Hasselblad ELM Homemade Battery Pack
I just finished fabrication of my first top quality Hasselblad 500 EL battery pack. I'm sorry I didn't take pictures of the process, friends. But it did turn out very nice. I had made several battery packs in the past out of cheap Sunbeam AAA batteries from the Dollar Tree, but this was my first one with rechargeables. I used 5 Sanyo Eneloop AAA's to get my 6+volts, actually 6.4VDC tested. I found that arranging them around an ordinary pencil gave me a very good pentagon arrangement, whereupon I tacked them together with some dabs of hot glue. Then I went around all contact ends with my Weller soldering gun and flowed out solder on each one. Then I cut little strips of copper tape and linked them in series by soldering. The last battery required a length of hook-up wire to finish the series, run down the center of the battery stack.
After that I soldered on a red hook-up wire to the pos, black to the neg. The arrangement tested 6.4V, on Eneloop batteries right out of the package I had bought last summer. Testament to the quality of this brand--They hold their charge well.
Then I procured some chipboard of the variety that is on the back of a legal scratch pad. I wrapped the pack with strips of chipboard cut to the same length of the AAA's EXCLUDING the extra length of the positive terminal button. I had calipered the diameter of an old-style dead battery pack (factory made), and wrapped my pack till the diameter matched. Then wrap a few turns of thin plastic box tape, 2 inch.
Then using some more chipboard I made ends with a small hole in the center for my wire to poke through. Then I stripped the wire flush with the surfaces (BE CAREFUL--you only get the one chance not to lose strands by stripping too deep). Then I fashioned some contacts out of copper tape and soldered down my stripped wires. Finished. Time: maybe a couple hours with the TV going.
Works perfectly. I might mention you might have to whack lightly on each end to smash down any sticking-up solder, and to level out the stack so you don't have to smash on the battery cover to get it to lock.
Camera purrs like a kitten--better than it had been doing on the packs I had been making out of 4 AAA alkalines. It winds with authority and quite snappy.
I just finished fabrication of my first top quality Hasselblad 500 EL battery pack. I'm sorry I didn't take pictures of the process, friends. But it did turn out very nice. I had made several battery packs in the past out of cheap Sunbeam AAA batteries from the Dollar Tree, but this was my first one with rechargeables. I used 5 Sanyo Eneloop AAA's to get my 6+volts, actually 6.4VDC tested. I found that arranging them around an ordinary pencil gave me a very good pentagon arrangement, whereupon I tacked them together with some dabs of hot glue. Then I went around all contact ends with my Weller soldering gun and flowed out solder on each one. Then I cut little strips of copper tape and linked them in series by soldering. The last battery required a length of hook-up wire to finish the series, run down the center of the battery stack.
After that I soldered on a red hook-up wire to the pos, black to the neg. The arrangement tested 6.4V, on Eneloop batteries right out of the package I had bought last summer. Testament to the quality of this brand--They hold their charge well.
Then I procured some chipboard of the variety that is on the back of a legal scratch pad. I wrapped the pack with strips of chipboard cut to the same length of the AAA's EXCLUDING the extra length of the positive terminal button. I had calipered the diameter of an old-style dead battery pack (factory made), and wrapped my pack till the diameter matched. Then wrap a few turns of thin plastic box tape, 2 inch.
Then using some more chipboard I made ends with a small hole in the center for my wire to poke through. Then I stripped the wire flush with the surfaces (BE CAREFUL--you only get the one chance not to lose strands by stripping too deep). Then I fashioned some contacts out of copper tape and soldered down my stripped wires. Finished. Time: maybe a couple hours with the TV going.
Works perfectly. I might mention you might have to whack lightly on each end to smash down any sticking-up solder, and to level out the stack so you don't have to smash on the battery cover to get it to lock.
Camera purrs like a kitten--better than it had been doing on the packs I had been making out of 4 AAA alkalines. It winds with authority and quite snappy.
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