Hi all

Just wondering if anyone knows if i can use a NI-MH AA Battery Charger to charge AA NI-CD Solar Light Batteries

And also if i fit Ni-MH Batteries in the Light (My anchor light) will the Solar Panel charge them

Any help would be appreciated

Regards Don

Just to clarify the solar panel is just the little 2 inch square one on the top of the light

Regards Don

Thanks for the information so far

What i have is a HPM 2 led Garden Light on my Spacesailer 20 that is on a mooring outside our house at Port Huon (a bit low tech here in Tassie )

I know that on the Mooring i dont have to show a anchor light but i leave it on all the time just incase someone hits it on a dark night (the boat has a dark green hull) and so when i get home at night (it is dark here now at 5pm) i can see that it hasn't floated away or sunk

When the light was new it would stay on all night (in summer) but now in winter it goes off around midnight

It is powered by 2 AA NI Cd and i thought i would get a charger and 2 more batteries and give the batteries a occasional run on the charger to fully charge them but the only charger i can find locally is a NI MH one

Also there is lots of NI MH batteries available and this is why i asked the question

One the mooring at night it isn't critical that it runs all night but if we overnight down the river at anchor i would like it to run all night long so if i had another set of fully charged batteries i could take them with us for the night

Regards Don

nebbian said...

Suck it and see...

That panel won't have enough energy to damage anything, so you should be fine.

I'd imagine that the NiMH batteries would last longer for a given state of charge, but anything's possible.

(btw I would think that the NiCad batteries are also fine, but they're not getting enough charge during the winter days, which would mean that putting NiMH batteries in won't help the cause... in that case you need bigger solar panels)

Correct, the panel won't damage anything, simply as it doesn't have the grunt to damage anything consequently it also won't charge a NiMH as the amount of power being taken out at night is not able to be replaced during the day. In the summer months with brighter and longer days you will get more charge but I imagine that you will still have to pull the batteries every so often to give them a full charge at home (with a NiMH charger).

NiCd batteries are now no longer able to be sold due to cadmium content. (Eat Cadmium and die).

Harry

Thanks for the information everyone

I appreciate it

Regards Don