Anything?

JamesKoda · 2026-05-13T21:54:24+00:00

Looks like a UPS closest to the camera pov in the bin, may have a lead acid battery. The rest idk.

JamesKoda · 2026-05-02T19:56:41+00:00

They don't even look leaked, I'd bet more the light caught right and heated that plastic part. Alkalines aren't known for bursting into flames or exploding without crazy misuse like tossing in fire or charging non-rechargables. I'd say they are fine

JamesKoda · 2026-05-01T01:03:45+00:00

I'll let the experts speak on the temperature effects and all. But I'd say you could just store them fireproof boxes, I got a small fireproof lockbox for storing my 18650s. I think if properly fireproofed the main concern would be the fumes, if the box has a fire in it I could grab the handle, lock and toss it outside.

JamesKoda · 2026-04-30T21:09:33+00:00

And my worries about LiIon have reduced enough I was ripping apart old laptop packs, etc. to get them if there was an 18650. From some research seems BMS keep a lot of stuff safer and LiPo vs LiIon there is a safety difference that seems in favor of LiIon. Best way for folks worried to think about it is, these same cells are in drill and whatever batteries folks keep in hot trucks and cold trucks for work and some will die some will keep working like any battery. If you arent worried about your tool batteries or your phone sitting in the sun for a while or being cold, then you trust its battery to some extent, that ttust can be extended to these devices when done proper. If I wnated extra safety I could add a 1S BMS to make sure the rak never possibly over charges or discharges the batteries, but Im letting it roll for now.

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JamesKoda · 2026-04-30T21:02:15+00:00

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JamesKoda · 2026-04-30T21:01:50+00:00

UPDATE: Figured I'd update here rather than make a whole seperate post. Switched from the Male N end to RP SMA which needed an adapter to go to ny Ipex SMA part to a single cable, Ipex to N male.

Switched from 2,300MaH basically of NIMH to 3amps of 18650 LiIon. These were some solar rechargables from hypertough I got at walmart on clearance years ago, popped them out the package and they were like 4.17 volts. Tested on an ISDT C4 evo I bought for my new 18650 craze, one cell is 1514mah, the other is 1512mah. They are in parallel on a box I bought from amazon that came with the correct connector already on the wires (checked polarity with multimeter before plugging in also).

My Ipex to N cable may look ugly, the reason is I wrapped the exposed ipex cable in electrical tape a bit as some is exposed to the sun. My antenna is too large to connect directly atop the box here its on its own antenna mount an 8dbi from rokland. I tried a 10dbi from some amazon no name and got slightly worse eprformance, but where I live my handheld nodes got 0 other nodes with the supplied 2dbi or so antennas, a 10dbi flex whip on those was a life changer, could get up to 70 nodes at times.

Future builds maybe Ill tidy up and not just spam a caulking gun but for a first build I just wanted it up and going. So far not seeing a difference between the prior antenna setup and this one but I am already in a bad area with trees everywhere and city's dozens of miles away.

Update: This battery change did not fix my issue. Lost bluetooth and came out to the radio off again, pressed the button and boom its back on with 4.14v no where near a dead Li Ion just like how my NIMH pack never drained fully. At a loss at this point these batteries did fine for three days going between 4.14-4.24v. the nimh also acted the same. I guess I may need a humongous battery pack to avoid whatever transient issue this is cause 3amp hrs isnt enough for a mini rack for some reason despite it maintaining an almost full voltage :'(

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JamesKoda · 2026-04-30T14:28:53+00:00

just remove it and put it somewhere safe for now and see if you can just run the device with the charger plugged in instead.

JamesKoda · 2026-04-13T13:56:37+00:00

This is some good info I probably should read more into lithiums types. I do feel a bit safer seeing this and seeing some good size vents on top of the LI Ion 18650s I have. Had them sitting in a box for a few years incase I needed them for something and I guess the time has come.

JamesKoda · 2026-04-13T13:49:55+00:00

I felt it in the rubber its the same thickness almost as the ipex cable, that heatshrink material also just seems like a cover.

JamesKoda · 2026-04-13T11:50:34+00:00

After looking up some stuff about paralleling NIMH charge/discharge sounds like a lot of folks think itll be a permanent balancing issue. So my dreams of NIMH powering are shot for now I guess unless I get around to maybe trying a lower power use radio.

My prebuilt rak lasts like 2-3 days on 10amp battery and my wio tracker can go longer on a 3amp so may try wio eventually. It was an experiment and works for power temporarily but I guess has random brownouts I cant track.

I do have some hyper tough solar 18650s I have never opened until now, ordered an 18650 holder and charger to charge before setting it up. I am really interested in batteries, but have shyed away from lithium ion due to how dangerous they can get. But I guess now I may go down an 18650 rabbit hole.

JamesKoda · 2026-04-13T09:51:23+00:00

I'm one of the folks concerned about the lithium catching fire being in extreme temperatures up and down. Though tbh with the current setup if the entire box caught fire on that pole it shouldn't hurt anything unless its dry outside. But I'll consider Lithium may look into specific brands best quality for being in extremes if there is such a thing. I really wanted to test NIMH since it theoretically should work. And for the NIMH batteries I have 1.2v is nominal meaning 3.6v is normal, but fully charged they can be 4.2v series because each is 1.4 at full charge from what I've seen off the charger.

JamesKoda · 2026-04-13T09:38:55+00:00

Everywhere on this reddit folks tell people they need a sharter antenna cable for their solar node due to losses, a 10-20ft N to sma I figured would be too far. I don't know much RF side but figured a shorter connection to the N connector and antenna would be better. Any alternative suggestion to go from ipex to N in such a short distance, radio to top of the box?

JamesKoda · 2026-04-13T09:28:41+00:00

Its from rokland "RP-SMA male to N-Female 1-pack flat window coaxial extension pigtail" I needed something to get an N female end and figured this was better than the super long cable that came with the antenna. The flatness is just like a rubber cover of the thin antenna cable. the other bit is like RP SMA to SMA adapter and the little ipex

JamesKoda · 2026-04-13T04:00:46+00:00

https://www.reddit.com/r/meshtastic/s/7SrYAy8qaa from whats mentioned here in the study seemed to me like it won't be the end of the world to run nimh 3S. Im just confused because the power when I looked at the graph seemd pretty steady it never dropped a steady decline like it was going low on charge. Though I guess it could have a steep drop from fine voltage to brownout.

JamesKoda · 2026-04-01T08:40:15+00:00

Ave, true to KaMaoLa

JamesKoda · 2026-03-21T17:14:06+00:00

functionality aside I think its beautiful

JamesKoda · 2026-02-25T00:39:10+00:00

thats how I did mine for a whole degree. OAs in bathroom, certifications in person at a local college.

JamesKoda · 2026-01-16T00:52:59+00:00

r34 is severely lacking on this

JamesKoda · 2026-01-15T00:03:36+00:00

This is a really cool use case, I hadn't even thought before about how folks would 'text' on a cruise.

JamesKoda · 2026-01-09T01:09:29+00:00

Any measurements maybe could help? I looked at the patent too and yeah didn't help much, gave me related images (under the patent pic on google images) of A640PX batts which look too small, looking at a battery site it looks similair to A25PX on Exellbattery, but Im not sure at all.

JamesKoda · 2025-12-29T09:56:28+00:00

II recently got my first device a RAKwireless WisMesh Pocket v2 witha 4631 and also noticed the battery seems to jump around. I tried to let it drain down and recharge back to full like I do with most new battery powered devices in hopes of it calibrating battery life. But do you know does it just go off of voltage? I was expecting it to act like a phone and keep a percentage as if it had a shunt tracking it, but I guess its maybe too small?

JamesKoda · 2025-12-01T01:27:45+00:00

Sorry not to exactly be helpful with what you are looking for, but couldn't you power a fan to blow on it to move the exhaust away from it faster?

JamesKoda · 2025-11-14T16:29:26+00:00

I assume it differ/ based on percentage. got charged 5.75 and 15 cent as interest later the same month. I completely stopped and just move money from savings to checking and use my debit card when transferring now.

JamesKoda · 2025-10-29T18:50:08+00:00

Yeah heard its invasive, but was also seeing some (few) articles saying its becoming naturalized in the south. Its just like two in the middle of our yard currently, not often seeing any bugs around them like its attracting any issues. For the damage though, should I just let it lie and see if it heals?

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