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Ok, I've searched and searched, but with no luck have I found anything that tells how to hook a recharge port up with a driver. I know how to hook up a driver, and I know how to hook up a recharge port, but not together. How would I go about doing this? Is there a diagram to refrence? Can someone make one? Its a lot easier than just reading and not being able to picture something in my head.
A recharge port is nothing but wiring the charger in "like a battery setup".
In fact, you can essentially think of it *AS* a battery... since it will be feeding the cells some energy.
Wire over + and -. That's it. Wire the port BEFORE any of the other components in the circuit, as in:
Battery cells ---> Port ---> Board/whatever ---> LED, etc.
Hopefully it helps you. Remember: it's JUST like hooking up the + battery to + and the -battery to -. :)
I was wondering in this set up would a Battery level indicator go after the recharge port?
thanks in advance
I think it would be between the battery and the recharge port. The PLI would have to be in direct contact with the battery. So, red wire from PLI would go to red wire in battery. I don't think you would want to solder the battery to the PLI though because the PLI would drain the battery below 0.0v. Right now, I am am looking at doing two connectors from the battery. One to the driver board and one to the PLI.
you could just add a mom switch between the pli and batt, then a press would show the batt level and then you can release it.
The PLI would go after the charge port. For one thing you wouldnt want the pli permanently connected as it would be on all the time draining your batteries. The second and more important point is that if the pli is in permanent circuit with the batteries then any type of charger that uses voltage sensing in its charging (the majority of them these days inc all smart chargers) will have the sensing messed up as the pli circuit will be drawing power too.
Depending on the charger this could lead from anything from the charger shutting off too early to the opposite of charging after the batteries are already charged. This would potentially ruin your batteries.
When wiring stuff think of it in logical blocks. Power, switching, circuitry, outputs, inputs etc. Wire each bit up seperately and test each bit. Then connect the building blocks together.
Neo makes an excellent point... you REALLY want to see about cutting ALL power to everything (other than the cells) when recharging.
That means speakers... PLIs... indicator LEDs... everything--wherever possible. It's true that some components are "passive" and won't draw power without a circuit to drive them... but--why do that when it sets a procedural standard for possible snafus?
Thats why I was thinking more of a headphone style jack for that type of port. The headphone jacks have this extra piece of metal that gets pushed out of the way to create an open circuit. This could be hooked up like a switch for the main circuit. When the jack is pluged in it would create only a circuit between the battery and the charger.
Moondragon the dc power jacks we use also have a third 'pin' that is switched. Thats why when you plug the charger in (or killswitch) the circuit is disconnected from the batteries.
The problem with the phono plugs used in the same way is that if you fast charge batteries there is a fair amount of current and heat generated. Ive personally seen this lead to the plastic bodies of the phono sockets going 'soft' from the heat which causes the spring loaded contacts to distort and move. I used to build and work with ALOT of equipment that was battery powered and used a plug in charging system like our sabres do. At best this results in a circuit that stays off even when the connector is removed, at worst the positive and negative contacts touch short circuiting the battery and causing a nasty meltdown.
The other thing that happens with phono jacks/sockets is that the way the connectors are designed its possible to bridge contacts as you insert the plug causing shorts/sparks on the battery pack too. DC connectors do the same job but without these shortcomings.
Oh if the jacks already have that feature then you're good to go. Yes the problems you describe are there with the phone jack, but there are other ways around that as well. A switching circuit etc. But if the store jack works like that you really don't need that kind of hassle to find other solutions.