What Battery charger to buy

[THEYTOOKMYTHUMB]

There are a couple schools of thought on how to run/store lipos. On any of my 2s-3s stuff, I just run it, charge it, run it, charge it- then store it fully charged. I've gone 5-6 months w/o use on some of the lipos and haven't had any problems. On the 4s-5s lipos, I'd top them off at least every two months, just because of the additional cells that can go bad and turn a $150 lipo into a paper weight.

Some of my heli friends who run huge 10s matched lipos, will go through a whole charge/discharge/balance routine and top them off at least once a month when not in use.

Luckily, or UN-luckily(depending how you look at it) 3s is the most I have to worry about. Maxamps said to store them at 60% if left for a long time. I looked at it as: "Well, if 60% is good than 100% woud be even better.". That's what I did and hopefully it works out. Thanks for the input.

[mtbnjim]

There are a couple schools of thought on how to run/store lipos. On any of my 2s-3s stuff, I just run it, charge it, run it, charge it- then store it fully charged. I've gone 5-6 months w/o use on some of the lipos and haven't had any problems. On the 4s-5s lipos, I'd top them off at least every two months, just because of the additional cells that can go bad and turn a $150 lipo into a paper weight.

Some of my heli friends who run huge 10s matched lipos, will go through a whole charge/discharge/balance routine and top them off at least once a month when not in use.

Luckily, or UN-luckily(depending how you look at it) 3s is the most I have to worry about. Maxamps said to store them at 60% if left for a long time. I looked at it as: "Well, if 60% is good than 100% woud be even better.". That's what I did and hopefully it works out. Thanks for the input.

Ya, storing them at 100% won't harm them, plus when you do decide to use them, it'll be a quick charge and you charger will take care of the balancing in case one of the cells are a little more discharged than the others.

[djthomp]

I like the Duratrax Onyx 230. Only $79 or $89.

Can charge basically anything. If you use Lipo you may need a balancer.