Balancing your lipo battery more quickly (and how cheap chargers work) 

Every RC channel has a video on lipo batteries and they all are the same content ---- except this one... This one is different. It is simply the best and most informative video on the subject I've ever seen. Well Done Bruce!

You're not going to believe this, but after 3 or 4 years of charging Lipo batteries, one of Thomas' brand new batteries had a Time Out error which on balance Charge. I made up one of these and I'm charging it right now. Fingers crossed it brings the cell back up :) Anyway my point being this video came at the perfect time. If it was ages ago I would have forgotten about it.

Wow, you just saved one of my most expensive batteries. I had 4.2, 4.2, 4.2 and 3.8V on a 4S lipo and couldn't get it to balance and I used this trick and it's now balanced like it was brand new. Thanks so much!!!

Love it, you explain things in a way all can understand and then tell them how to get something done. Love the work you do to help others.

Hi there to the MAN behind RC Model Reviews. Never been to New Zealand but heard much about the beauty of its landscape. I'd like to thank you for this video which has given me a solution to a nightmare that's affecting everyone that's got a 2S and above LIPO battery in their arsenal. I made the charging link as prescribed and whilst typing this, I'm charging a 3 cell and getting the individual cells balanced using your idea. I'd like to add that I find your RU-vid channel very interesting and am grateful that I have learned much from it. As commented by Godfrey Poon recently, we mortals don't have your heat resistant fingers but we're slowly getting there!!! Cheers from up north-west in Malaysia. Ravi

Thank you so much for not only this video, but all your videos. I watched this one a week or so ago and just found myself in a situation where I needed to make and use a lead like you demonstrate here. Had I not watched the video I wouldn't have even known to do such a thing and been left with no immediate solution to my problem. I've learned so much from you. Please keep 'me coming.

What a great explanation of the basics of a balance charger. I love your delivery - clear, precise and engaging. Thankyou muchly.

I come back to this video so many times to refresh before I start the process. Many thanks again for the excellent video.

I really appreciate you explaining how it works in a straight-forward fashion. No flowery prose from me, just a very genuine "Thank you." Please, do continue on your wonderful path to educate those of us who thought we knew and realize we don't. :) You do it in such a way that accepts we are human and that it is ok to make a mistake and continue on the correct path.

This is exactly what I did a few days ago with an unbalanced battery. My charger kept telling me battery error, well after some fiddling around I said enough! I'll just charge each cell individually and be done with it. Now I just got to make a 0.1" pin header connector with a JST or Deans. Thank you very much for sharing this great info.

Awesome tutorial, I'm knew to the RC World and this video is a tremendous help in understanding the ins and out for charging damaged RC batteries. Great job thanks!!!

Thanks, this is very helpful information about how multi-cell batteries are connected internally and the concept behind balancing charger.

Thanks! Couldn't have been explained better! I'm just getting started with a little 1S-8S battery alarm/meter, cheap chargers, and 2S batteries for my quadcopters, and will be sure to keep them maintained thanks to your help!

Great explanation on how a charger balances a multi-cell LiPo.That homemade charging lead looks like it'll come handy if needed.Thanks for posting this!

I always wondered how the whole balancing stuff worked and why it sometimes takes for ages to complete a almost finished charge process. Great video!

Bruce, Very taken by your thoughts and remarks on bringing wayward cells back to balance. Thanks Joe Homer

this video helped me so much to understand battery charging and design my own charging systems for robotics! Thanks so much! I come back to this video now and then to review and refresh my understanding!

Amazing video. Watched a few others but this one gave me the confidence I needed to try this. Had everything I needed on hand and it's working as I type. Thank you for saving my battery!

Great teacher. Great "splainer"! Luigi Galvani and Alessandro Volta would be happy to see this!

THANK YOU sir when building your own batteries your advice makes it possible. Only video like it from those of us who refuse to use BMS. Thanks again my hero

Been years since I last watched your videos, and about 3 years later still thoroughly enjoying them as much as I did back then. Not sure if I sent regards the last time I watched your enjoyable and informative videos, so heres a big thank you. Cheers. PS: so very curious to know if you were ever a teacher or a professor or the like, you have a great style and energy about you in the way you share knowledge!

I love your ability to explain electronics with some humour Bruce! Great video.

Top content Bruce! I wish I saw this vid a couple days ago, I spent the whole day yesterday charging 2 unbalanced lipos, well I just made my individual cell charging cable, thanks!

Fantastic. I just brought back from the dead several three cell lipo packs where one cell had gotten way lower than the other two. No special harness required. My new (2019) charger was able to charge all 3 and repeatedly discharge the two high ones until the lower one "caught up" IF AND ONLY IF I set the charging amps to around .01 and let the unit take its time. Without your explanation of how balance chargers work, I wouldn't have known this was possible. So, thanks.

I bought an iMax B6 charger and like yours, a bunch of various adapters came with the kit. One of those adapters, a small red one with a shroud around 2 pins, came in useful in place of your .1mm Pin Header, I simply used a small hobby fret saw to cut a groove around the base of the hood, not too deep or the pins will be damaged, and then used a pair of pliers to neatly snap off the hood, exposing 2 perfectly matched pins that fit into the cell connector, I then set about charging each cell individually and balanced what was an ailing 36v 10ah LiFePo4 Ping battery pack. Now, during charging, the SIGNALAB BMS cell LED's flicker into life within seconds of each other and they come back up to working voltage in unison,...if you have one of those chargers, use a fret saw or craft knife to cut a groove around the base of the hood, and snap off the hood,....works perfectly and the red and black wires are already connected.

Thank you for your channel! Really very useful information. And I get smarter and smarter each time I watch your videos!

This is awesome Bruce. I learn something every time I visit your channel

Another great video Bruce, very clear and informative. Thanks, I will make a lead up now. so back to the bench!!!

Hello, I know this is an old video, but I hope you see that you have continually helped folks such as me. Great Intel and tip(s). Thanks so much. cheers Boots Langley La Mesa, Ca

Superb, as always, Bruce.

Great explanation! I am new at this so thank you for getting me up to speed on charging and discharging these batteries! Great video!

Thank you boss. This is by far the best/easiest way to balance very unbalanced batteries 😁👍

thank you so much for helping newbies like me. i love all of your videos. very informative yet entertaining. keep it up my good sir.

New to Lipos. Just found your videos. They have been soooo helpful.

Sir! I would love to thank your for your great demonstration about the function of BMS cinrcuits. I was searching the internet for that till i found your video, and it was all I ever wanted to know Thank you very much.

very good idea and saves time. Another way to do this is to use a separate balancer and balance the battery. After the battery is balanced then continue the balanced charging from that point with the charger.

Thank you very much for explaining the whole charge process in a very good way!

Finally...! Someone explained the "C" rating on the batteries, rather than just using it in a sentence. Thank you. 1:31 - Why do some batteries have the rating in amps, as well as milliamps...? For those of us who suck at math. 5:09 - 4 X .450 = 1.25 amps Thanks again.

As always, Vvery informative! Thanks Bruce.

I couldn't figure out why one of my lipos seemed to only be charging one cell. Thanks for explaining this.

Love your videos and your website, Bruce - thanks!

you should be nicknamed "Ohm's" cause you get it! my uncle totally understood, and he would explain in a way that folks would or could...get it. Uncle Ohm's. salute and thanks

Nice example and explanations! Perfect as this is happening on a couple of battery cells! Thanks and hope you're going well!

I think i liked more the detailed explanation on how the charge works (whiteboard part) than the conector itself. Nevertheless, i've just made one myself to "rebalance" a Lipo. Just trying it now. Thank you Bruce for the effort and always detailed classes, not only this one, but many other topics i got lectured remotely :)

Awesome explanation Bruce! I never knew the intricacies of these chargers.

Happy New Year Bruce. Your a top bloke. Hope to get up north and fly with you some day. This vid was brilliant . Just made myself a field charger with 18650s 4x6 but one cell (4 x 2500mah) was 0.11 difference from the other cells. Was painful to try balance through charger at .5amp so i made a rig and got them back up to match the rest. Thankyou have a wonderful new year champ.

best rc plane channel on yt. Thanks Bruce

I enjoy so much to see your lessons :) You make thinks so easy to understand. You Rock!

VERY interesting and informative. I will be in the shed tomorrow checking batteries and making these leads up.

bruce, thanks for this vid. was having some problems with a couple older tattu batteries. I got them all balanced now. worked perfectly

Excellent explanation, i am new to the li-ion battery world an now have a good view on the balance charge method. Thanks.

Sincerest Thankyou. The explanation and insight is very much appreciated. TonyC from Canada

Nice one Bruce. don't forget though that many chargers can be set from the common default of balancing in the constant voltage phase to balancing always or in the constant currant phase. Also when considering spending a bit more on a charger the balance circuit power is an important spec to consider. Keep up the good work Bro.

i first got into rc about 8 years ago but havent really touched anything rc in about 6 years. now that i am building an ebike that will be powered via lipo, i am finally zeroing in on exactly how these chargers and balance ports work. it helps that i also got into solar and battery bank building recently. anyways you have confirmed what i thought was true about the theory of operation on these chargers. thank you

Gotta love the white board sessions! Very educational.

Thanks, Bruce this addressed my problem and provided a solution. Now to get my hands on the pin headers.

yet another very useful and excellent tutorial Thank You master Bruce

Hi Bruce, Thanks for this tip. Just received a new 2200 Zippy 20C Flightmax battery and it had exactly this problem. One cell was a bit low so the first time charge was taking forever. It started off 0.05 below and ended up at nearly 0.1 below by the time the charger was starting to balance and it was looking like it might take the rest of the year. I didn't have any pin headers but it turns out the pins on a servo cable are close enough pitch that a pair of adjacent pins connects well with a pair of adjacent sockets in a common balance connector. So I just pulled the signal pin and used the servo cable. No need to get the soldering iron out. Nice. One thing I would caution is that you mut be very careful not to accidentally insert this hacked lead the wrong way around or bad things will happen. Was able to use this method to get the errant cell up to par and balance out the battery. Can't say for sure if it saved me time but it gave me a bit more confidence in the whole process. Will have to keep an eye on that battery. Beck to the binch.

Thank you for passing on your excellent knowledge, I have learned more today.

Thank you making this video, great idea. I charge all my lipos in a metal container when I can. Store them in that to

Thank you for taking the time to explain and demonstrated. Very valuable information for me. 👍🏽👍🏽

Superb tutorial as usual Bruce, thanks!... I'll see if I can put this in practice today :)

Hey Bruce.... salutations from Ford City PA,USA,i love your videos i find them rather informative and very useful,this here is a very clever idea .....carry on.

Best informative lipo charge and discharge!

Sir, thank you for the video. I'd already built the cable for a rainy day and that day has come. I just got a new battery today and needed to bring up two of the four cells. I need to test the maximum about of current I can run through the cable. 1.0A may be the safety limit.

Excellent, will spoken and easy to understand, thank you.

Hey Bruce, Thanks for the great tip !! As BMSWEB mentioned, this came at just the right time. I have a 3200 mah battery that was in the plane when it was lost during an FPV flight. Plane was returned to me 3 days later and of course , Batt was dead. I used the Nimh trick to bump it up to 3v so it would charge normally which worked well. However one cell has been hanging about .8 lower then the other 2 cells. I just bumped up the one cell using this method and hopefully the Batt will now live a longer happier life.

so it is that simple! I was trying to figure it out how the charger can balance the 3 cells battery! All those inventions always suprise me by their simplicity! Usuelly people think that it is much more complecated than it really is !

That's a brilliant lesson. I've often had the issue of one cell lower than the others and as a result, the battery has spent ages on the balance charger. Certainly takes some of the mystique out of Lipo's.

A source of pin header for a quick hack would be a servo extension lead. Remove the outer shield that the female plug goes inside of. You'll then be left with 3 pins. Either use a knife to lift the retaining tab and remove the pin to the signal (white or yellow) wire, or chop it off flush. Then just plug into the servo connector on your multi lead. Or chop the extension and solder into a spare plug, whatever floats your boat.

for those like me who have trouble finding the pins Bruce is talking about, type "pin header" in your favorite shopping website (I got mines from AliExpress) great video BTW, I wish I had known that a few months ago ;)

Such a great explanation - thanks Bruce!

I wish I watched this about two years ago! Sometimes I've been desperate enough to put crocodile clips on the positive and negative cell that needed balancing fast on my ebike battery without realising all this time I could have just done what you do! Many thanks!

Wow! Very nice video! That explained so much why some balancing takes a long time on my tenergy tb6b! Once I get the 3s batteries I am going to use on the zmr 250 build you did I will make one of these :D thanks so much!

Great video Bruce, very informative.

Thank u so much I don’t know if I ever would have come to that on my own! Super helpful

Awesome video! I over discharged a small 3S 300mha battery on its first use and I’ll try reviving the one cell that got too low with this (in a fire safe environment of course). Thank you very much!

Nice video something everyone should at least know about and how to do it. Keep the great videos coming always enjoy them and always learn something from them. Thanks again

Awesome video! Great explanation of balance chargers :)

Thank a lot my friend! This answers TONS OF MY QUESTIONS!!! GREAT!

Thank you, very informative. The sad thing is I used to try and discharge all cells and then charge them all again. This worked on probably 80% of the batteries. I used to get a few slightly puffed batteries that still worked OKish. I wonder how many batteries I messed up because I did not think of this resourceful 'trick'. Life lets those that still want to learn, another lesson, thanks

Great video...loved the solution...hope you will make more videos....thanks for your effort for making such useful videos...

Super awesome video... thank you for taking the time to do this...

3:35 Ron, The "L" in solder is like the "P" in swimming; both are silent. Greetings from A-MUR-CA. Love your channel for the education and entertainment.

Great video. Very informative and helpful!

Bruce you are the man!! great idea and works and thanks for the reason why.

Nice program Bruce.. glad someone explained clearly what goes on with this standard chargers... basically the final phase of the charge is as fast as fast the charger can "discharge" each cell.. wich in the case of the cheap chargers like the Acucell 6 is very slow (5W) .. even my IMAX B8 (25W) takes sometimes forever. I wonder what a good charger would be that does the proper process (complete the final balance throught the balance port individually) would be.. probable quite more expensive but i readed people in forums saying they are quite worth it

OMFG I Just made this and it is a life saver, Good sir you are a great man for putting this video out, amazing amazing amazing!

Bruce, you've just justified your existence on earth and anything goes from here on!

Great video Bruce, I always learn stuff watching your videos even if it's not the main focus of the vid. ATB Malc Team Nana UK

Thank you for this video. I purchased a brand new venom battery with one cell staying at 3.9v I tried your method and revived the battery. It took well over 3hrs to fix one cell but it worked.

Really hanging out for your results on the UHF systems Bruce. Your feedback will determine who gets my money, but hoping sooner other than later please mate. Cheers.

Great video. Informative and practical

I love the way you explain electronics! You are so knowledgeable, have you ever thought about doing a series on circuit design, or something to do with EE? If you are looking for "bench based" video ideas, I would be interested in watching content about simple circuits, or maybe you could explain how modern electronics work, ect. Just a suggestion, keep it up!

Hi Bruce, very useful tips as usual, the battery symbol, the long terminal should be positive in your diagram :) I wish I had asbestos fingers like you when tanning those terminal pins!!!!

Once again an education, great vid.

Brilliant as usual mate👌

good stuff bruce its good to see you doing handy stuff again cheers bazz

That's pretty cool ...Bruce Awesome info

best video explaining how charging batteries work thank you sir