good scenario of someone who's not computer savvy and that's is a good test
I have two Xtar VC4S capacity testers that I use. I also bought a simple load tester to help me test bigger batteries
Ya, I was rather excited to see these things and a few different guys on YT have tested them. I am not intimidated by the hands on aspect as it is my bread and butter (But these don't actually need programming, more in a sec on that). What I DON'T like seeing is how incredibly friggy and temperamental they seem to be. The need to go in and fiddle with configuration files should be a power user OPTION and not a straight up first place to go if something is wrong. The user issues should have been ironed out a lot more in prototyping so that at least it would be easier to weed out where the actual issues are; meaning user error or manufacturing or design faults.
Thanks for trying though!
I get the enthusiasm for the potential sophistication of this and not bashing it, but at a practical level - you've just made the case why I just use OPUSs.
I tried to simply share my experience and let you (the viewer) decide good or bad.
There are a lot of things improved on the Megacell Charger since we were running the Beta Version.
Thank you for your time and the making of this video. I am frustrated with this charger and the support. I am looking to sell mine and will just pick up four liitokala chargers. I have done repeated tests of inserting cells in the exact same way only to find problems with the interface. I don't know what it means when the screen turns from showing each cell and its values to a screen of red/orange with the letters n/a in each one. Sometimes the cells show up as in the led lights up after hitting the charge icon in the sw other times the little led never comes on. Just more frustrating than it has to be the overextended themselves with the sw it is not really a good fit. Now I am told lots of folks are using this charger and the makers of the charger state no reports of problems. I found it hard to believe beings the rough edges on the sw.
I certainly reported my problems to them, so I don't know how they can claim "no problems". But I washed my hands of this product altogether. I gave it away, no payment. in fact, I paid for shipping just to get rid of it.
Sorry brother I would have helped but I do not know about that thing. I am working on a small 12 volt pack from 18650s. Thanks for sharing with us man. God bless.
Actually just laughing a little. I figured with your knowledge of charge controllers terms like flash and firmware would be something you’d have known but hey love your videos and your honesty. Great job!!!
My Victron Charge controller has an app on my phone. The app updates the charge controller automatically, I don't have to do anything.
I picked up 300 of the 21700 Samsung 4 ah. Trying to figure out the best way to use them. Planning a backup solar generator with a 3000 aims inverter. Bad thing is the aims in 12 volt inverter.
We're doing something similar with an active balancer/BMS similar to batrium. but ours is web based, so you just browse the ESP and see what it's doing. no need to stay connected. also will be doing alarms and grafana data metric etc. early stages though.
When you update the firmware, you could be possibly updating any calibration it may have had.
"They were using words, like flash......and they call it firmware" 🤣😜 LOL Newb!!! 😉😎 But you did a good job figuring it out in the end 👍
Is there a bulk testing unit lile this that isn't as convoluted... I need one for both 18650 and 21700 but I have over 100 cells to test...
Man I wondered when your next video was coming out. Must have set you back a bit of time. Thanks for the review
Hi Frank. Yeah, I've been breaking open the modem packs and swapping them out on the charger for over a week now. But, it's done. I bounce between my projects of this, wiring the inverters, building things with my daughter. Thanks for watching.
thors modem batterys look a great deal but been in the uk i think the import tax would be the killer prob more then the the cost of the packs
It seems you can buy fully working and intuitive quad smart chargers with AC adapters for $25. Paying $170 is excessive.
Yes, the Opus BT3100 is the "industry" standard in the hobby. Mine are in constant use.
@@ahaveland I have one of those too. I'll probably get a couple more when I get time to really get involved.
They are horrendously inaccurate, but keeping that in mind, they're entirely useable.
@@ahaveland yup looking forward to buying mine. It's discontinued on gearbest now for some reason
and then you still have to buy a power supply on top of that...
Eh 200, ain't too bad, I went through 1500 with 5 4bay, and a few tp4056, I'll stick with what I got!, I have a total of 7 , 4 bay chargers,
That squiggly gold thing above the gold IC chip in the middle looks like a Bluetooth or wifi antenna.
Battery Hook sells fully tested cells which is cool after 50 tears of tech work recovering and testing cells is too much tedious mucking around, been there done that I just want a bigger battery.
Thx for sharing! Like #221
Your welcome. Thanks for watching.
Sounds like it needs some kinda offset programed in.
That looks like it’s built on an arduino system. Especially if you have to flash stuff and set up com ports and everything. Even that led screen in the middle looks like a common arduino piece
Maybe, I don't know.
Yes, we need ESP8266 for the processing and the software is written in Arduino. It started like a prototype project, but then we invested the time into making the numbers right
You maybe could have used an old computer power supply for the 5V DC input requirement. Do you know how many amps it requires to charge with all bays occupied?
Lithium Solar tried using a 22 amp computer power supply and it wasn't enough. This one I bought was a 30 amp and it worked.
@DavidPoz - Maybe with that 22A computer power supply and bays 2, 9, and a few others empty, it would have worked fine. I have a bunch of those here, I can check if any of mine are more than 22A. Also, I think for those 5V rails to put out full power, there also has to be a significant load on the 12V rail. Maybe he didn't do that. UPDATE: The very first power supply I checked (I have dozens of them), has a 30A rating for the 5V rail, however it states that 5V and 3.3V combined output cannot exceed 160W so you would just about max that out with 30A @ 5V. Also with some computer power supplies, you can combine the DC outputs, although it is not recommended.
Shame it doesn't have a 12v input with a wide tolerance. That would make it much more useable.
I tried to buy one of those but something happened and it didn't go thru. I'm kind of glad it failed now.
The idea is good, but they are going to have to be simple to use before they put them on the market.
Yeah, i heard they refunded some recent orders.
Holy shit!
That wiggley line on the board is a wireless 'com port' ie wireless communications port,if you turn on bluetooth or wifi it would of been easier to setup the com port an you wouldn't have to faff about with that usb cable an going into your computer settings
I just followed the instructions.
for $200+ price delivered to USA,,, way too expensive
Thank you for the video and special thanks for being perfectly honest on how these EXPERTS (are they?) describe things to end users (common people) who want to use their products. It’s not your fault for being frustrated, when you said , that you spend several hours referring to external media to obtain info. Why do you have to struggle so much to install and or update codes for the device you paid for? I’d say that these people are totally dumb, failing to impart knowledge to the buyers of their dumb products. Sir, I’m with you and I fully understand your predicament. I could feel your anger when you spoke, though you diplomatically subdued and covered it.
The guy from overseas, was mumbling incoherently, further confusing me. Hello... I, just wanted to buy the damn thing to charge Li-ion cells and not run a Reactor. These people are not engineers, they are frantically cheating people for quick funds with their contraptions. I’d go for 4 Opus and be happy with it.
I apologize for the outburst. I end my note with due regards and respect.
Sounds like you also bought one, is that right? I didn't go into everything. I tried to keep it to just the facts. But at one point Martin called me "crude" for asking this question on the facebook group: "Anyone know how long getting a license usually takes? Thanks." I get the impression working with mega cell charger is a side hobby for him, because he said I would have to wait until he finished "work", got home, ate dinner, and then he will "generate" my license.
I'm with you, just give me some simple Opus testers. Thanks for sharing in the frustration with me.
@@DavidPozEnergy I can just imagine trying to get a license (for sotware that don't even NEED to be licensed) if you buy one used, or aren't a RUclips reviewer...
I signed up for the crowd fund and later got an email from Alex explaining that the funds were frozen by PayPal. I called PayPal and could never get the AI agent to understand what I wanted to ask. Finally got on chat with a human and they checked and said the problem had been resolved. I emailed Alex back and told him what I had learned. He thanked me and things were supposedly on normal schedule again. Now I have got a notice from PayPal that my money has been refunded? I'll just keep using my OPUS chargers until something makes sense?
If it was a decent product to begin with, there would be a lot more out there supporting it. After spending the $$ for 2 of them (used), and then running what I ran into, I felt SCAMMED. -You're lucky you got your money back.
60$ delivery fee? I hope batteryhookup had cheaper international delivery
Just buy a whole bunch of ZB2L3. They're $5.00 each and a bulk order of TP4056 for less than $0.50 each. The simplest and cheapest way to go.
Check in to www.vortexit.co.nz/ it's opensource hardware. Keeps central DB of EVERY CELL you test and EVERY time you test it. Just an option, and you can built small testers (4 cell) or big ones (8 cell) and just keep adding them to your ID
may be open source hardware, but the software is licensed.. and to me, that aint open source...
Those deviations were normal...Every IC and every little resistor that the board has is slightly different from each other and that's why the measurments are not on point... The thing that is missing is some calibration... And since you are meant to flash new firmware on it, any factory calibration that might be on it is probably lost... So they should give you instruction on how to calibrate it on your own
Sounds about normal chineseum is a lot of work.
when i built my last pack that is 4s15p i have over a 100 cells tulk along time but i used the opus bt-c3100 as it would fully charge the cell then run a discharge test then recharge them after i would just put 4 ceels in when i went to bed and normaly they be done when i got home from work the next day had to discharge at 500 mah as built in cooling was not upto job but if i removed the back added an 80mm fan then i could run at full tilt with no problems
That's a good idea, to add a fan on the back.
@@DavidPozEnergy it kept shutting off so figured it was a heat problem turns out i was right simple hacks alway make life better lol
No, this isn't a good idea - if the cells are getting too hot it is because they are past their prime and shouldn't be used.
Force cooling them is just masking a problem that could come back to bite you.
However, I do think that adding a gentle breeze is ok if you're in a hot climate.
@@ahaveland I think the fans are to cool the load dump resistors, not so much the cells.
The charge cycle is linked to the cell temperature. It might not be a good idea to add an external fan. Because this could mess up the charge program
oh wow, i recognise the esp32 or esp8266 in the middle with the oled display, that costs $10, feels a rip off on the product, maybe youre paying for the software development.
heya that is very strange indeed
just looked price of postage would be the same as the 15x 8cell modem packs damn
Is it a fixed cost that could be spread over a larger order?
@@DavidPozEnergy i have no idea i think it is down to waight
OK, darn.
man i am 4 minutes in but what a headache, ill just buy another one that just works
I think they sent you the flaky test unit one they had around the office. Anyone interested in Chargery BMS-8T BMS units I have 2 for sale on eBay for fast shipping. Since switched to 16s so don’t need them. They just arrived and are still new in the box. Let me know.
Too complicated and time consuming for the average user that just wants to test his batteries. Thanks for enlightening us.
It really depends on the number of the cells you are testing. If you are doing it for fun and don't care of using these in packs in the future, that's ok. But where this device really saves time, it's when you want to use the cells in the pack, finding the right ones to place in each string and checking for self discharge after 2 weeks and updating the database using the QR code scanner.
You bought the prototype version. There is a kick starter going
I don't think there is a kick starter going. Alex made his website to look like kick starter, but it's not kick starter.
@@DavidPozEnergy it is. You got the 3D printed version. The newer one is moulded with tooling so should "look" slightly better. Firmware might not be improved though
@@DavidPozEnergy It looks like he's in essence having you beta-test the product for him. It's not ready for market but he stills sells it - not ethical imo.
This product is meant for super geeks. Unfortunately most people aren't the right target audience for this
Yeah, I wish I was more of a geek and could figure it out.
@@DavidPozEnergy I thought it would be simpler to be honest. I saw jehu's video and it seem slightly simpler. Maybe they sent you a "blank". They should have made sure its flashed (installed) properly and give proper documentation. I don't know how they claim to have sold 400 units in the state yours arrived. It's too over priced for what it does.
“But I had to update… umm… they call it FIRMware!” Oh my, poor Dave. 💜😂💜
What’s your day job, man? For some reason I thought you were an engineer of some sort. 🤓🤔🤷♂️
My background is construction.
DavidPoz Well, you clearly put a lot of research into this stuff! Kudos!! 💜🤓👍
@@DavidPozEnergy I guessed that right off -from all the DeWalt tools you got all over the place ;)
After using Opus chargers and having slots and fans fail left and right moved on to liitokaala chargers and Zanflare C4 chargers. They work fine but this one beats them all. the ability to automatically record all cells into a database and printing labels automatically is awesome. When processing thousands of cells, this is amazing.
Sure, this is not for the faint of heart as it requires some tinkering and knowing what and how to update firmware. I come from an IT background so this is right at home for me.
Your view is portrayed in this video as mostly negative.
It prints labels from a thermal printer. Thermal labels have a lifespan of 6-9 months. I'd like to see what some of the labeled cells look like after 1, 2, or 3 years...
Did you find anything in the video to be untrue? If so, could you explain?
I have both Electronics Engineering and IT education.. I just don't have a weeks worth of my time to devote to getting this junk running. (my time -is worth about 50.00 an hour, so I'd be throwing good money after bad if I were to get these running. I can buy 20 -30 GOOD 4 bangers for that money!) It was junk when I bought it and it will be junk when it burns houses down due to the fact that there is no way to calibrate it after you get it running... If you want them, I'll sell you the 2 I have for 100.00! good luck Lnxpro...
Glad I didn't have the money to buy one, sounds too buggy to be reliable
It was in the prototype stage and we had a lot of things to improve, that's right. The good thing was that we managed to fix most of the issues with software updates.
You say that voltage was high on all slots. Sure, You are using the same voltmeter for all measurements. This means that all slots are in sync but Your voltmeter may not be accurate enough.
Yeah. Not worth it
You knowingly purchased a beta level product and you got a beta level product. FIRMWARE is the base level programming of the HARDWARE, it's how the hardware talks to the outside world. Yes, you should have started with an Opus-3400. Be careful with the 18650 project man, you are flirting with burning down your house at this rate.
blah blah who cares
Here's the mega charger link.
megacellcharger.com/