I'm, about to buy a Lil' Trickler. My flying sessions are usually spontaneous and invariably I have not put my batteries on charge. The Lil' Trickler would allow me to place my Rx, Tx, and glow driver batteries on trickle charge and leave them there indefinitely insuring that they're always ready to go when the fly urge strikes :) Does anyone have any first hand experience with the Lil' Trickler?
I'll work great, buy you one. Eddie Fulmer Or take a regular light timer and charge your batteries about 6 hours a day and that will work fine too. Some timers are able to be set to come on several times a day just give'em a shot several times a day(2 hours) and that will work fine too.
Charge for 6 hours a day, every day? That sounds like a lot of overcharge. I use the daily timer system, and set it to 1 hour a day. When I come back from the field I just plug everything in, put the timer on overide, and it turns itself off after 8hrs or so, reverting to 1hr a day. Works for me.
Hope this is not too late, but you can make the same thing for peanuts . . . just a box with a diode in the AC line that can be switched in and out to go to trickle when the wall wart charger is plugged into it. A standard electrical box with a duplex outlet and a switch somewhere on it to switch the diode in and out of the AC line.
-- Red S. Red's R/C Battery Clinic
Surely some mistake? With a diode in circuit the transformer flux won't get reset every cycle and will waltz into saturation and overheat. Unless there's something I don't understand about wall wart type chargers. Like perhaps such a high impedance the saturation is minor?
Steve, Forget your flux theory for a moment and just try it. If the charge current is not reduced to a good trickle charge rate and the wall wart over heats I'll give you a new one.
Would someone out there look inside their Lil Trickler and tell us what they see. I have looked at them and know, but it would help if someone else would substantiate . . . after all, what do I know?
-- Red S. Red's R/C Battery Clinic
Fair enough - I wouldn't dare argue with someone who actually does it and finds it works for them. I was just a little curious that it worked successfully.
Personally I prefer the timer and charge at full rate for an hour or so a day. My chargers don't seem to discharge their battery when powered off. Each to their own.
Any chance it isn't a diode but a symmetric breakdown device? That would reduce the net transformer power input and produce a trickle charge. However given your experience I'm sure you would know the difference.
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