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Nox No Longer Charges.. Any Advice?


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1 hour ago, Erik Oostra said:

Thanks for your advice F350Platinum (and others), but my Foxy Noxy was bought second hand (like all my detectors)..

Warranty transfers and it is 3 years!  The oldest Equinoxes out there are only 3.5 years old.  ML can track to manufacturing date using the serial #.  In the states they are basically just handling under warranty claims no questions asked, including bad batteries which ostensibly have only a 1 year warranty. 

Although the Equinox likely has a low voltage protection circuit for the battery, you really should not regularly take Li Ion batteries down flat which unnecessarily reduces battery lifespan by putting more full charge cycles on the battery than necessary.  Li Ion batteries only have a finite # of full charge cycles before they lose capacity. 

Also, check the charge contacts on the Equinox head unit AND the charge cable.  The magnetic attachment is a neat feature but it also readily attracts ferromagnetic debris on the contacts which causes intermittent contact or a large voltage drop that can mimic a full charge as far as the charger is concerned.   

Finally, yes you should be able to swap the batteries between the 600 and 800 without too much effort, but the fact is the connection plugs and internal hardware fasteners are likely not designed to stand up to the mechanical fatigue associated with repeated swapping and may fail at some point.  I certainly would not rely on the Equinoxes maintaining their watertight integrity under repeated battery swaps.

Good luck on resolving the battery problem.

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Lithium batteries don't like to be stored fully charged. Ultimately, they should be kept between 20 and 80% charged if the device is not going to be used for a week or more. Then charge the battery the day that you go detecting.

They also should not be discharged until dead. If that happens, put it on the charger as soon as possible but only charge it to two bars, then charge it to full when you want to use the machine.

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18 minutes ago, Badger-NH said:

They also should not be discharged until dead. If that happens, put it on the charger as soon as possible but only charge it to two bars, then charge it to full when you want to use the machine.

Thanks Badger, I didn't know that.. another steep learning curve.. 

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5 hours ago, Steve Herschbach said:

 

Here's a source for a very high quality 26650 Li-ion battery for $10.95. All you'd have to do is remove the plug-in cable from the old battery and solder it to the new one. I've been using their 18650 Li-ions for over 12 years in high power devices and their quality can't be beat.

Orbtronic 26650 Battery

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9 hours ago, CPT_GhostLight said:

Here's a source for a very high quality 26650 Li-ion battery for $10.95. All you'd have to do is remove the plug-in cable from the old battery and solder it to the new one. I've been using their 18650 Li-ions for over 12 years in high power devices and their quality can't be beat.

Orbtronic 26650 Battery

If you've got the actual desoldering and soldering skills (not a universal skill btw - or at least not the project I would pick for your first go with a soldering iron) and know how to avoid heat damaging the replacement battery, it could be a good option.

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WTH , I'll give it a shot.

101   

On a battery , you need to heat the connection point but NOT the rest of the battery. A fairly hot tip is needed (~40 watt iron ,,,should be fine for this size job.) . Probably get away with the low setting on a gun  but it will be QUICK !        and leave the torch for other jobs PLEASE !    

A cooler tip will take forever and heat the joint as well as the whole battery and not hold very well or conduct electricity that well either.... this is called a "cold" joint . You don't want one of those !                    No , I didn't make that up ! LOL

Warning : you will need to grow a third hand and maybe a fourth ! LOL  Use a clamp or a vise ,carefully. Optionally a volunteer whose fingers are not yours may be involved ....but I digress.....

OK ,READY ?

Place the iron to the battery with the wire in between , and touch the solder a little away from the contact point , heat just till just after the solder starts to melt ,remove the tip and quickly move solder end to the wire and flow more in till you have a good coverage but not a big puddle (you should still see the shape of the wire but no bare spots.... (if it starts to bind up apply a little more heat)

A good solder connection looks smooth , wet and shiny , if it doesn't do it again.  BUT let it cool down first .

 

This lesson was free , at least worth what you paid ,,mess up ( I mean practice) all you want but don't complain OK ?  

Actually practice might be a good step 1 ... It's really easy though, I learned when I was 10  ! ( use the dead battery !)

The factory "pros" actually use a mini spot welder , and I could tell you how to rig up a likely MacGiver replacement but lets not go there today  !! 

 

 

 

 

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Ya knowwwwww , I was just adding an edit to my last post ,,,, you could use the dead battery for practice BUT !

It is possible to "jump start" a "dead" LiFePo4 batt with a little juice from a charged battery  !! sometimes they just get too low for the BMS to kick in,,,

Parallel 'em up for a few seconds  20-30 and try charging again normally , try a little longer ?60 seconds?

If that doesn't work , start practicing !

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22 hours ago, rvpopeye said:

On a battery , you need to heat the connection point but NOT the rest of the battery. A fairly hot tip is needed (~40 watt iron ,,,should be fine for this size job.) . Probably get away with the low setting on a gun  but it will be QUICK !

 

15 hours ago, rvpopeye said:

It is possible to "jump start" a "dead" LiFePo4 batt with a little juice from a charged battery  !!

How dangerous is all of this?  Lithium batteries are known to explode when shorted.  (I've seen it happen -- wouldn't want to be standing next to it, for sure.  There are often built-in protections, e.g. diodes, but...)  You say 'parallel' so positive terminal to positive terminal and negative to negative.  Just don't accidentally do the opposite (positive to negative...).

I'd recommend at leasat a good eye shield....

Always need to ask if it's worth taking safety risks to try and save a few (tens of?) bucks.

I recall 30 years ago when working at a well known national lab, an engineer put a large lithium multicell in a lead lined concrete vault meant for (and containing!) high intensity radioactive sources.  All I could think of was "what is wrong with this picture???!!!

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I sometimes forget that not eveybody has a solder iron in their hands 8 hours a day. Soldering lithium batteries is one of the more dangerous thing you can do with a soldering iron. I too have had a lithium battery pop on me while soldering. If you haven't made lithium battery packs, it's probably best to seek other solutions.

I read somewhere that you can buy a Nox battery direct from Minelab for about $40 if you email them.

Also, if you don't need to stay waterproof, there is the external battery option. Here's a popular one that just clips onto the Nox shaft. You could remove the stock battery and clip this on and there would be very little overall weight change.

Nox External Battery

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