Dangerous charger, Chinese fake, etc

coolfx

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Dec 19, 2016
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I bought two new Imax copy from Ebay, older ones were prettyaccurate, just a bit under-volting so no worry for the cells.
Theses two new units seems upgraded, they have a "BuildPower" with red leaflogo next to the screen and menu allow to charge li-ion to 4.35v if you have high-cap cells, that's seems a good point, only before testing the unit with a voltmeter...

As you see, it over-volt dangerously at 3A, about 5V charging, at 6A it's even worst so I stopped quickly before venting the cell...
I linked this video to the seller and wait for a refund.


It can be interesting to list here this kind of bad product to avoid peoples to create a disaster or simply ruining their cells/pack.
 
Set it up outside and leave it running ?

Fire sells apparently
 
Lucky i didn't buy one!
Are there counter fit imax b6 that work correctly or should i avoid them?
maybe you can post the name of the seller so that we know which one the avoid.
Is there already a forum with products to avoid and to promote? if so you can post the seller/link to the product there?

Lux
 
Lux_Gamer said:
Lucky i didn't buy one!
Are there counter fit imax b6 that work correctly or should i avoid them?
maybe you can post the name of the seller so that we know which one the avoid.
Is there already a forum with products to avoid and to promote? if so you can post the seller/link to the product there?

Lux

It's not a counterfeit, it's a different brand. It is BuildPower branded. Now if it had the SkyRC name on it and was not authorized by SkyRC, that makes it counterfeit. What you mean to say is BuildPower is a lower quality company than SkyRC. Not "counterfeit".
 
Sean said:
Set it up outside and leave it running ?

Fire sells apparently

Maybe I will try that, I have boxes of low capacity cells to sacrifice.

Lux_Gamer said:
Lucky i didn't buy one!
Are there counter fit imax b6 that work correctly or should i avoid them?
maybe you can post the name of the seller so that we know which one the avoid.
Is there already a forum with products to avoid and to promote? if so you can post the seller/link to the product there?

Lux

They are some good ones, but it's hard to know before you buy, I had three units from the same sellers, two different designs, all finally burned down...
One smoked during a discharge test, one was locked because it don't allow you to calibrate it, the last was my fault as I reversed polarity by error and it has no protection (half user fault half bad design). Too bad because the two last were pretty accurate and lasted for months charging 18650, bike PB battery, makita 18V packs for really cheap.

mike said:
It's not a counterfeit, it's a different brand. It is BuildPower branded. Now if it had the SkyRC name on it and was not authorized by SkyRC, that makes it counterfeit. What you mean to say is BuildPower is a lower quality company than SkyRC. Not "counterfeit".

It copy the design, specifications, user interface and even the product name, do you really think SkyRC allow them to use their design with low quality design and sell them less than 20$ ? You cannot copy products and just sell them through a different brand.
Theses don't pretend to be SkyRC ones, but others from Ebay (like two of my older ones) display "SkyRC " when booting, that's even worst.
 
coolfx said:
mike said:
It's not a counterfeit, it's a different brand. It is BuildPower branded. Now if it had the SkyRC name on it and was not authorized by SkyRC, that makes it counterfeit. What you mean to say is BuildPower is a lower quality company than SkyRC. Not "counterfeit".

It copy the design, specifications, user interface and even the product name, do you really think SkyRC allow them to use their design with low quality design and sell them less than 20$ ? You cannot copy products and just sell them through a different brand.
Theses don't pretend to be SkyRC ones, but others from Ebay (like two of my older ones) display "SkyRC " when booting, that's even worst.

SkyRC did not patent the design nor did they trademark the word "imax", that's why there is thousands of people selling them with hundreds of different brand names. There is no infringement occurring.
 
I didn't knew they haven't registered the name nor patented the design, so it's not a counterfeit you'r right, thx for the explanation.
But it's still a poor design you don't want to buy.
 
In the UK it's known as "passing off" - and it's a common law offence.

Call it what you want, be as pedantic as you want it's a fake/copy/clone/rip off/ counterfeit of the SkyRC product - more fool them for not protecting the iMax B6 product labelling.

The world is full of fake/copy/clone/rip off/ counterfeit items - folks don't bother looking at who really manufacturers them, they buy because they are cheap - and if folks keep buying, other folks will keep making them.

Buy cheap buy twice.
 
station240 said:
Sean said:
Set it up outside and leave it running ?

Fire sells apparently

I doubt that applies to selling lithium ion battery chargers. :rolleyes:

That commen was aimed at the get paid per click tubers - everyone loves a good fire.

so Yoda said the other week.
 
It seems odd that your battery would raise from 4.1 to 5V at 3A charge rate, thats an esr of 300 milliohm so an already toast battery

care to check your multimeter battery, looks to be a cheaper model, and they read weirdly when near flat.
 
I have several multimeter (3 full scale and 5 tiny that I solder directly on some devices for long term control) and the are all pretty accurate, maybe not under 0.01% like expensive Fluke ones but it's not giving more than a percent, around 1-2.5v, range I use for computer CPU and GPU they have a deviation of maximum 0.01V-0.02v.

I tested on that battery mroe than once so it's probably toasted now, I remeber it wasn't so much the first time, but still around 4.5V.
 
Next up, when you used the battery meter function on the charger, did it read correctly?
 
Theses copy don't have the battery meter and battery internal resistance function as the SkyRC Imax b6 mini.

The only way to meter a battery is to use a balance connector as I use for my Makita 5S packs, in that case it read pretty correctly (minus 0.05v from voltmeter) and output voltage is correct.

I tested again with good cells tested ok on BT-C3100, three different types, even at 2A for 4cells it charge at 4.4-4.5V, and more amp more volts.

So it's ok in balance mode, with balance cable, not with regular charge/discharge.
 
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