Conditioning/Forming Nimh packs

[hoober]

5 mv is about right for subC packs. Here's a recipe:

For brand new packs or nice packs that have sat for a long time. 1-2 slow c/10 charges will form and balance the cells.

For packs that have sat or self-discharge at varying rates or for some other reason are imbalanced , no amount of cycling will bring the cells back to balance. A c/10 charge should be done for 15 hrs to balance them once.

Although "cycling" may help the pack as a whole it will not ever bring the pack to even balance. What is needed is a "forced overcharge" and normally a peak charger is a very poor choice unless it has a trickle charge that is allowed to overcharge an amount for a lenth of time that is equalk to the difference in capacity between the highest and lowest cell.

An example may be a single peak charge with a 100 ma trickle allowed to full charge then trickle well overnite. If the pack is already balanced then it makes no difference.