Diablo
Achiever
- Joined
- Oct 14, 2013
- Messages
- 1,784
Ok, quick start. I put off buying a 7-22 solely on the basis of needing at least one new battery and charger. Primarily I use 18350/500 batteries in my gear. The seven30 I hate for the gold accents. Looks awful to me.
But when I saw one come up for sale with charger and battery at the right price I jumped at it. Fits the kanger giant perfect. So day one, on arrival, giant on, battery in (half charge ish) and powered up. Get settings right. Make executive decision to use battery as is and charge when it's nearly flat or at the end of the night, whichever came first. So all day happy vaping.
End of the night comes (26650 really does well compared to the 18 stuff, half charge on any 18 wouldn't see the use the 26 achieved). Stick the battery in the charger and turn the power on, there's an audible squeal from the battery/charger, lasted a second or so then silence. Not liking this I watched it carefully for a few minutes, picked it up and felt it for heat, no problems. Weird.
then a few minutes go by and there's an electrical discharge (static like) noise. Instantly cut the power. Pull the battery, cool. But the charger? Hot. Too hot. I thought initially I might have reversed poles, but no, was done right. So charger now plugged into a fused extension. Just in case. I intended to turn it on and check voltage output without the battery. Turned it on, crackling discharge again and a smell of ozone. Power off.
ordinarily I would bin it at this point, but it's the only charger I have for 26650, on the start of a weekend and a seven22 suddenly mothballed. Not happening without a fight.
so unplugged the charger , located the screws holding the case together (under the rubber feet), opened it up and had a prod and pull to see if I could get the board out. Seemed well fitted in though, a bit of play and movement but seemed solid in there. The fact I had moved it a little though prompted the thought maybe it was tight against something in there and shorting?
upside down so the board wasn't near anything combustible I turned it back on again. Instantly saw an arc of electricity. Off with the power, on with the magnifiers. Turned it back on and there near the corner of the board is the culprit. Power off again and close examination revealed A bad solder point. Right where the power lead goes behind the board. It had looked fine when I first checked, but the action of powering up had left an arc mark and up close I could see the post as it comes through the board wasn't held by the solder, only resting against it.
Soldering kit out, a minute or two with the soldering iron, job done. Retest. Output voltage stable. Total silence. No heat buildup. Job done. Watched it like a hawk, and if I add the picture of the charger you will see it is in a tin I used to add a bit of protection in case of a meltdown, but the soldering had fixed it.
It it may be mine was one faulty item in a batch of thousands, but the fact is the solder point had failed. If you have a similar charger and it makes any noise, it might be worth checking out In case there are more the same.
Either way, the fix worked. Job done. I should add, I don't blame the seller in any way. It could have worked perfectly before I got it. It's been posted halfway up the country, battered around, then the wire unwrapped here and plugged in. The pin may have been resting perfectly happily against the solder, or even held by a tack, and the very act of unwrapping the wire could have made it finally fail. Either way, no complaints about the deal. But none of that changes the fact the solder point was defective.
I didn't take a picture of the board (sorry) but looking from the underneath with the plug wire at the 12 o clock position, the offending joint was the highest and furthest right. It shares the connection track with another pin and solder point.
I will have to add pics of the charger later, not transferred from phone yet. But it's a black single 26650 mains charger (hard wired UK plug lead).
But when I saw one come up for sale with charger and battery at the right price I jumped at it. Fits the kanger giant perfect. So day one, on arrival, giant on, battery in (half charge ish) and powered up. Get settings right. Make executive decision to use battery as is and charge when it's nearly flat or at the end of the night, whichever came first. So all day happy vaping.
End of the night comes (26650 really does well compared to the 18 stuff, half charge on any 18 wouldn't see the use the 26 achieved). Stick the battery in the charger and turn the power on, there's an audible squeal from the battery/charger, lasted a second or so then silence. Not liking this I watched it carefully for a few minutes, picked it up and felt it for heat, no problems. Weird.
then a few minutes go by and there's an electrical discharge (static like) noise. Instantly cut the power. Pull the battery, cool. But the charger? Hot. Too hot. I thought initially I might have reversed poles, but no, was done right. So charger now plugged into a fused extension. Just in case. I intended to turn it on and check voltage output without the battery. Turned it on, crackling discharge again and a smell of ozone. Power off.
ordinarily I would bin it at this point, but it's the only charger I have for 26650, on the start of a weekend and a seven22 suddenly mothballed. Not happening without a fight.
so unplugged the charger , located the screws holding the case together (under the rubber feet), opened it up and had a prod and pull to see if I could get the board out. Seemed well fitted in though, a bit of play and movement but seemed solid in there. The fact I had moved it a little though prompted the thought maybe it was tight against something in there and shorting?
upside down so the board wasn't near anything combustible I turned it back on again. Instantly saw an arc of electricity. Off with the power, on with the magnifiers. Turned it back on and there near the corner of the board is the culprit. Power off again and close examination revealed A bad solder point. Right where the power lead goes behind the board. It had looked fine when I first checked, but the action of powering up had left an arc mark and up close I could see the post as it comes through the board wasn't held by the solder, only resting against it.
Soldering kit out, a minute or two with the soldering iron, job done. Retest. Output voltage stable. Total silence. No heat buildup. Job done. Watched it like a hawk, and if I add the picture of the charger you will see it is in a tin I used to add a bit of protection in case of a meltdown, but the soldering had fixed it.
It it may be mine was one faulty item in a batch of thousands, but the fact is the solder point had failed. If you have a similar charger and it makes any noise, it might be worth checking out In case there are more the same.
Either way, the fix worked. Job done. I should add, I don't blame the seller in any way. It could have worked perfectly before I got it. It's been posted halfway up the country, battered around, then the wire unwrapped here and plugged in. The pin may have been resting perfectly happily against the solder, or even held by a tack, and the very act of unwrapping the wire could have made it finally fail. Either way, no complaints about the deal. But none of that changes the fact the solder point was defective.
I didn't take a picture of the board (sorry) but looking from the underneath with the plug wire at the 12 o clock position, the offending joint was the highest and furthest right. It shares the connection track with another pin and solder point.
I will have to add pics of the charger later, not transferred from phone yet. But it's a black single 26650 mains charger (hard wired UK plug lead).
