My LADDA cells arrived today and you're right about them being oversize. I'm not happy trying to force them into the tray so I will use them to make an external pack and charge it with an airsoft charger.
--
Mike G8GYW

I took a good tooth pick with a very small amount of "Crazy Glue" on the end. I stuck in and after about 1/2 a minute or so, pulled out the tip.

73, Joe, K8JP/K5

I purchased a 817ND recently and it had the same problem. It was stubborn but I was able to pull it with a very fine "dental pick" type of tool. No harm no foul on the sale, but the rig wouldn't power up when I received it. Now it's working fine as my portable satellite uplink rig. 73

Thank you Ronan, I had forgotten that the whole cell case apart from the circular bottom plate is positive and I have the LADDAs in there right now. That was a forced option because the '818's battery pack has withdrawn its cooperation, and a replacement 1900 mAh pack is simply not fiscally justifiable for myself.
--
Steve, G4VRR.

The LADDA cells are a tight fit in that plastic tray, right enough, but I've not had any issues with them not making connection. They are pressed quite firmly to the cells in the adjacent rows though so it is wise to check the integrity of their plastic wrap when fitting..... Things could get a little toasty if it gets damaged....

Your mention of Eneloop cells is interesting, Steve. There has been much chat elsewhere (candlepower forum, I think) to suggest that the LADDA cells are rebranded eneloops as they are made in the same factory in Japan.?

I also have had the experience that many NiMH cells, especially the slow self discharge/pre-charged cells are larger in diameter than their alkaline counterparts and will not fit in some equipment.

Another gotcha is the button height. If you compare any alkaline cell next to a NiMH rechargeable you will see that the case on the NiMH is longer and the positive button height is shorter.

This proves to be a problem on devices that have battery compartments with a recessed contact.

I have soldered #2 brass washers in places or used little bits of foil to mitigate this problem in some things.

The worst is older equipment that was made decades ago before a lot of these cells were even available. (Think Radio Shack CB walkie-talkies)

Happy tinkering!
-Albert
KI4ORI

I'm aware that I wasn't anything like the first, but I flagged up the IKEA Ladda cells some time ago, probably on the groups.io Elecraft KX group and was indirectly rebutted by some foreign correspondent for suggesting that folks should consider anything other than Eneloops in their expensive radios. So what? I hear you saying ... Well that's what I thought too, but in addition "your loss Mate".

I just wanted to advise that these most excellent Ladda cells (probably like most NiMh LSD rechargeables?) are nominally 14.3 mm diameter, while standard alkalines are a tiny bit smaller. There may only be 5 or 6 thou' in it, but miltiplied by four rows it is sufficient to resist the cell holder's spring forces. Since the cell holder will only install without all the cells in-situ, this means that cell continuity is a lottery and although you may get lucky, the radio mostly won't power up in my experience. You can push two of the rows of cells in one direction, but the other two rows are difficult to pull in the other direction using just finger tips. Moreover, for what is essentially a portable radio there is the nagging doubt that once working, they will dislodge with loss of power.

I have neatly cut away the central rib in the cell holder by repeated scoring on each side with a home made miniature metalworker's adjustable back marking gauge and using a scalpel (Exacto knife?) at each end followed by repeated flexure and it was actually quite easy to make a neat job of it. This has ameliorated the issue to some degree but it is not a total solution. Of course this may be confined to my own use case but I expect not. If anyone else has experienced this with LSD cells I'd appreciate a heads-up for any "cure". I cannot point my finger at Yaesu this time because they never intended ths radio to be used with rechargeable cells, but they've forced the issue by refusing to investigate superior power options. Even an accessory replacement battery compartment door with a pressing that would allow 18650s would be a start. It's shameful.
--
Steve, G4VRR.

You're right! I found it at the bottom of the box (unused).

OK one more question. Is the installed battery pack only charged from an external supply when CHG is selected?

Thanks,

开云体育

On Mon, Oct 31, 2022 at 02:38 PM, John Fitch wrote:

Do you charge them with the ft817 or take them out & use an dedicated, branded IKEA charger?

I have done both. The charging circuit in the radio takes an age as it's designed for smaller capacity packs. I have a couple of external 4-cell chargers which do the job much faster.

To be honest, I ditched the AA's and now use either 3 X Li-ion 18650's in an external tray similar to the one Ron posted above, or a larger 4 x LiFePO4 6Ah pack that I put together for my other radios.

Cheers,
Ronan

On Mon, Oct 31, 2022 at 07:49 AM, Mike wrote:

I'm Interested in the LADDA cells. How did you connect them together?

There was an 8xAA battery tray included with the ft-817 when I bought it second-hand. Not sure where it came from originally.

--

I'm Interested in the LADDA cells. How did you connect them together?

Have a look at the LADDA branded 2450 mAh NiMH rechargeable batteries that are sold in IKEA. They're produced in Japan and are excellent quality cells. I bought 8 for the internal battery tray in my FT-817 and they work very well indeed. Much better than the awful low-capacity pack sold specifically for the radio.?

Alternatively, 3 X 18650's will keep you going for about the same amount of time.

It is sliced already and under 3D printing on my Mk3 Prusa printer….
I will let you know the results.?

Petr

This shows how to make the internal charger terminate on lithiums.
/g/ft817/files/ZL1THH/FT817-BatteryCircuits.pdf
Read all the notes on the schematic.

Note also that there is a lot to be said for just using new NiMH - they are much easier to use, and more than twice the capacity of what was available in the old days
/g/ft817/message/113133

My testing of lithiums shows them to often be well below what is expected, and only marginally better than good NiMH e.g.
I also have some LIPO's (labelled 4200mAh) that fit inside nicely, and they test at ~2500mAh at 212g.

On Fri, Oct 28, 2022 at 06:08 AM, Albert Marsh wrote:

Does it allow you to run full power? I did some tests a while back, and the results are a little fuzzy in my head, but I seem to recall that the radio only allowed full power when the internal pack voltage was above something like 11V.

You can manually select full power at any voltage.
On HF you can get 5W output at 9V. (At UHF the gain falls off at low voltages)
So you can get full power off the NiMH? battery pack.

The radio automatically shifts mode to 2.5W when voltage falls through 11.5 V or changing ext->int power, so you have to watch out for it not being what you thought you had set it to.
This is _not_ the same as saying the radio won't do full power on low voltage: it does.