External 18650 Battery Pack and Adapter for the GrassHopper

[Joel W.]

I built a battery pack and adapter for my hopper and it works amazingly well.

1. 119+ full power hits per charge compared to a new stock battery, which gave me 6 full power hits.
2. It runs off (4) Sony 18650 batteries and requires no modification to the Grasshopper itself.
3. The Aluminum piece also works as heat sink, that pulls excess heat from the hopper body and back end.
4. No internal battery to get hot from use to add to the heat issue.
5. No constantly swapping out dead batteries, cleaning threads, wearing out the contacts.

The only real downside for me is the 10A cord. It's bulky and cumbersome on such a small device, but the trade off is well worth it for me.

I would like to hear any ideas on improvements (the box, the cord, the materials, anything) or any criticisms you may have of the design or any safety issues we can think of?

I am still trying to narrow the final design down in my head as this is the first and it is a bit rough looking. I used JB Weld to secure my negative contact in place and to glue in the cord in place on this one but on future designs, I plan to use pressed in contacts. The positive contact on mine was actually a part from another product that I adapted to get this working easily. Those that have already PM'ed me about this, I consider them to be on my short list in order, at the top.

I am assuming all hopper threads are equal, this may be a mistake on my part? So far, I have only seen 4 bodies and 2 back ends, but the threads were all the same.

Once I nail down the parts, I can work on figuring out the price! The wife just said "GO DO IT"...

My post in the Hopper thread has some more info.
http://fuckcombustion.com/threads/the-grasshopper.18482/page-463#post-1018449

 

[Kalessin]

I have no electrical skills with which to offer advice, just wanting to save my place on the potential ordering list haha. This would be perfect for me. I have been using my Hopper as my DD since I got it. (When it's been working) So I would use this at home and that'd let me save the native batteries for out and about... Did have a question though. Will it need to have all four batteries in it to work? Like, if I took most of them out to charge and just left one in would it still work, or are they all required to be in place to complete the circuit or whatever?

 

[Joel W.]

Did have a question though. Will it need to have all four batteries in it to work? Like, if I took most of them out to charge and just left one in would it still work, or are they all required to be in place to complete the circuit or whatever?

The way it is wired now, it will work fine with one battery, yes.

I have also made another quick connector plug that is attached to plastic spacer, about the length of a battery. I slip that into my/your charger and then plug the quick connector into my pack. I charged all 4 in place in about 8 hours or so at .5A. This will be included in the kits.

 

[Kalessin]

The way it is wired now, it will work fine with one battery, yes.

I have also made another quick connector plug that is attached to plastic spacer, about the length of a battery. I slip that into my/your charger and then plug the quick connector into my pack. I charged all 4 in place in about 8 hours or so at .5A. This will be included in the kits.

Whoo! That's awesome, I was already thinking about the slight inconvenience unscrewing the case and taking the batteries out to charge would be. Even though for my use I feel like it would be an every 3 or 4 days thing with this and thus minor, still great to not have to deal with

 

[virtualpurple]

I want this bad boy! I kinda would prefer fully assembled. Often times I prefer to assemble myself, but not today for some reason.

 

[pandaphysics]

I have also made another quick connector plug that is attached to plastic spacer, about the length of a battery. I slip that into my/your charger and then plug the quick connector into my pack. I charged all 4 in place in about 8 hours or so at .5A. This will be included in the kits.

Could you maybe use this plastic spacer to connect this battery pack with with 18650 vapes? Like the air, milaana, etc. ?

 

[Joel W.]

Could you maybe use this plastic spacer to connect this battery pack with with 18650 vapes? Like the air, milaana, etc. ?

The pack may work, depending on those vapes, I have used neither. Then you would need to adapt power to it somehow?.

 

[sag]

A plug and play would work for me

 

[ZC]

I'd happily buy the adapter. Should work perfectly with the Milaana power supply I've already built.

Personally I would prefer the cloth-covered lamp style cord but it's not a big issue either way.

 

[Joel W.]

I'd happily buy the adapter. Should work perfectly with the Milaana power supply I've already built.

Personally I would prefer the cloth-covered lamp style cord but it's not a big issue either way.

The long cord between the pack and the adapter actually came off a dead 10A vacuum cleaner. It's just what I had on hand, but I will take a look at anything suggested.

 

[subway13029]

Dude I saw this on the hopper thread and was like I want one of those and now I see it here and I'm like I want one of those. How do I get on the short list?

 

[Joel W.]

Dude I saw this on the hopper thread and was like I want one of those and now I see it here and I'm like I want one of those. How do I get on the short list?

Just Send me a quick pm. I Will keep track.

 

[Joel W.]

I have been looking at cloth covered wire and I see a bunch of 18g/2wire but it's rated at 300w and that's less than 3 amps at 110v?

I see some twisted 16/2 wire but that looks to have a solid copper wire like house wire?

If you have any links, I'd look at them.

 

[JoeMama]

Oh baby oh baby yeah.


Tell your wife I said thank you, too! LOL

 

[ZC]

I'm no electrician. but I'm pretty sure in terms of cables 300w is 300w. You're not runnin 110v through it, you're running 4.2v and not exceeding 60w so pretty much any 18/2 wire should be fine. I don't think it's easy to find wires that are rated with 4.2v in mind, but that doesn't mean they aren't adequate.

 

[Joel W.]

I'm no electrician. but I'm pretty sure in terms of cables 300w is 300w. You're not runnin 110v through it, you're running 4.2v and not exceeding 60w so pretty much any 18/2 wire should be fine. I don't think it's easy to find wires that are rated with 4.2v in mind, but that doesn't mean they aren't adequate.

Maybe we can get an electrician in here because I am thinking it's the amps that really matter and my math says it's rated to 2.5amps when they list the watts only?

This is just one reason why I should not attempt this project. The liability and dangers when something goes wrong with 4 of these batteries, in parallel. Fuses and an off switch would need to be included in future design for sure, if this happens.

 

[subway13029]

Maybe we can get an electrician minded person to help out with some of the details? Obviously you've whooped the main part of it and that was not only thinking it up but making it happen. Now we just gotta fine tune it for safety right. I say we but shit I know an electrician..he's not on fc but I'm sure we have a few withe smarts on here.maybe @OF or the likes of some others?

 

[JoeMama]

Right Up Front: I'm not a graphics artist, nor do I have any d

[/IMG] esire being involved in the business end of this endeavor, but I sure as hell want to see Joel succeed. And if he passes the baton on as he moves onto other cool creations, I'd want to see anyone else's endeavor to making the ultimate hopper adapter be a success as well. Nor am I suggesting anything by sharing this thought.

I couldn't help myself. It's just a fantasy.

Just as the Hopper charger slips on top of the backend, we have to admit, it's a sexy design (haha, literally I guess!). Which is why I'd pictured this; kind of the same design.

I know this kind of thing requires a LOT of design work, so I repeat...
I'm just sharing a dream

 

[OF]

Maybe we can get an electrician in here because I am thinking it's the amps that really matter and my math says it's rated to 2.5amps when they list the watts only?

Maybe we can get an electrician minded person to help out with some of the details? Now we just gotta fine tune it for safety right. I say we but shit I know an electrician..he's not on fc but I'm sure we have a few withe smarts on here.maybe @OF or the likes of some others?

OK, if I follow (not a given....), the question is 'how big a wire do we need?'? The answer, as always, is 'it depends.......

First off the only consideration is current (not voltage or power). Amps, not Watts. Generally fatter wire has less resistance per foot so it 'drops' less voltage for the same current. This doubles (or halves) every 3 wire gauges, BTW. The key is 'how hot can we let the wire get' which links back to current. 'Power equals I squared R' causes Watts which means heat. Depending on how fast it can shed the heat and how hot the insulation can get (the wire won't melt or burn until long past insulation failure). So, tougher insulation (with higher temperature rating) lets you run more current. Put the wires inside a metal conduit and you need to derate. Bundle a bunch together and the internal ones will fail early and so on. No fixed answer?

You can get all sorts of answers from tables like this, depending:
http://www.engineeringtoolbox.com/wire-gauges-d_419.html

That said, for a couple Amps for a short distance 18 AWG is plenty. 22 would be fine as well. If you go too small you can get too much voltage drop at higher currents. I have an external CD drive that won't work on anything but a very short, heavy cable to the USB connector. Otherwise it pulls too much current (probably doing a seek or something at flank speed, sucks the voltage down like the kitchen lights when the washer starts and the sucker resets. Right in the middle of the movie.......

Anyway, I think that was the question? Depends on the current needed.

BTW you can also buy a very nice 12 Volt pack (what I think is going on?) like this one:

Shown recharging a Solo with it's charger next to it. The LED lighting guys love these things. Inside this is what you get:

If I understand correctly, all you need is an adapter to get going? $35 and you're in the game.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00ME3ZH7C/ref=oh_aui_search_detailpage?ie=UTF8&psc=1

Works for lots of other vapes, of course. Those that charge with 12 VDC or from a USB port.

Regards to all.

OF

 

[Joel W.]

I'm just sharing a dream

This was my first idea also, but The back end still needs to be in the circuit, for blue lights to fire .

 

[Kalessin]

If I understand correctly, all you need is an adapter to get going? $35 and you're in the game.

So if we had a adapter piece like Joel is using for his Hopper mod that would mate with this battery bank you think it would work then? @Joel W. Think you could make one that would fit these that he's talking about? Since you're worried about the safety properties on your box

 

[Joel W.]

That said, for a couple Amps for a short distance

I run it at full power and they list it at 30w-45w peak @ 4.2v from one cell, with some PWM controller magic.

 

[OF]

So if we had a adapter piece like Joel is using for his Hopper mod that would mate with this battery bank you think it would work then? @Joel W. Think you could make one that would fit these that he's talking about? Since you're worried about the safety properties on your box

That battery pack is strange, it's output is a female coax connector (standard is 'power out the male'). This is needed since the bulkhead version of the male doesn't really exist. But they give you a two headed Y cable. You plug one end of the Y to the pack, the other to the load (device to charge). The charger plugs into the female (unplugged in the photo above.

So you need to match the (standard) 5.2mm Male coax connector on the Y to your unit. You can see the adapter to do this where the Y plugs into Solo in the photo.

If you buy one of those universal replacement chargers that come with a bunch of adapters, the base unit is almost always that 5.2 mm connector. Like this one I just bought:
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0027BZEYC/ref=oh_aui_search_detailpage?ie=UTF8&psc=1

Or the ones in this kit:
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01C5F4GW0/ref=oh_aui_search_detailpage?ie=UTF8&psc=1

Once someone identifies the connector needed I'm sure something can be arranged?

I run it at full power and they list it at 30w-45w peak @ 4.2v from one cell, with some PWM controller magic.

Again, it only depends on current (Amps). And average Amps at that.

OF

 

[JoeMama]

This was my first idea also, but The back end still needs to be in the circuit, for blue lights to fire .

Well that IS interesting!
Do you mean that there is more to the backend than it being a simple connection path for the battery? Even if, in that drawing, that backend had machined metal threads (with insulation for the center contact etc)?

Anyway, Your first idea was GREAT!!!

 

[Joel W.]

Again, it only depends on current (Amps). And average Amps at that.

OF

10-12 amps peak ( by math) . I will put a amp meter on it tonight to see actual and average amps...

So if we had a adapter piece like Joel is using for his Hopper mod that would mate with this battery bank you think it would work then? @Joel W. Think you could make one that would fit these that he's talking about? Since you're worried about the safety properties on your box

It would need something that can drop the volts down from 12v to 4.2v while keeping up the amps?

I am having some doubts about this project..

I will focus on the aluminum adapter for now.