Springbok Flyer

Hi guys

I have a number of models which I don't fly all that often and 'black lead corrosion' is driving my mad. Depending on the period between usage the black lead from the RX battery first goes, then the rot continues onto the switch. I have even had this problem on some of my turbine ECU battery leads. I do realise that the cause is leaving the model with charged batteries in storage. However, I can't always remove the batteries before storing the model. I also need to mention that I am strictly 'old school' when it comes to batteries and only use Nicads. 4Cell packs on my receivers, 6Cell on my turbine ECU's and 5Cell on my smoke pumps. Does anyone have an easy, but completely user friendly solution?

So far I've been given the following battery management and 'black lead' prevention ideas: One alternative is to discharge the batteries before storing the model, but I would need to watch my cycler and stop it as soon as it switches over to charge. The other is to connect a light globe to the charge socket and leave it to discharge the battery, again I'm concerned about going below the acceptable minimum voltage for the particular battery pack, running the risk of reversing the polarity.

I'd love to find some sort of electronic component or setup (I know very little about these things) that I can rig up and plug into the various battery charge sockets and leave it there while the model is in storage. First it needs to discharge the battery to minimum voltage, then it must hold the minimum voltage untill I want to charge up and use the battery again - at which time I will remove it and only plug it back in when the model goes back into storage.

Thanks in anticipation for your help

Springbok Flyer

Silver182

My Feedback: (2)

Are you plugging Gold connectors into gold or silver, or what? Gold to gold shouldn't do this...humm maybe I'd better check some connectors as I've got some that have been setup for several years! I keep all of my flight ready packs peaked & trickling 24/7/365.. Robert Suding's Ultimate Charges!
Lee H. DeMary
AMA 36099

djindivik

Preventing this is easy. Either disconnect the cells, or better still, remove them. Then store the cells seperately, in your preferred manner. Ray

Springbok Flyer

Lee

Only gold to gold connectors. I'd like to do what you do but will need too many chargers.

Cheers

Springbok Flyer

asimace

Hello, this has happened to me too a couple of times in the past...
As Ray already wrote, the best is to remove the batteries from your models... this is what I do too.
I prefer to have a few battery packs that I can use in all my models, so I'm always sure to keep them safe and efficient...
If you can't remove them try at least to cycle them regularly...

http://www.rcbatteryclinic.com/blkwire.html

Mauri, Italy

MaJ. Woody

My Feedback: (28)

I read the article in the above link. It only makes reference to Nicds so are NiMh cells free from this problem?
Dom

asimace

I have experienced this only on nicd... but I think it can happen to nimh too, and this link seems to confirm it: http://www.rcgroups.com/forums/showthread.php?t=366463

Mauri

Eddie P

My Feedback: (4)

It also helps if you keep your batteries in good condition - get a quality charger like an Astro, Shulze, etc. and use the battery cycle feature to charge and discharge the pack and then store them discharged.

I've had this happen too yet only with NiCD batteries, and it's happened with a variety of quality connectors. We used to call this "black wire disease" but I don't own any NiCD packs anymore so it's just a bad "memory" now, along with NiCD "memory".