A Question Regarding La Crosse BC-900 Battery Charger [Archive]

SYS

19th of February 2009 (Thu), 15:45

I'd like to purchase this for recharging my Eneloops and other rechargeable batteries, but before I press the order button from Amazon.com (free shipping), I'd like to know whether this unit can also analyze regular (not rechargeable) batteries in terms of how much juice still remains. You see, my 4th grader son has a science fair coming up at his school, and he wants to test various brands of regular as well as rechargeable batteries to see which lasts the longest... Not knowing anything about battery analyzers like Maha and La Crosse, I thought I'd ask here first... Thanks in advance.

j_m_k

19th of February 2009 (Thu), 15:52

Let me find a regular battery real fast and I can tell you. The hard part is going to be finding a non-rechargeable battery.

j_m_k

19th of February 2009 (Thu), 15:55

Actually wasn't as hard as I thought. It will show the remaining voltage on them. I just plugged a regular Energizer AAA into it and it showed up as 1.38V remaining. Any other questions about it just ask. I really like it. The adjustable charge rates are nice. Charged a set of Eneloops (4AA) from completely dead to full charge in about 30 minutes on the max setting. Of course this isn't the recommended setting but it's there if you need it.

SYS

19th of February 2009 (Thu), 16:18

Actually wasn't as hard as I thought. It will show the remaining voltage on them. I just plugged a regular Energizer AAA into it and it showed up as 1.38V remaining. Any other questions about it just ask. I really like it. The adjustable charge rates are nice. Charged a set of Eneloops (4AA) from completely dead to full charge in about 30 minutes on the max setting. Of course this isn't the recommended setting but it's there if you need it.

Great, thanks for going through the trouble for the info! :)

j_m_k

19th of February 2009 (Thu), 16:20

Not a problem. Only a few things I can help on around here as I am still learning the whole photography thing compared to everyone else so I help out where I can.

Shenanigans

21st of February 2009 (Sat), 00:15

The charger would have to drain the battery to record the amount of "juice" that it contains, so no, it is not a practical method of evaluating alkaline batteries.

SYS

21st of February 2009 (Sat), 00:52

The charger would have to drain the battery to record the amount of "juice" that it contains, so no, it is not a practical method of evaluating alkaline batteries.

Hmmm.... but didn't j_m_k read the remaining juice on his alkaline batteries? :confused:

den_s

21st of February 2009 (Sat), 02:59

For alkaline batteries, a simple voltage measurement is not enough to indicate capacity. You need to put a load on it. You can use something like a ZTS Battery Tester. http://www.thomas-distributing.com/zts-products.htm

SYS

21st of February 2009 (Sat), 09:37

For alkaline batteries, a simple voltage measurement is not enough to indicate capacity. You need to put a load on it. You can use something like a ZTS Battery Tester. http://www.thomas-distributing.com/zts-products.htm

Thanks. Looks like this unit can test both regular alkalines as well as rechargeable Nimh batteries. Guess I'll just have to order the La Crosse BC-900 for charging and ZTS Tester for my boy's science fair project...