Always look forward to these, thank you :) I just graduated from electrical engineering and now starting work this week at a PCB manufacturing company. Your videos are the only thorough explanations of exploring practical circuits and understanding how their components work so its been very useful. Unfortunate that my school didnt have enough practical content like this! Stay safe and have a great day :)
Congratulations! And good luck to you. In what country is the PCB manufacturing facility? That sounds super interesting. I always love watching videos from those places. His channel is great. Its is one of the only comprehensive explanations on TH-cam!
The retail price for this charger in IKEA is a ridiculously low £4.50 GBP. I do wonder if it is been sold at cost to encourage battery sales. At twice the price it looks a good quality device.
Ikea is known for selling things below their price in order to attract people, they do the same with their food by selling it near the break even cost, or some even below the cost price
The problem with the "new" types of LEDs is that manufacturers just pass the same amount of current through them as they would for the old types - so they turn into flashlights instead of indicators. For the new ones, 160uA or so is more than enough as an indicator. Even as low as 5uA can be enough. But they use 10mA, which is insane.
This really reminds me of some Chinese ODM no-name and off-brand electronics where that is done and thus there's an incredibly bright blue LED. It's as though they didn't test their products in the dark!
Torx is so much better than pozi/philips! I'm always happy to find them, because there is a lower chance of stripping the screw heads. Even with a cheap chinesium set of bits, torx is easier to use.
many times, what looks like a Phillips is actually JIS, the angles are slightly different, which is why a Phillips screwdriver will cam out and strip it.
PHILLIPS or even POZIDRIV were created and have been used with different objectives than TORX (this one focused to solve automotive industry constraints). A curious fact about PHILLIPS is that electronics industry have used them very often exactly because of the hidden “feature” of Cam-out if over-torque is employed. Using automated and torque-controlled tools in an assembly line are easier to make, but when properly designed, that feature is welcome for repairable equipment with housing and casing parts made of plastic. An over torque could simply the plastic post, or fracture the thread. A serviceman would be more difficult to break the plastic as the screwdriver cams out of the Phillips head. Google “List of screw drives” in the Wikipedia (EN) site, it has a general description of several screw drives.
IKEA “brand” seems to care for a minimum of Quality and Performance. In this case here the Battery chargers seem quite GOOD. However, I have 1 concern: I did not research the influence of PULSED current where the instantaneous CURRENT is more than 4 TIMES the AVERAGE. Maybe it creates gassing, but depending on pulse duration, battery CHEMISTRY may recombine the gases (or not…). Just guessing, comments and replies for further discussions are appreciated, or maybe even another video. Thanks for sharing, @DiodeGoneWild!
I am amused by your "new" oscilloscope, is that front port a floppy disk drive? Could you use it to capture some samples? I bet you'd have some working floppys laying around along with some drives
A very nice data storage media before flash storage and wireless data transmission :) I also have used a oscilloscope once with a serial port to transfer data to computer, its a very nifty feature.
Try to "play" with a horizontal or acquire menus, there should be some option for a 25/50 MHz bandwidth limit, to limit an HF/RF noise. You also got cursors and automatic measurements in the upper block of buttons... that's quite old but pretty decent DSO.
For a low cost manufacturing operation, torx can actually save everyone a lot of headache. Our company's current product formerly used all internal hex (allen) screws, and the internal hex drive is very easy to destroy if there is not a perfect match between the driver and the slot. Torx is much more forgiving when it comes to that. Phillips screws have basically been obsolete for quite a long time--they were designed for a time when pneumatic screwdrivers had just been invented, but no one had yet come up with a torque limiting device, so Phillips screws are designed to have inherent torque limiting. Nowadays there's no point to that. If I need to open something up, I would rather the screws be Torx, because I can easily apply a lot of torque to loosen the screw if it has gotten stuck. With Allen or Phillips I might be in for a tougher time--the Allen can easily just be mushed into a circle and lose its engagement, while with Phillips you have to apply downward pressure and then it also might round off. Another advantage of Torx over hex drive is you don't have two different sets of sizes to deal with.
But Philips head screws are still used in wood working because they look better than other types of heads. Less industrial and more decorative.
2 ปีที่แล้ว +1
The best part about Torx is that even if you strip it somehow (too much force, wrong tool, or corroded/rusty screw), you can usually work it out with a hex bit.
Biggest gripe with hex is imperial vs metric sizes. You can have a key and head that look like they are a match but they're not. Ones metric and the other is imperial and they are ever so slightly different and that little bit of play cause the head (and sometimes the Allen Kwy) to strip.
@@Professional_TH-cam_Commenter We had that exact problem at work. Our product was built from some parts that had metric screws and some parts that had english. We ended up having a lot of 1/16" hex screws but a few 1.5mm which is *almost* the same. Stripped a lot of screws because of it.
I think that the "noise problem" (15:16) on your oscilloscope is aliased noise because the oscilloscope is undersampling when in scrolling mode. Later(17:54) it works fine.
A hint on those old Tek scopes. Enable the 20MHz BW limiter for your 2 inputs. You do not need the full bandwidth for measuring switching supplies and the trace looks a lot cleaner. Also, I forgot the exact name of it, but if you change the sample size in the trigger menu from 10k points to 500 points, the waveform update/refresh rate is vastly increased looking a lot more like an analog scope, except the fine zoom-in resolution after you freeze a snapshot will not be as fine.
It could be charging the batteries in pulses to better measure their voltages, NiMH batteries actually lower their voltage near 100% SoC. Ending the charging by this voltage drop is better than using the temperature method
Ikea always sells products with very complex but intelligently designed circuits. I buy USB chargers at Ikea, because they are well built and very safe compared to other brands.
I've seen the red/white leds in a couple lights on bigclive's channel. Also looks like the LEDs are center positive, you could rotate them 180° so red is the normal colour and white is error, which would make it more pleasant at night unless there's an error :P
This was the first time I saw it in real life. I may replace it with a red/green led, or maybe red/yellow, because the new green ones are 525nm rather than 574nm. This makes a huge difference for scotopic vision and circadian sensitivity.
@@DiodeGoneWild hah, scotopic vision. Many years ago i was able to pre-test a new digital 3 chip sensor camera my employer was manufacturing. I set it up at night at home in my garden under the only light available of a very bright full moon.The resulting images were incredible with rich colours present, especially red hues of various flowers more intense than using ordinary sunlight. It was an uncanny feeling, seeing no colour but plainly the camera could.
If you change red to white or the other way round, you also have to change the series resistors. Other wise the red LED will most likely be overdriven a lot because of its lower forward voltage.
I use fine felt tip sharpie marker, to dab a bit of ink on the LEDs. I do this with all of my devices that have bright indicator lights. Its still clearly visible, But will be dimmer, so it doesn’t bother you when sleeping in a dark room. This is especially helpful for car chargers and things plugged into the cigarette lighter inside a vehicle. Because when driving at night, some of these modern bright indicator lights can blind you!
I only buy chargers that charge each battery separately any more. Great tip on heat sink compound to bring out lettering on ICs. Never thought about that.
@2:08 - I have a power band that is that way. Lights the entire room. I go around my room with shiny, metal tape to cover any and all flashing or glowing lights. Even the ones on power strips and wall warts get covered.
Put a bit of painter's tape over the LEDs, kills their brightness right down and you can pick your color. Hot Glue is also good, but harder to remove and/or replace.
Funny I am a carpenter not an electrician or electronics specialist but I enjoy your videos and have learned so much from you and a couple others that I actually can take something apart now and sometimes diagnose what has gone wrong amazing and thanks for all your hard work and great videos.
I use fine felt tip sharpie marker, to dab a bit of ink on the LEDs. I do this with all of my devices that have bright indicator lights. Its still clearly visible, But will be dimmer, so it doesn’t bother you when sleeping in a dark room. This is especially helpful for car chargers and things plugged into the cigarette lighter inside a vehicle. Because when driving at night, some of these modern bright indicator lights can blind you!
I have come across an LED driver that runs on universal mains, output is about 45 watts, 3.8 A. Strange thing is I think it uses an IGBT as a regulator. I’d love to see a video on such a driver.
@Ryan Thank you for the reply, I made an amateur error and discarded the transistor that was heat sinked and didn’t write down the part ID, the controller is a BP3238. The feedback and control circuit does not appear to use an opto-coupler for feedback.The board came out of an Artika product after it unexpectedly failed, so I’ve been using the board to learn LED driver circuitry.
Thanks for the look inside of this IKEA Steenkool charger. I was thinking it can't be any good bc of the low price, but it turns out to be a very decent charger. Probably with -dV/dt cutoff. I'll buy one or more now that I know.
A suggestion for a Special Video(s): Brand view, as IKEA = here was the Battery charger, in the past the 5V USB charger (3 port). Both seem well constructed, cost competitive and share some design similarities - at least in terms of electrical protection, design concept (channel independence, etc) and other design drivers - could raise some interesting discussions. Thanks!
As far i know, Stenkol means "coal" Maybe because the color and form of it they call it "coal" I brought one for only 39 danish kr. include 25% tax ( 6,2 dollar) and it works fine. Incredible what get for the money. I have done a little test with it, and it charges the batteries just as well as the more expensive charger. It a overnight charger.
@@DiodeGoneWild :-) Good guess. They still use some coal, but will be phased out in the coming years. Sweden has nuclear power and also uses solar, water and wind energy. IKEA will stop using disposable batteries and will only sell rechargeable nimh batteries in the future to reduce waste. Like your video and cat :-)
The mysterious package was the donated utrai jumpstarter power bank. It came from china, but it went through Lithuania and they put a new label on it and gave it a new tracking number.
Hi Diode very interesting video! I have one of those alkaline battery chargers that works and it would be a great idea to analyze one of those on one of your videos. Keep up the great work!
To be fair in the light of safety most manufacturers recommend that we don't leave the charger unattended. This is because of a rare occasion cells can fail catastrophically and start a fire. Since sleeping is a state in which one is not aware of this reality either by dream state or deep sleep. So if it's possible for that much danger to exist in such an incident looking package then should we not err on the side of caution and simply not change while we sleep in the first place? That allows us to choose color for their aesthetic value instead of worrying about whether it's going to keep us awake.
I still have the “old” white Ladda IKEA charger and the outputs are rated a lot higher. I wonder if it’s just the way they spec 4x….. I feel the need to open mine now and compare it to this new one.
I actually bought a Stenkol and although it’s nice that you have individual LEDs for each battery, it is MUCH slower at charging than the “old” white Ladda charger.
Why did they shrink wrap the inrush resistor thermal fuse, and not the MOV? What are the chances of a resistor exploding? My guess is that the resistor will pop at 125ºC and they wanted to mark it on the piece? Usually MOVs are shrink tubed as they sometimes explode from lightening strikes.
awesomely thorough look! IKEA says this uses 0dU/dt for termination. I'd be interested to see whether after termination there is residual "trickle charge" current as this can reduce life of LSD cells (eneloop/ladda).
wow well built design! Though I think there was alot of engineering that went into something that uses PWM charging to the batteries, I will stick with a nicer charger that uses buck regulators and constant current control.
Yes modern electronics are annoying with the led indicator lights. I use black electric tape to cover them up. Maybe just replace the LEDs since you're opening it anyway
I was expecting a comment on the surface mounted spark gap visible at 22:01. This is mounted between the primary to secondary. Notice the absence of solder resist.
I bought Kvarts charger few months ago, but now it's discontinued in the favor of Stenkol. Kvarts appears to be very finicky, discards some too worn batteries, and sometimes doesn't charge mildly worn red Lidl cells fully. I guess it's tuned for Ladda cells (and by extension Eneloops). Inside Kvarts looks very similar, with a microcontroller and a shitload of circuitry. But it cost 2 times as much.
This new Stenkol also seems to be finicky with some cells. I tried to charge my fairly old Energizer NiMHs, but it wouldn't accept them. Starts charging then after some 10 minutes the red LEDs start flashing. Of course I can charge the cells with a different charger.
@@zoltandiveki5233 So I guess software wise they did not change much. Then disregarding the price, Kvarts is better, case design is more stylish and status LEDs are bigger.
And still you are able to reuse those batteries at least 500 times which is still a lot better than buying 500 times new 1 use batteries…… plus I have green current.
The reason for the 50% duty cycle limit is to limit the average charging current to a safe level. ( < 800mA per AA cell ) Excessive charging current would overheat the cells. Notice that the AAA cells have lower charge rate.
Добрый день! подскажите, в этом зарядном заряд идет для каждого аккумулятора отдельно или для пары, соединенной последовательно? В моем устройстве работают три аккумулятора и боюсь что оставшийся один заряженный, при следующей зарядке будет портить картину.
I think it only estimates the impedance. The non rechargeable batteries probably have a higher impedance - their voltage increases too much when it tries to charge them.
@@DiodeGoneWild back in my day chargers would have their bottom piece try to make contact close to the edge of the bottom surface and rechargable ones would have the whole surface metal, meanwhile single use ones would have a very thick border and couldn't even make physical contact.
I have problems with this changer and IKEA LADDA 900 AAA batteries no. 23076. Almost all get blinking red ligth (error), while my old ikea charger works fine (Ikea Ladda YH-990BF). Seems this charger is more "strict" somehow? I do feel the IKEA LADDA 900 AAA batteries get a bit hot during charging in Ikea Ladda YH-990BF so maybe STENKOL incorrectly detect this as error. but just guessing. Edit: so also guessing, when detecting heat is should have reduced changing current\duty cycle instead of just going into error mode. A design error IMO. But where are these heat sensors?
I have a question regarding an old charger which I have which charges the batteries in about 15 mins. It's the lg v800c fast charger. Why do the new charger charge so slow in comparison to the old charger? Did they come to the conclusion that charging so fast damages the batteries? Is this why you can't purchase fast chargers anymore? Looking forward to your response.
![[MV] A leap of faith...ความเชื่อใจครั้งสุดท้าย (From "Petrichor the series")](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/U1piZH2CNXA/mqdefault.jpg)
Always look forward to these, thank you :)
I just graduated from electrical engineering and now starting work this week at a PCB manufacturing company. Your videos are the only thorough explanations of exploring practical circuits and understanding how their components work so its been very useful. Unfortunate that my school didnt have enough practical content like this!
Stay safe and have a great day :)
Congratulations! And good luck to you.
In what country is the PCB manufacturing facility? That sounds super interesting. I always love watching videos from those places.
His channel is great. Its is one of the only comprehensive explanations on TH-cam!
Stenkol is Swedish for black (bituminous) coal, ie the kind of coal usually extracted from deep underground mines
Greta should love that!
In German we have the term "Steinkohle" which directly translates to stone/rock coal, which also means the coal from a mine.
@@tastenheber Steenkool in Dutch
And now I'm waiting teardown video of the new oscilloscope :D
The retail price for this charger in IKEA is a ridiculously low £4.50 GBP. I do wonder if it is been sold at cost to encourage battery sales. At twice the price it looks a good quality device.
Yeah I noticed that too. So many components for so little money 👍
Ikea batteries aren't expensive either. I guess it's just economy of scale.
Ikea is known for selling things below their price in order to attract people, they do the same with their food by selling it near the break even cost, or some even below the cost price
I immediately did the same thing. I checked how much it costs. That is a lot of technology for a low cost. Value for money.
£5 now 😣
The problem with the "new" types of LEDs is that manufacturers just pass the same amount of current through them as they would for the old types - so they turn into flashlights instead of indicators. For the new ones, 160uA or so is more than enough as an indicator. Even as low as 5uA can be enough. But they use 10mA, which is insane.
Yea, some new leds are insanely sensitive. I have some which light up just by holding the led from other pin and touching ground with the other.
This really reminds me of some Chinese ODM no-name and off-brand electronics where that is done and thus there's an incredibly bright blue LED. It's as though they didn't test their products in the dark!
agreed , my tv box indicator light is bright as a flashlight.
Yes, when build circuits in the past a 300ohm limit resistor was fine, i just started a new project, leds so bright i slap in a 10k :O
These LEDs are pulse driven, else they couldn’t let them flash slowly on and off like this.
Torx is so much better than pozi/philips! I'm always happy to find them, because there is a lower chance of stripping the screw heads. Even with a cheap chinesium set of bits, torx is easier to use.
many times, what looks like a Phillips is actually JIS, the angles are slightly different, which is why a Phillips screwdriver will cam out and strip it.
PHILLIPS or even POZIDRIV were created and have been used with different objectives than TORX (this one focused to solve automotive industry constraints).
A curious fact about PHILLIPS is that electronics industry have used them very often exactly because of the hidden “feature” of Cam-out if over-torque is employed.
Using automated and torque-controlled tools in an assembly line are easier to make, but when properly designed, that feature is welcome for repairable equipment with housing and casing parts made of plastic. An over torque could simply the plastic post, or fracture the thread. A serviceman would be more difficult to break the plastic as the screwdriver cams out of the Phillips head.
Google “List of screw drives” in the Wikipedia (EN) site, it has a general description of several screw drives.
@AKAtheA and of course it not easy to find JIS tools outside Japan.
Thanks for that. I bought one recently and it seems good, unbelievable amount of circuitry in there for such a low price.
Got to love the name, Stenkol. Someone at IKEA had a sense of humor.
It's Swedish for "stink hole", which also produces their meat-balls for their restaurant.
@@piconano Öh, va fan har du hitta på?
@@piconano LMFAO!
More likely someone at IKEA will get fired because English speaking people won't be running out to buy Stenkol battery chargers...
@@piconano Not really...
Now I'm very impressed that the charger is so cheap, considering what's inside it.
IKEA “brand” seems to care for a minimum of Quality and Performance. In this case here the Battery chargers seem quite GOOD.
However, I have 1 concern: I did not research the influence of PULSED current where the instantaneous CURRENT is more than 4 TIMES the AVERAGE. Maybe it creates gassing, but depending on pulse duration, battery CHEMISTRY may recombine the gases (or not…).
Just guessing, comments and replies for further discussions are appreciated, or maybe even another video.
Thanks for sharing, @DiodeGoneWild!
I am amused by your "new" oscilloscope, is that front port a floppy disk drive? Could you use it to capture some samples? I bet you'd have some working floppys laying around along with some drives
Yes, it has a floppy drive. I already managed to store some waveforms to a floppy disk. I have a pile of floppy disks, of course :).
@@DiodeGoneWild LOL, of course. :D
A very nice data storage media before flash storage and wireless data transmission :)
I also have used a oscilloscope once with a serial port to transfer data to computer, its a very nifty feature.
Try to "play" with a horizontal or acquire menus, there should be some option for a 25/50 MHz bandwidth limit, to limit an HF/RF noise. You also got cursors and automatic measurements in the upper block of buttons... that's quite old but pretty decent DSO.
@@BobT36 ovvvv corseeeeeeeeeeeee (read in Diode's accentttt) :P
It is reassuring to see what a properly built power supply (and charger) looks like as there are far too many "dodgy" devices in the supply chain!
For a low cost manufacturing operation, torx can actually save everyone a lot of headache. Our company's current product formerly used all internal hex (allen) screws, and the internal hex drive is very easy to destroy if there is not a perfect match between the driver and the slot. Torx is much more forgiving when it comes to that.
Phillips screws have basically been obsolete for quite a long time--they were designed for a time when pneumatic screwdrivers had just been invented, but no one had yet come up with a torque limiting device, so Phillips screws are designed to have inherent torque limiting. Nowadays there's no point to that.
If I need to open something up, I would rather the screws be Torx, because I can easily apply a lot of torque to loosen the screw if it has gotten stuck. With Allen or Phillips I might be in for a tougher time--the Allen can easily just be mushed into a circle and lose its engagement, while with Phillips you have to apply downward pressure and then it also might round off.
Another advantage of Torx over hex drive is you don't have two different sets of sizes to deal with.
But Philips head screws are still used in wood working because they look better than other types of heads. Less industrial and more decorative.
The best part about Torx is that even if you strip it somehow (too much force, wrong tool, or corroded/rusty screw), you can usually work it out with a hex bit.
Biggest gripe with hex is imperial vs metric sizes. You can have a key and head that look like they are a match but they're not. Ones metric and the other is imperial and they are ever so slightly different and that little bit of play cause the head (and sometimes the Allen Kwy) to strip.
@@Professional_TH-cam_Commenter We had that exact problem at work. Our product was built from some parts that had metric screws and some parts that had english. We ended up having a lot of 1/16" hex screws but a few 1.5mm which is *almost* the same. Stripped a lot of screws because of it.
@rfmerrill I just use torx bits with hex-hole screws. The bit might bind to the screw, but they'll never strip.
I think that the "noise problem" (15:16) on your oscilloscope is aliased noise because the oscilloscope is undersampling when in scrolling mode. Later(17:54) it works fine.
A hint on those old Tek scopes. Enable the 20MHz BW limiter for your 2 inputs. You do not need the full bandwidth for measuring switching supplies and the trace looks a lot cleaner. Also, I forgot the exact name of it, but if you change the sample size in the trigger menu from 10k points to 500 points, the waveform update/refresh rate is vastly increased looking a lot more like an analog scope, except the fine zoom-in resolution after you freeze a snapshot will not be as fine.
Hello, Diode! I love when you post new videos.
This is a charger review video, was hoping to see the rare and elusive "Nice" verdict at the end of the video!
Thank you Dany ☺️ >> Please people support this man, you can also send something, he will take it apart and examine whether it is GOOD 👍 or DODGY 👎
I like, "SUPER DODGY".
@@Joetechlincolns i love it too 😄
3.19 best bit. The cat is the star of all your videos. :)
It could be charging the batteries in pulses to better measure their voltages, NiMH batteries actually lower their voltage near 100% SoC. Ending the charging by this voltage drop is better than using the temperature method
Whenever I see those 4 legged ICs I hear your voice in my head saying "optocooopler". Great video as always ;)
Of course I’m always pleased to see your cat! And you were OK too! Its the Best day when you upload a new videos!
Ikea always sells products with very complex but intelligently designed circuits.
I buy USB chargers at Ikea, because they are well built and very safe compared to other brands.
I like their LED lighting controllers with the remote control.
I've seen the red/white leds in a couple lights on bigclive's channel.
Also looks like the LEDs are center positive, you could rotate them 180° so red is the normal colour and white is error, which would make it more pleasant at night unless there's an error :P
This was the first time I saw it in real life. I may replace it with a red/green led, or maybe red/yellow, because the new green ones are 525nm rather than 574nm. This makes a huge difference for scotopic vision and circadian sensitivity.
I had two LEDs [5mm ones] that automatically change colors between RED and GREEN. Classic ones do it between red and blue.... What a rarity.
@@DiodeGoneWild hah, scotopic vision. Many years ago i was able to pre-test a new digital 3 chip sensor camera my employer was manufacturing. I set it up at night at home in my garden under the only light available of a very bright full moon.The resulting images were incredible with rich colours present, especially red hues of various flowers more intense than using ordinary sunlight. It was an uncanny feeling, seeing no colour but plainly the camera could.
If you change red to white or the other way round, you also have to change the series resistors. Other wise the red LED will most likely be overdriven a lot because of its lower forward voltage.
I use fine felt tip sharpie marker, to dab a bit of ink on the LEDs. I do this with all of my devices that have bright indicator lights.
Its still clearly visible, But will be dimmer, so it doesn’t bother you when sleeping in a dark room.
This is especially helpful for car chargers and things plugged into the cigarette lighter inside a vehicle. Because when driving at night, some of these modern bright indicator lights can blind you!
I only buy chargers that charge each battery separately any more. Great tip on heat sink compound to bring out lettering on ICs. Never thought about that.
That is such a sophisticated charger
@2:08 - I have a power band that is that way. Lights the entire room. I go around my room with shiny, metal tape to cover any and all flashing or glowing lights. Even the ones on power strips and wall warts get covered.
Sir, you are tank of knowledge.
Put a bit of painter's tape over the LEDs, kills their brightness right down and you can pick your color. Hot Glue is also good, but harder to remove and/or replace.
That charger is much smarter than I expected it to be.
Funny I am a carpenter not an electrician or electronics specialist but I enjoy your videos and have learned so much from you and a couple others that I actually can take something apart now and sometimes diagnose what has gone wrong amazing and thanks for all your hard work and great videos.
15:40 i love the osciloscope with
floppy drive
I use fine felt tip sharpie marker, to dab a bit of ink on the LEDs. I do this with all of my devices that have bright indicator lights.
Its still clearly visible, But will be dimmer, so it doesn’t bother you when sleeping in a dark room.
This is especially helpful for car chargers and things plugged into the cigarette lighter inside a vehicle. Because when driving at night, some of these modern bright indicator lights can blind you!
just loved it , if the Item does not say "don't open", we should open
I have come across an LED driver that runs on universal mains, output is about 45 watts, 3.8 A. Strange thing is I think it uses an IGBT as a regulator. I’d love to see a video on such a driver.
@Ryan Thank you for the reply, I made an amateur error and discarded the transistor that was heat sinked and didn’t write down the part ID, the controller is a BP3238. The feedback and control circuit does not appear to use an opto-coupler for feedback.The board came out of an Artika product after it unexpectedly failed, so I’ve been using the board to learn LED driver circuitry.
can you do a test with the Panasonic BQ-CC55 ? It's now the best to buy AAA & AA charger
I wonder if we could feed it DC power and/or increase the charging current hmm
I was expecting to see unrolling of the transformer coils.... Other than that, excellent video as always.
No nude transformers today😂😂😂😂😂😂😂
The show was rated pg14
thats a nice day Bcuz my favourite channel posted a nice video again 👍thank sir and thanks to engineer Cat for schematics 🐱
Thanks for the look inside of this IKEA Steenkool charger.
I was thinking it can't be any good bc of the low price, but it turns out to be a very decent charger. Probably with -dV/dt cutoff.
I'll buy one or more now that I know.
A suggestion for a Special Video(s): Brand view, as IKEA = here was the Battery charger, in the past the 5V USB charger (3 port). Both seem well constructed, cost competitive and share some design similarities - at least in terms of electrical protection, design concept (channel independence, etc) and other design drivers - could raise some interesting discussions.
Thanks!
Also the batteries from IKEA are quite good!
Nice video when I see IKEA I thought you will find in the box the chargeur parts with the pcb and a cheap soldering iron .
What a Kafkaesque design :D It could be SOOOOO much simpler.
Great Scope! You deserve a lot more donations, an Isolation Tester for example or a "FLIR" IR-Cam. 🙂 Love your channel! 👍
As far i know, Stenkol means "coal" Maybe because the color and form of it they call it "coal" I brought one for only 39 danish kr. include 25% tax ( 6,2 dollar) and it works fine. Incredible what get for the money. I have done a little test with it, and it charges the batteries just as well as the more expensive charger. It a overnight charger.
It's probably called coal because it uses electricity from coal to charge the batteries ;).
@@DiodeGoneWild :-) Good guess. They still use some coal, but will be phased out in the coming years. Sweden has nuclear power and also uses solar, water and wind energy. IKEA will stop using disposable batteries and will only sell rechargeable nimh batteries in the future to reduce waste. Like your video and cat :-)
In Italy it's sold for 4,95€ taxes included, or 9,90€ (taxes included) in bundle with 4 AA 1900mAh batteries, or 12,90€ with 4 AA 2450mAh batteries.
Excellent video as all ways, thank you!
Is this the package from Lithuania caught by customs? I am really curious what happened with it?
The mysterious package was the donated utrai jumpstarter power bank. It came from china, but it went through Lithuania and they put a new label on it and gave it a new tracking number.
So is it a good charger to use? Because many say that pulse charging damages the cells
I am interested as well.
No one answered 😭
High current pulse can be critical with older cells with higher IR
You should activate the 20MHz limit bandwidth to lower the noise ? 300MHz bandwidth is kind of useless on this kind of circuitry.
Great video. I love the new scope. If you don't mind me asking, where are you from? Your accent is very hypnotic. I mean that in a good way.
Nice review video
Hi Diode very interesting video! I have one of those alkaline battery chargers that works and it would be a great idea to analyze one of those on one of your videos. Keep up the great work!
Ikea electronics are mostly well built
Can you make a video on liner power supply V&A controlled
11:48 finger near live terminal.
Eagerly waiting for spark.
To be fair in the light of safety most manufacturers recommend that we don't leave the charger unattended. This is because of a rare occasion cells can fail catastrophically and start a fire. Since sleeping is a state in which one is not aware of this reality either by dream state or deep sleep. So if it's possible for that much danger to exist in such an incident looking package then should we not err on the side of caution and simply not change while we sleep in the first place? That allows us to choose color for their aesthetic value instead of worrying about whether it's going to keep us awake.
23:15 Can't wait for testing the new Lidl accus i see in this clip curious of the capacity ...
I wonder if theese pulsating charging destroyes the batteries quicker than charging with constant voltage.
I still have the “old” white Ladda IKEA charger and the outputs are rated a lot higher. I wonder if it’s just the way they spec 4x…..
I feel the need to open mine now and compare it to this new one.
I actually bought a Stenkol and although it’s nice that you have individual LEDs for each battery, it is MUCH slower at charging than the “old” white Ladda charger.
@@atariandre5014 Slower charging is better for the batteries.
@@massengineer7582 yeah thought about that. It’s hard to believe they didn’t improve the charger…
Up to 1C charge rate is pretty safe, old LADDA made by same OEM as the Sanyo/Panasonic charger iirc
Why did they shrink wrap the inrush resistor thermal fuse, and not the MOV?
What are the chances of a resistor exploding?
My guess is that the resistor will pop at 125ºC and they wanted to mark it on the piece?
Usually MOVs are shrink tubed as they sometimes explode from lightening strikes.
Probably to contain the arc flash/sparks from the popping resistor just in case
In most digital oscilloscopes under 50mv you have noise. You need to short the prob ground but some times will help some times not to much.
Very well explained
Nice oscilloscope. I like it!
awesomely thorough look! IKEA says this uses 0dU/dt for termination. I'd be interested to see whether after termination there is residual "trickle charge" current as this can reduce life of LSD cells (eneloop/ladda).
Yes, I can't seem to find an answer on this regarding the Stenkol charger.
I had those two color leds 3 yrs ago red amd green in one
wow well built design! Though I think there was alot of engineering that went into something that uses PWM charging to the batteries, I will stick with a nicer charger that uses buck regulators and constant current control.
Yes modern electronics are annoying with the led indicator lights. I use black electric tape to cover them up. Maybe just replace the LEDs since you're opening it anyway
Is it time based charger or smart?Can it to check each battery, and if battery is 50% charged,to charge it only for the rest of 50%?
Smart with -dv/dt termination
I was expecting a comment on the surface mounted spark gap visible at 22:01. This is mounted between the primary to secondary. Notice the absence of solder resist.
This is making me to want to open up my EBL charger which is powered by micro USB but I don't want to mess up the case.
here, have some faith 😏
Nice new digital scope!
You should be happy with it but the old analog scope is more fun
I bought Kvarts charger few months ago, but now it's discontinued in the favor of Stenkol. Kvarts appears to be very finicky, discards some too worn batteries, and sometimes doesn't charge mildly worn red Lidl cells fully. I guess it's tuned for Ladda cells (and by extension Eneloops).
Inside Kvarts looks very similar, with a microcontroller and a shitload of circuitry. But it cost 2 times as much.
This new Stenkol also seems to be finicky with some cells. I tried to charge my fairly old Energizer NiMHs, but it wouldn't accept them. Starts charging then after some 10 minutes the red LEDs start flashing. Of course I can charge the cells with a different charger.
@@zoltandiveki5233 So I guess software wise they did not change much. Then disregarding the price, Kvarts is better, case design is more stylish and status LEDs are bigger.
I misread the title as "ikea stinkol" i cannot stop laughing
Gives off stink lines while charging like in a cartoon LOL
The name Stenkol could be reminding us "Your environment-friendly electric device could actually be powered by coal"
And still you are able to reuse those batteries at least 500 times which is still a lot better than buying 500 times new 1 use batteries…… plus I have green current.
How do i mail you something to do a video on?
Is this a Timer-based charger ?
Haha, I just saw this thing in IKEA a few hours ago and literally thinking what it would look inside
Other TH-camrs - watermark logo
DGW - *SKETCH PEN*
Great video but hard to focus when I'm hearing Borat talking to me about ikea battery charger :P
Excellent analysis.
How does it regulate the current going into each/all batteries?
Why does it charge one cell at 50% duty cycle?
The reason for the 50% duty cycle limit is to limit the average charging current to a safe level. ( < 800mA per AA cell )
Excessive charging current would overheat the cells.
Notice that the AAA cells have lower charge rate.
Another reason is that the charger is measuring the cell voltage droop during the period between the charging pulses.
Do these Stenkol chargers trickle charge after finishing charging?
The oscilloscope is nice.
I bought a used hp 54603b, instead of one like this, becouse the ui seemed a bit clunky.
wonder if its a re-branded Panasonic charger since they sell re-branded Eneloops
Stenkol is swedish for Bituminous coal / black coal
Добрый день!
подскажите, в этом зарядном заряд идет для каждого аккумулятора отдельно или для пары, соединенной последовательно?
В моем устройстве работают три аккумулятора и боюсь что оставшийся один заряженный, при следующей зарядке будет портить картину.
Best chareger
How does it detect if a battery is not rechargable?
I think it only estimates the impedance. The non rechargeable batteries probably have a higher impedance - their voltage increases too much when it tries to charge them.
@@DiodeGoneWild back in my day chargers would have their bottom piece try to make contact close to the edge of the bottom surface and rechargable ones would have the whole surface metal, meanwhile single use ones would have a very thick border and couldn't even make physical contact.
Like your videos like always (:
Please do similar for IKEA 1 amps (5 watt) usb charger. I use it for overnight mobile charging. Thanks for your help.
I still believe that Gigabyte can learn from this video making safer PSUs😄😁😆
14:20 is that an oscilloscope with a floppy drive?
I have problems with this changer and IKEA LADDA 900 AAA batteries no. 23076. Almost all get blinking red ligth (error), while my old ikea charger works fine (Ikea Ladda YH-990BF). Seems this charger is more "strict" somehow? I do feel the IKEA LADDA 900 AAA batteries get a bit hot during charging in Ikea Ladda YH-990BF so maybe STENKOL incorrectly detect this as error. but just guessing. Edit: so also guessing, when detecting heat is should have reduced changing current\duty cycle instead of just going into error mode. A design error IMO. But where are these heat sensors?
Lol bought it on Friday on my birthday 😂
I have a question regarding an old charger which I have which charges the batteries in about 15 mins. It's the lg v800c fast charger. Why do the new charger charge so slow in comparison to the old charger? Did they come to the conclusion that charging so fast damages the batteries? Is this why you can't purchase fast chargers anymore? Looking forward to your response.
Yes. Fast charging like 15 min killing your battery fast. Because excessive heat and too much current than rated current stated by manufacturer.
How to charge NiMh cell.
Can u make easy and simple charger.plz
Kaptan tape over the white LED'S fixes the blue-White colour.
Torx are very common, maybe most used finder in the europe.
Stenkol in Polish, it sounds like someone is groaning while pooping. Swedish have a sense of humor 😁.
how long does it take to charge?
Is it good or not? Someone tell be please