Celestron power tank 17 help

[spaceblue (Jim)]

I have a Celestron power tank 17 charger which I have stuipdly left plugged in to the wall for over 6mths, I have just tried to use it and suprise suprise no power, I have reset the circuit breaker and nothing has changed, the fuse hasn't popped, when I go to plug the unit back in I get no lights, nothing.

I have a nasty feeling I have wrecked the battery,but I am hoping that someone on this site has experience with these units and can tell me if I am going to have to replace the battery or better still give me an idea how I can rectify my own idiocy without needing to replace the battery.

[Marke (Mark)]

Hate to say this but you have most likely klled it
Common problem with the power tank. You can probably open it
up and replace the battery without too much drama.
Or just get a 21AH marine jump start pack from Super cheap Auto
or K-mart for probably close to the price or a replacement battery.

[DavidU (Dave)]

She's RIP mate.

[spaceblue (Jim)]

Originally Posted by Marke

Hate to say this but you have most likely klled it
Common problem with the power tank. You can probably open it
up and replace the battery without too much drama.
Or just get a 21AH marine jump start pack from Super cheap Auto
or K-mart for probably close to the price or a replacement battery.

Thanks Mark,

you have told me what i was hoping I wouldn't hear (but lesson learned).

With the 21AH jumper will I be able to plug it directly into my Nexstar 4 SE ? Or will I have to get an adaptor.

[Marke (Mark)]

It has 2 cigarette lighter sockets on it so if thats what you use
then just plug it in.

[Visionoz (Bill)]

Jim

I had a similar experience about 2 months ago with the same model and what I did before I thought I really had to chuck the thing out the window was to put it on hyper-charge mode using a car-battery charger (mine was an Arlec model which had switchable rates of charge) and this I did by clipping the terminals of the charger to the unit's two leads - of course bearing caution as to the polarities - and lo and behold after a day or two of that charging everything came good again

If your battery was good before this happened then most likely leaving the charging unit in all the time would not have caused the problem since I understand that it float-charges the battery - in my case I might have inadvertently left the rocker switch in the wrong position - I must add that one has to be very careful of that 3-position rocker switch that can easily be switched to a position that is not required and thus depleting the battery cells flat (I suppose the industrial designer who designed the Tank is not an amateur astronomer!)

HTH
Cheers
Bill

[spaceblue (Jim)]

Originally Posted by Visionoz

Jim

I had a similar experience about 2 months ago with the same model and what I did before I thought I really had to chuck the thing out the window was to put it on hyper-charge mode using a car-battery charger (mine was an Arlec model which had switchable rates of charge) and this I did by clipping the terminals of the charger to the unit's two leads - of course bearing caution as to the polarities - and lo and behold after a day or two of that charging everything came good again

If your battery was good before this happened then most likely leaving the charging unit in all the time would not have caused the problem since I understand that it float-charges the battery - in my case I might have inadvertently left the rocker switch in the wrong position - I must add that one has to be very careful of that 3-position rocker switch that can easily be switched to a position that is not required and thus depleting the battery cells flat (I suppose the industrial designer who designed the Tank is not an amateur astronomer!)

HTH
Cheers
Bill

G'Day Bill,
Thanks for the reply and the advise, do you mean connecting the charger to the jump leads on the power tank? Can you also tell me what you mean by Hyper charge and what sort of power your charger puts out.

Thanks again.

[Visionoz (Bill)]

Hi Jim

Yes use the two alligator clips (that's what I have on my Arlec car battery charger's leads) and of course ensure correct polarity first - ie +pos lead to red lead, -ve lead to black lead of the Power Tank

My Arlec charger is rated @ 8amps RMS and there is a rocker switch marked "Normal" and on the other end "Boost" which is the high charging rate mode; if your car battery charger has no such facility, don't worry just put the charger on and not forgetting the switch on the Power Tank should also be put into the charge mode and away you go; you might have to leave it charging for at least a day before you see results

I think because I used the "Boost" setting whilst charging it seems to have done the fix overnight, not sure how long it will take on "normal" setting though I must add that there is no worry of "over-charging" the battery because the car-battery charger normally enters the automatic float-charge mode (ie trickle charge) when the battery gets near full charge

That's how mine worked so best give it at least a try rather than junk the lot first without trying!

HTH
Cheers
Bill

[spaceblue (Jim)]

Originally Posted by Visionoz

Hi Jim

Yes use the two alligator clips (that's what I have on my Arlec car battery charger's leads) and of course ensure correct polarity first - ie +pos lead to red lead, -ve lead to black lead of the Power Tank

My Arlec charger is rated @ 8amps RMS and there is a rocker switch marked "Normal" and on the other end "Boost" which is the high charging rate mode; if your car battery charger has no such facility, don't worry just put the charger on and not forgetting the switch on the Power Tank should also be put into the charge mode and away you go; you might have to leave it charging for at least a day before you see results

I think because I used the "Boost" setting whilst charging it seems to have done the fix overnight, not sure how long it will take on "normal" setting though I must add that there is no worry of "over-charging" the battery because the car-battery charger normally enters the automatic float-charge mode (ie trickle charge) when the battery gets near full charge

That's how mine worked so best give it at least a try rather than junk the lot first without trying!

HTH
Cheers
Bill

Thanks Bill,
I thought you meant clip to clip but I wanted to make sure, I'll grab myself a battery charger and see what happens, i need a charger anyway. i will post the results once I know and they can be archived for anyone else who makes the same mistake.

[Visionoz (Bill)]

Originally Posted by spaceblue

Thanks Bill,
I thought you meant clip to clip but I wanted to make sure, I'll grab myself a battery charger and see what happens, i need a charger anyway. i will post the results once I know and they can be archived for anyone else who makes the same mistake.

Hi Jim

Just to ensure you get the correct idea (your comment ..."you meant clip to clip.." worries me a bit!) what I did really is NOT USE the little wall plug-pack charger that the Power Tank is provided with BUT instead used a car-battery charger to charge the Power Tank directly.
The car-battery charger's leads were then connected to the Power Tank's 2 flying leads which incidentally has copper-tipped largish clamps (the two that are stored behind the clear plastic cover in the rear of the Power Tank unit) being mindful of the correct polarity as one has to be as in charging a car battery (or any battery for that matter) AND thus bypassed the charging receptable that is on the Power Tank that you would normally use if you used the wall plug-pack charger

You must set the 3-position red rocker switch to the "CHA" mode on the Power Tank as per normal otherwise the charging will not occur

Hope that clarifies the method

Cheers
Bill

[spaceblue (Jim)]

Originally Posted by Visionoz

Hi Jim

Just to ensure you get the correct idea (your comment ..."you meant clip to clip.." worries me a bit!) what I did really is NOT USE the little wall plug-pack charger that the Power Tank is provided with BUT instead used a car-battery charger to charge the Power Tank directly.
The car-battery charger's leads were then connected to the Power Tank's 2 flying leads which incidentally has copper-tipped largish clamps (the two that are stored behind the clear plastic cover in the rear of the Power Tank unit) being mindful of the correct polarity as one has to be as in charging a car battery (or any battery for that matter) AND thus bypassed the charging receptable that is on the Power Tank that you would normally use if you used the wall plug-pack charger

You must set the 3-position red rocker switch to the "CHA" mode on the Power Tank as per normal otherwise the charging will not occur

Hope that clarifies the method

Cheers
Bill

Hi Bill,
I got what you meant I just don't explain myself properly sometimes , I have connected the cables from the battery charger to the cables on the power tank, and I have the unit set on trickle charge.

The rocker switch has been set to "charge", I have noticed that the green fully charged light on the power tank is flashing.

Did you get any flashing lights when you did your unit?

[Visionoz (Bill)]

Hi Jim

I didn't notice if it is normal for the green "Charging" LED to blink during the charging process or not but as long as it does not go out it at least means it is charging - the "Fully charged" LED should be constantly on when it is full charged; I just checked mine

Not sure if the trickle mode charge is good since the battery was at least fully depleted, perhaps you need to hi-charge it for at least 30 minutes initially to give it a kick-start so to speak

Anyway you''l soon find out mate

Cheers
Bill

[asterisk (Geoff)]

Originally Posted by spaceblue

...power tank 17 charger which I have stuipdly left plugged in to the wall for over 6mths ...

I also suffer from this problem, but I solved it with:

http://www.batteriesdirect.com.au/sh...28/xs3600.html

Great little unit - I leave it plugged in and turned on all the time. My batteries (both deep-cycle) are always fully-charged whenever I want to use them. No more problems of forgetting to re-charge or turning-off after charging; no more replacement battery costs.

[spaceblue (Jim)]

Hi Guy's,
It's been a while since I posted thanks to being back at work, but I thought I would bring the saga of my power tank to it's conclusion.

I was able to return my power tank to the Aust Geo shop and get a full refund, apparently my problem isn't uncommon with power tanks, and I believe they also had wiring problems, the store manager told me that they are not able to source them from the supplier and there has been no indication of when they will be available.

I have since gone out a bought a Jump starter with a 17ah battery and a 240v charger that you can keep on charge indefinately as it goes into float mode and will not damage the memory.

I got this unit from a place called Australian All Electric Vehicles, and the guy I delt with was terriffic and very knowledgeable with batteries, this unit cost me less than buying one from an auto store, it is light and easy to use, the only other thing I would suggest to get is an extension for the 12v socket plug as the cord that comes with it is a little short, it is also important to make sure that the tip of the 12v plug that goes into the telescope is the right polarity, my tip was positive and the guy was quite happy to test it and confirm the polarity.
His last comment to me was that if I wasn't sure of anything to call him and he would help out, he even suggested that if I was unsure I could take the telescope into him and he would test it to make sure of the polarity, so that I didn't blow my scope.

so all's well that ends well, many thanks to all who posted replies and a big thaks to Visonoz who showed enough interest to keep in touch with Pm's.