"Remember That Black & Decker Charger You Bought For Me?

[MEXICOWANDERER]

Yes, my son-in-law. I remember. You have been connecting and use it solely with the isolation transformer, right?

Yes. I did as you asked.

What is the problem?

When I plug it in, nothing happens. It is dead.

Well, I warned you (Sixty of my dollars down the drain)

Can it be fixed?

Yes

How?

[MEXICOWANDERER]

It probably was the fan. Dual ball bearing fans are the way to go. Most switched devices operate fine from 80 - 250 volts. My isolation transformer stops transients like nothing else ever conceived.

Lots of blown up digital controlled chargers around here. I rob transformers and turn them into carbon rod soldering guns.

My BIG charger sounds like a Huey warming up when I throw the switch. It has a transformer the size of a 13" old fashioned tube television set. Rectifiers with TWO OUGHT AWG braided leads. 1.675 KV PIV. I did not screw around when I built that thing. Thirty one pounds of irradiated copper heat sink.

[landyacht318]

Don't get me all riled up about muffin fans......

Back before I knew better, I replaced the failing extremely noisy fan in my Coleman 800 watt MSW inverter, with the same exact fan.

I'd thought if I did not use the same exact fan the unit would blow up.

Well the new fan started getting loud in about two weeks.

Sleeved bearing Chinese POS!

Lots of fan options are out there, some of them downright impressive with the effort and technology and design to not only move air, but move air more effectively for less noise and less current consumed.

Here, I ripped the loud 40MM fan from my Schumacher sc2500a and installed a 60mm Noctua, which is basically inaudible. The magic blue smoke is still safely contained within.



Also, I take issue with the locations some products choose to locate their fans. Any resistance behind the fan blades.... the closer the resistance is to the fan blades, make the fan less effective and also make it louder.

I Put a Noctua 120mm fan pushing air through my compressor fridge condenser, replacing a sleeved bearing higher noise higher CFM fan pulling air through it, and performance increased, and noise decreased, and the fan itself draws less than half the current.

Don't believe me, go put your fingers near the back of a spinning muffin fan. Airflow will decrease by a significant amount and the noise the fan makes will increase. Put your fingers in front of the fan and it will move nearly the same amount of air, and make no more noise.

So instead of mounting the fan in a manner where it can be most effective, they just use a higher RPM fan in the most appearance friendly location, as the expense of fan life and noise.

BTW, with muffin fans, you cannot just reverse the polarity to reverse fan spin direction, and the better fan blade impellers will not be effective in reverse.

[MrWizard]

hershey wrote:
Most of the problems with the B&D chargers seem to be the cooling fan. Mine quit shortly after I got it. I had to sit a small fan right next to and directed into the charger to use it. Plus, you can't get into the darn thing to replace it.

On the B&D 40 amp belonging to a friend
I opened it up and replaced the fan, with a computer fan from allelectronics
Mine still had the OEM fan
Luck of the draw ?
Bought at the same time from the SAME store
Big lots

[pkunk]

Kiwi_too wrote:
Who's this Eisenhower? :B

Let's see....I was in school, too young to vote, but the 'in crowd' all wore 'vote for Ike' buttons. Perhaps the greatest president in recent history.:B

[BFL13]

hershey wrote:
Most of the problems with the B&D chargers seem to be the cooling fan. Mine quit shortly after I got it. I had to sit a small fan right next to and directed into the charger to use it. Plus, you can't get into the darn thing to replace it.

The fan on my VEC1093DBD was noisy until it warmed up. I was worried from reading on here about that fan thing. In fact, you can unscrew a bunch of screws ( set down in holes) and it all comes apart no problem.

I found that the fan unit was a bit loose in its slot, and that was what the noise was. No effect on performance.

I decided to do a mod where I snipped the wires from the fan unit, drew them out through the vent and mounted/wired a different fan outside against the vent. I got that fan from an old converter that had fried, but almost any 12v fan would work of that size.

The first time I tried it, the VEC overheated and shut itself down. I played around and tried it with the fan on the other way so it blew in instead of sucked out (or maybe it was the other way around, can't remember for sure) It then worked no problem and is whisper quiet. Very nice. Yes I could have just reversed the wires but didn't think of that at the time 😞

[hershey]

Most of the problems with the B&D chargers seem to be the cooling fan. Mine quit shortly after I got it. I had to sit a small fan right next to and directed into the charger to use it. Plus, you can't get into the darn thing to replace it.

[SCVJeff]

Kiwi_too wrote:
Who's this Eisenhower? :B

he was the guy that whipped Custer!

Geeeez, nobody knows their history around here......

[time2roll]

How high was the voltage when measured?

[AllegroD]

Who's this Eisenhower? :B

[Gene_Ginny]

MEXICOWANDERER wrote:
... Selenium Rectifier died ....

Those things really stink when they let go.

[MEXICOWANDERER]

In every scenario there are positive and negative percentages. Say hello to your punching bag doppelganger.

Shall I post an image of my 1952 battery charger? The "new and improved" Selenium Rectifier died when Eisenhower was in office, but it's still trucking. I use it on old 6 volt batteries like for Massey Ferguson tractors.

[BFL13]

Mine are four and still work great! Love my Vector (B&D) smart chargers. 🙂

[MrWizard]

Mine is 3 yrs old and gets used several times a week
This way I can do the AGMs and the flooded cells separately
Flooded on WfCo and AGMs on B&D

[MEXICOWANDERER]

Once a week perhaps for one group 27 marine battery charging from 70% state of charge. Two years. 104 times. Maybe 75 cents a charge. These piles of junk are not repairable.

CUT OFF THE CABLES (a snicker from the other end of the line)

CUT OFF THE POWER CORD (now laughter)

BUT DON'T PUT IT BEHIND YOUR REAR TIRE. THE SUCKER PROBABLY HAS SOMETHING SHARP INSIDE AND IT'LL GIVE YOU A FLAT.

Toxic waste. Natural resources to the landfill. That will be the last SMART CHARGER I handle outside the target range. What a waste of money.