Rechargeable Batteries

Tom Nic · Post by **Tom Nic** » Thu Jan 11, 2007 8:35 am

What have you found that works well for rechargeable batteries, specifically the "C" Cells that many of the popular dive lights use?

Suggestions? Sources for good deals? Things to stay away from and watch out for? Brands that you love? etc. etc?

With the cost of batteries and the way dive lights run through them rechargeables are the ONLY way to go IMHO, both from a $$ standpoint, a convenience standpoint, and I suppose you could throw in an environmental standpoint (less stuff in landfills!).

Of course, we all want the HID light sabers with their proprietary rechargeables... but for most of us the scuba units simply do not stretch far enough! Advice for the rest of us?

Looking forward to the great thoughts and advice that always come from the great folks in the Club!

Celeus · Post by **Celeus** » Thu Jan 11, 2007 9:01 am

I've been pretty happy with the Powerizer line of Ni-MH batteries. I've gotten good deals through http://www.batteryspace.com/ Bensbargains.net frequently has coupon links for them (none now that I could find).

That said, I recently got a battery pack for my main UK HID light- all those C cells are a giant hassle to travel with.

boydski · Post by **boydski** » Thu Jan 11, 2007 9:14 am

Hi Tom,

I've had exceptionally good luck with the Maha PowerEx line of batteries from Thomas Distributing . These NiMh batteries are very popular with photographers, and the batteries I use in my strobes are still going strong after more than 6 years of constant use.

The Maha chargers also work very well, even on dive boats with wildly fluctuating voltages.

Zen Diver · Post by **Zen Diver** » Thu Jan 11, 2007 10:14 am

I've got two rechargeable packs for the UK series of lights (Light Cannon and/or C8), and they are great. Last a good 2.5 hours or so on one charge, which is why I have two (in case of a third dive, or not enough charging time between one day and the next). They cost about $80.00 or each and are well worth it.

-Valerie

http://www.brightguy.com/products/Recha ... Cannon.php

(actually, they are a bit cheaper now than when I got mine

)

Nwbrewer · Post by **Nwbrewer** » Thu Jan 11, 2007 10:37 am

I'll second Celeus' recommendation for the powerizer batteries, that's what I use in my homemade canlight, and they seem to work well. I bought mine through batteryspace.com also.

Jake

Tangfish · Post by **Tangfish** » Thu Jan 11, 2007 11:15 am

This is where I get all my batteries. I don't use disposables anymore, in any capacity. Get some batteries and a 'speedy box'.

nwscubamom · Post by **nwscubamom** » Thu Jan 11, 2007 1:59 pm

boydski wrote:Hi Tom,

I've had exceptionally good luck with the Maha PowerEx line of batteries from Thomas Distributing . These NiMh batteries are very popular with photographers, and the batteries I use in my strobes are still going strong after more than 6 years of constant use.

The Maha chargers also work very well, even on dive boats with wildly fluctuating voltages.

I use what Scott uses, and have used them for years now. Thomas Distributing is a good company to deal with, and the prices are good too. So far I've used only AA's though, so I don't know about the C's.

- Janna

Tom Nic · Post by **Tom Nic** » Thu Jan 11, 2007 2:41 pm

Zen Diver 2 wrote:I've got two rechargeable packs for the UK series of lights (Light Cannon and/or C8), and they are great. Last a good 2.5 hours or so on one charge, which is why I have two (in case of a third dive, or not enough charging time between one day and the next). They cost about $80.00 or each and are well worth it.

-Valerie

http://www.brightguy.com/products/Recha ... Cannon.php

(actually, they are a bit cheaper now than when I got mine )

Hi Val! I too own one of these for my Light Cannon. I haven't used it in awhile... I suppose i need to revisit it.

I had a Cannon go bad (which UK of course replaced free $\:D/$ ) and for awhile I thought it was the battery pack.

-Being NiCD, not NiMH, it is my understanding that these develop a memory?
-Plus, with the recharging unit there is no "light" or other indicator to show that you have it plugged in correctly, let alone that it is actually charged. What... just leave it on 24 hours or so?

The uncertainty, coupled with my light winking out on a couple of dusk dives, (which I handled with a backup

) have made me a little gunshy of this battery pack. I now have a new Cannon, plus a used one that I bought that came with 8 NiMH batteries (I love it!), so I haven't revisited the battery pack. I'm looking at some additional NiMH C cells, plus one of the "intelligent" chargers that gives you battery status and stops juicing them after they are refreshed and fully charged.

So, "sell me"! I have it, I just need to be convinced it won't puke on me at depth!

Great responses from everyone, by the way... I haven't had time to answer because I've been checking out all the cool websites!!! Very useful information, as I knew there would be with this great bunch!!

Thanks again!!

-Tom Nic

jackieg · Post by **jackieg** » Thu Jan 11, 2007 7:44 pm

I also have the battery pack for the UK Light Cannon - same as Valerie's. I just charge it for 12 hours and it works great. Been using it almost a year now and have not had any "failures" to speak of.

However, that being said, it is annoying that there are no indicators on the battery pack to indicate when it is "done" - just feels warm.

jackie

Celeus · Post by **Celeus** » Fri Jan 12, 2007 5:00 pm

I also use the Lightcannon Battery pack, and I've noticed that it seems a bit brighter than with the C cells. I was surprised by that. Am I imagining things?

Tom Nic · Post by **Tom Nic** » Fri Jan 19, 2007 9:42 am

I wanted to thank everyone for their contributions to this thread. I've really enjoyed visiting the various websites and will be picking up some new C cells before I head for the Red Sea this Summer! $\:D/$

Also, your input encouraged me to try my Light Cannon battery pack again. As I said before I had a Light Cannon go bad on me... I thought it might have been the battery pack... sent it back to UK through my LDS... fixed free of charge... LDS let me use rental lights

(another argument for supporting your local LDS even if you do occasionally buy things elsewhere!).

Yesterday I tried the battery pack again after maybe 18 hours or so charging. It and my newly fixed Light Cannon performed flawlessly.

We did two dives at Redondo and one at Three Tree each of about 50 minutes. It did not even weaken, and I also thought that the beam was a bit brighter with the battery pack than with the C cells. Of course my C cells have quite a few charges on them, so they may not be as powerful output wise. I will compare them again. In the meantime I have a "new" Cannon, and a used Cannon as a backup, so it's all good! $\:D/$ I still do not like the fact that the battery pack has no indicator that it's charging or that it's done charging. Perhaps that isn't a big deal in the larger scheme of things, but as a customer it would sure add to my peace of mind to see a red light turning green or some other such thing!

Thanks again to each of you for your input! I love this board!

Nwbrewer · Post by **Nwbrewer** » Fri Jan 19, 2007 10:07 am

Celeus,

Are you saying your light cannon seems brighter with the rechargable UK pack than with rechargable C cells?

If so, my guess would be that the pack is actually 10 cells for a total of a 12volt battery pack, where as 8 C cell Ni-Mh batteries only puts out 9.6 volts (1.2v/cell). This will give you a noticable difference in bulb brightness. (At Least it will with a halogen, I think HID would be the same)

Jake

Tom Nic · Post by **Tom Nic** » Fri Jan 19, 2007 10:14 am

Interesting observation...

I know that when you put C cells into a Light Cannon there is a small "base" inserted that is about an inch deep with springs at the bottom and metal pieces on the top of the plastic to make the loop.

With the battery pack you remove the base and just put it in, so it is physically larger.

Nwbrewer · Post by **Nwbrewer** » Fri Jan 19, 2007 10:35 am

I'll bet that's it.

When using standard disposable Alkaline batteries, 8 cells (1.5v per cell is 12 volts, so using rechargables (1.2v per cell) actually results in a dimmer light than the disposables. (This is with nominal voltage) That's why a lot of the lights say they don't recommend using rechargables (at least the PT ones I've had do)

When I made my canlight I made it so that I could add 2 additional AA cells to the pack when I'm using my rechargables, but I wanted the ability to still use disposables if I travel with it.

Jake

Celeus · Post by **Celeus** » Fri Jan 19, 2007 2:58 pm

That probably explains it. Then again, I've also noticed differences in brightness and "color temp" between my HID Light cannon, one I borrowed from the LDS when it was being fixed (props to UK for that), and my various dive buddies Light cannons.

I was surprised there would be that much variability between bulbs, batteries and battery packs.

One other thing- the batter pack kit I got also came with a replacement bulb, but it was for a lower wattage.

At least I'm not imagining things. Or at least not this

Post by **GreenInlandSea** » Sun Mar 04, 2007 10:04 am

Any techno-wizards out there that know what the mAh # means? I'm assuming that the bigger the number, the better. I had a dive light that I was using rechargeable nimh D cells that I bought from Radio Shack, which worked great (except for the price). I bought a pack of Energizers from Best Buy, same battery (or so I thought) but much cheaper. I was surprised that the light output was noticably reduced even at a full charge. I looked at the mAh #, they were only 2200, as compared to 4500 for the RS batteries. Both were 1.2v.

Nwbrewer · Post by **Nwbrewer** » Mon Mar 05, 2007 10:34 am

DeepSea,

the Mah rating is Milliamp hours. It's a measure of how much energy the battery holds. A D-cell with only 2200mah or 2.2 ah is really low. Most high quality rechargable AA cell batteries now will give you 2.5-2.7ah. How long your batteries will last in a given device will depend on the voltage of the battery pack, the wattage of the device and the number of amp hours the battery pack is rated for. To fiugre out how long your pack will last, here's a quick example -

A Divelight using a 20W bulb at 12v, and a battery pack of 2.5 ah (this would be 10 1.2v AA's) Divide 20W/12v to give you 1.66 amps that the bulb will draw. you now divide the 2.5ah pack by 1.66 amps to get 1.5 hours that your pack should last.

In reality, the Ah rating is only a ballpark number, and is dependant on the tempertaure, the amount of current draw and a few other things, but this should get you in the ballpark.

Look fro some D-cells at http://www.batteryspace.com. You should be able to find some 10000mah cells that will give you a nice long burn time.