motorola radius p100

y2kmental · Post by **y2kmental** » Sun Jan 18, 2004 11:58 pm

hi, i have a couple of motorola p100s, they work, but their chargers dont seem to be working. I plug the charger in the wall and the red charging light comes on, i insert a battery and take it out and it shows charging complete. But it never charges.

does anyone have any idea?

Thanks

kydeputy1463 · Post by **kydeputy1463** » Mon Jan 19, 2004 12:04 am

Sounds like the battery is shot, how old is the battery?

Edited for a grammatical error.

y2kmental · Post by **y2kmental** » Mon Jan 19, 2004 12:08 am

no, im sure the batteries are good, i think the chargers are fried. becuase i put to batteries in one charger at once and i think it got messed up

kydeputy1463 · Post by **kydeputy1463** » Mon Jan 19, 2004 1:02 am

How did you get two batterys into one charger?

motorolamonster911 · Post by **motorolamonster911** » Mon Jan 19, 2004 1:15 am

I hope hes trying to say he put two batteries in the same charger AT DIFFERENT TIMES...

Nick

y2kmental · Post by **y2kmental** » Mon Jan 19, 2004 1:19 am

no it can either take the whole radio with the battery, or a single battery, i shoved 2 single batteries in it

Cam · Post by **Cam** » Mon Jan 19, 2004 1:25 am

for what reason may i ask

kydeputy1463 · Post by **kydeputy1463** » Mon Jan 19, 2004 1:26 am

I dont think that would have affected the life of the batterys being there is only one set of contacts in the base. But the main question is, why?

y2kmental · Post by **y2kmental** » Mon Jan 19, 2004 1:33 am

actucally there are two sets of contacts on this base

y2kmental · Post by **y2kmental** » Mon Jan 19, 2004 1:34 am

the other charger broke, and i wanted to use both radios at the same time, so that why i did it

EKLB · Post by **EKLB** » Mon Jan 19, 2004 4:08 am

Obviously your refering to the P100 rapid charger and not the standard rate over night charger.

In the past i too have had diferent problems with the rapid chargers ect.

To check to see if the charger is actualy putting out a charge = take a volt meter and see if you have approx 30 volts at the contacts.

The 30 volts is just off the top of my head and im not sure its the actual voltage but its in that range.

And this voltage will be without the battery pack in the charger.

If memory serves me corectly one of the contacts will be minus and the other two will be positive dc voltages.

You can still get LED indications on the P100 rapid charger even if the internal fuse is blown / not 100% sure why other than the battery may be providing the needed power to do so.

But if you remove the chargers cover you should see the glass 1/4 inch barrel fuse soldered directly to the ac input.

I will add that normaly a blown fuse here usualy lights up the red led constantly though so im not real sure about your chargers problem without looking at it thoroughly on the bench.

Good Luck.

EKLB

arlojanis · Post by **arlojanis** » Mon Jan 19, 2004 6:22 am

This is a common problem with the P100 rapid charger. The red led stays on when there is no battery inserted. The fix is to replace the blown slow blow fuse in the charger. The fuse was blowned by a bad battery. If you try to charge the bad battery again, the fuse will blow again. This fuse is inside the charger and soldered to the board.

y2kmental · Post by **y2kmental** » Mon Jan 19, 2004 2:30 pm

how saef is it to open this up?

EKLB · Post by **EKLB** » Mon Jan 19, 2004 7:16 pm

With the charger unplugged from the wall outlet= It would be 100 percent safe to open the charger as no voltage would be present to be a shock hazard.

Im thinking this fuse has also been a white cant see through type in some chargers as well but they are 1/4 inch in diameter by about 1 and 1/4 inch long.

But id still check it with a ohm meter to see if in fact its good or blown.

As stated above it is probably the most common failure for the P100/HT50 rapid charger.

EKLB

y2kmental · Post by **y2kmental** » Tue Jan 20, 2004 4:12 am

hey you think i could install a mod, so i can change the bad fuse without opening it up next time?

y2kmental · Post by **y2kmental** » Tue Jan 20, 2004 11:40 pm

you were right, it was the fuse, i tried another one and it worked for 2 minutes and then blew again. what would happen if i just bridged the connections with wire instead of a fuse?

KG6EAQ · Post by **KG6EAQ** » Wed Jan 21, 2004 12:37 am

y2kmental wrote:you were right, it was the fuse, i tried another one and it worked for 2 minutes and then blew again. what would happen if i just bridged the connections with wire instead of a fuse?

You'd probably destroy the radios. Fuses are put in for a reason, to protect the equipment. Something is causing it to pop, either the right fuse hasn't been put in or you are drawing too much off it. Check what fuse is supposed to be inside it then make sure you have the right amperage.

EKLB · Post by **EKLB** » Wed Jan 21, 2004 5:30 pm

I have not bothered to check the manual on the chargers fuse specs ect.

But i can tell you that i instal the 1 amp slo blow type fuse and all works well when things are electricly corect within the charger itself.

Keep in mind that if you placed the same bad battery into the charger that it will more than likely cause the fuse to fail again and that you need to now consider the posibility of trying another known good battery to see if the problem persists or not.

EKLB

Will · Post by **Will** » Thu Jan 22, 2004 2:24 am

Allways check the voltage on the P100/HT50 batteries BEFORE blowing up the charger. If the open circuit voltage is less than 6 volts do not even try it in the charger as it WILL draw enough current to blow the fuse, dammage the current switch or blow a diode.

EKLB · Post by **EKLB** » Thu Jan 22, 2004 4:39 am

I respect Wills posted reply and totaly apologize if i offend him or anyone else for that matter.

So here goes as a qeustion rather than an attack and with due respect extended .

I have told my customers over and over that you need to drain the charge out of the P100/HT50 portables ocasionaly to eliminate the memory effect in the NICAD battery packs to optimize the best performance possible from the battery.

Ok my point is from my experience that i have not seen any problems that the charger due to its inherited design had with charging up a battery drained well below the 6 volts .

And the charger performed well with the exception that now and then the customer had drained the battery so well that there was not suficent voltage to begin the charge unless you let the battery set and build up some rsidual charge or place the battery into a 16 hour slow charger to get a bit first.

And before anyone asks how often you should drain the battery and put a fresh charge back into the radio = I have to say this / it differs from customer to customer because of there charging habits versus daily usage ect.

But as a general guide line for the catch all department id say consider it done say about every 3 to 4 months for the light radio usage and say every 9 to 12 months for the heavy radio users.

Now to put some clarification on the above chart id like to say that a radio being used heavily will remove the charge from the radio which replaces the charge with a fresh charge deeply into the batteries remaining capacity thus reducing if not eliminating memory effects.

A radio that is being lightly used but charged in a daily basis or stored in the charger for long periods of time will not normaly get the charge removed and then the charge becomes shall i say old/stale and does not provide the voltage/amps needed to provide good performance curves.

So now if you think about memory effect in a battery and your habits on usage versus charging habits you can come fairly close to what you should do as to when and how often you should consider doing your batteries.

NOW PLEASE BE AWARE THIS APPLIES TO NICAD BATTS NOT THE NMHD BATT PACKS.

Again with all respect and a hand shake extended .

Keep up the good work and posts WILL.

EKLB