Anyone tried Battery Kings DCS Pro batteries?

They have two batteries, neither of which are marked Kodak. They claim that they are new... but it's not clear how long they have been new. One is an OEM battery, and the other seems to be aftermarket. The OEM ones are $51, and the aftermarket are more like $67. Both come with a 1 year warranty. Both are rated 1700mAh.

Yesterday I took test shots for PhotonsToPhotos, after taking my battery out of the charger. Total was something like 60 shots, and the battery made it, but it did complain once or twice that the battery was too low. Waiting a few seconds was enough for it to finish the shots. Turning it back on a few minutes later showed a full battery again. Clearly not ideal behavior, but I wonder how much better these "new" batteries would be.

I messaged Battery Kings to find out the differences between these two batteries. Their terse reply was, "Hello, Unfortunately that battery has been discontinued."

Both of them show Available=Y on their Web site.

So, now I'm thinking something like this might be suitable for replacement cells: www.amazon.com/EEMB-Battery-Rechargeable-Connector-Certified/dp/B095VQRW73/ref=sr_1_6?crid=2BXJ7KXJZ1PJ4&keywords=eemb%2B1800mah&qid=1681827713&s=electronics&sprefix=eemb%2B1800mah%2Celectronics%2C151&sr=1-6&th=1

Anybody know the pinouts of the battery? Or have opened one and can post some images?

Hi,

And here I thought you'd found a source. No matter how well they worked or didn't, I bet they'd have been better than what you have.

Stan

The OE battery itself is actually marked on the case.

Looking at the bottom of the battery, with the contacts at the top, the rightmost contact is marked + (let's call that pin 5) and the one one from the left is marked - (pin 2, if the leftmost one is pin 1).

Measuring voltage between the contacts, I got 7.88V between the - and + ones, and slightly lower voltage using pin 3 or 4 for -. Not the same slightly lower voltage... one was like 7.84 and the other like 7.86.

I was hoping to just find 3.7 ish volts between some combination of contacts, but it does not appear the individual cells or the center point between them are brought out to the contacts. Pin 1(?) as - measured something like 0.1V from +.

There isn't a whole lot of room for a battery management circuit inside... but I guess there probably is one in there. More investigations will have to wait until I get an extra battery that is in worse shape than my current one.

Hi,

Yes, I think you are going to have to open one up to find out. I never got into this series, so I have no sad sack packs to open up and look at to try and help here. Just the older stick NiMH packs here. And those aren't anything special.

You don't want to mess up something that still works, even if only somewhat.

I tended to put the chips and FET switches inside the pack case. Often times wrapped up in the cell itself. Or one of the cells if I was using two. And then usually had the cells as independent inputs to the chip flex with that having the output to the pack terminals. That way, I could monitor the LiIon cells themselves independent from each other.

Here's betting Kodak did the same. Although....

They may have only a rudimentary bit of electronics inside the pack and do most of it inside the charger and the camera. Those units were pretty early for how they were handled.

Stan

I think this series of batteries are overly complicated and over engineered in every aspect (for some reason). Somewhere around the web was the schematic or block diagram of the charger and it had a PPC cpu or an i960 (don't remember which of the two right now). Pretty sure the the battery has some sort of communication with the body and charger.

A good way to start the research could be taking apart the charger (which can be done in a non-destructive way) and start probing the pins. (Warning: shock hazard)

Also rebuilding the pack is often feasible, just open it and replace the cell connecting everything as it was original. Newer batteries (like the ones from RED cameras) have a battery backed RAM that loses all the information when the pack is taken apart rendering the battery useless older batteries were not like that, just the necessary to keep it working, the internal electronics are for safety and precision metering the remaining charge, like Stan said, theres often a FET to control each cell to avoid overcharge and overdischarge, also a thermal fuse.

Maybe the camera works fine if only voltage is supplied and just wont meter the charge, that way you can hook any cells you want, you'll have to charge them with another generic charger but as long as it works...
I know is a Ni-MH one but on my D1x i made this mod with two 18650 cells and it works wonderful. If you prove this to work you might even be able to design and 3d print an adapter, similar to the AA holder of the Finepix S.

Either you're thinking of a different charger, or someone was pulling your leg.

There is no CPU inside this charger. There is a 24pin SOIC, and a 14pin SOIC. The 24pin has a number like AS-2126L or something, but I'm not finding any match for that.

There are only three connections to the battery. They correspond to pin2 (ground), pin3 (?), and pin5 (Vb). Pin3 has a small trace that looks like it goes eventually to the 24pin IC. Maybe it's a status signal from the battery management board... or maybe it's a temperature sense pin?

Well that's great news for you, maybe was another charger for the Pro Back or another product. 3 pin Li-Ion are often Positive, Neutral and Temperature or Sense.

Temperature is often measured via resistance (often a few K ohms), you can easily check that with a multimeter, get a reading at room temperature, then cool down the battery on the fridge and see if the value changed, also if it's temperature you can see the value modifying as it warms again.

Sense is often a fixed resistor, different resistors means different things, like full battery capacity and such, somewhat an identifier.

In some weird cases the third pin is a serial communication line, since the charger is so simple and the replacement batteries looks quite cheap (i have one on mine) i don't think is the case.

I'd try to supply voltage to the camera and see if it works, for testing purposes a lab power supply is really good to tune the perfect voltage and limiting the current in case something goes wrong, but with a regular 12v power brick and a cheap variable dc-dc you can make your own test power supply. if you read 7.8v that's perfect for two Li-Ion cells in series, they go from 3.6v when almost discharged to 4.2v fully charged.

As a source for batteries i like to go with good original cell phone batteries, they are much better than regular cells from disputable sites and they tend to be cheap if it's from a model that's somewhat outdated, on my NC2000 i have an assortment of really old cells from the mid 2000s and they work really well, for another project I used some NOS Blackberry batteries for the Q1, those are made in Japan and they've taken a beat without a significant lose in capacity (actually i think what they are powering stand on the same amount of time since i build it).

I bought a second NOS battery for my SLR/n. Trying it out now to see how its frame count for a charge compares to the old one. In any case, now that I have a second, I will likely, in the next few days, open up the old one to see what I can find about rebuilding it and/or making suitable replacements.

OK. Opened up the old battery today. Turns out the battery housing is not plastic welded, but simply snaps together. You just remove the lock mechanism from the end, and then snap it open. There's a battery management circuit at the end near the contacts, and two flat cells each 49 x 34 x 10 millimeters.

The battery manager has an S8232E (battery protection IC) and two TPC8207s (MOSFET array).

Looks like the cells are pretty close to 103450, however, for 103450, and most other LiPo flat cells, they come with a battery management circuit attached. Any ideas where I can get bare cells? Worst case I can probably remove the management circuit, but I'd rather not have to.

That's very interesing.

I've cascaded management circuits with no issues, you can always try that and if it's not working correctly then you remove the one from the cells.

For safety reasons I'd leave the cells with their own protection even if they act a little weird, the chances of not getting cells with the same specs as the originals are quite high and I wouldn't feel that safe charging them with a management circuit designed for other variety of cells

The chances of the cells fitting with the extra circuit board on them is pretty close to 0. So that means either remove them, or go for much lower capacity cells that will fit with their circuit boards in place. As I understand it, and also from what the management ICs' data sheets say, the main concern is voltage, which is set by chemistry, not capacity.

I ordered a couple of 103450 LiPo cells from Walmart.com. Claim to be 2000mAh, and 3.7V, of course. Should have them around Wednesday. I'll update here how it goes. Price-wise, $20ish for the pair delivered.

Hi,

Yep. Sounds like you'll need to cut the cells loose from their controller boards and run on the original. You will probably be OK doing that. When they sell the cells (Suzie sells battery cells by the seashore?) in this manner, they don't know as you'll have your own controller. Usually someone wanting cells to go with their own battery management are buying by the thousands directly from the cell maker.

This manner is more for someone who's replacing other chemistry cells with new type ones. Such as when I pull NiCds out of a two way radio pack. Then I need some sort of controller, which is supplied.

Stan

Yes totally, Lithiums are all about voltage, and you can find different ranges across different Li batteries, you should check specifically on every cell but i've seen listed from 3.6 to 3.9v as nominal and from 4.2 to 4.5 maximum charging voltage. I guess Li-Ion and Li-Po have their own differences. I've also seen some newer batteries marked as Li-Ion 00, not sure what the 00 means.

In case of doubt the first charge I always do it with a long lead on the back yard and in case of fireworks i'm safe.

Got my new cells today. Turns out that 103450 includes the attached circuit board, and, still, these are a bit smaller than the originals. Now that I have removed the originals, I can see that they are a bit more than 11mm thick, so the new ones will be a pretty easy fit for replacement. So, after all, I will be leaving the management boards on there. With the connector at the top, there's a red wire for overall +, then left solder point on the board is overall -, and there's a right solder point which is the mid-point between the two cells. I'll install the new ones tomorrow and let you know how it goes.

Mostly looks good. I swapped in the new cells and the voltage from the battery is correct, and the battery works in the camera. It's in the process of being charged. It has gone from one, to two, and then three flashes (>= 70%) charged. Waiting to see if it reaches "full" charge. Also then need to see whether it lasts longer than the NOS battery I recently bought.

Unfortunately, I broke one of the snap tabs when reinstalling the cover, so a drop of CA was needed.

I also did look to see if I could find cells that were closer to the OE ones. I did find 113450 from one vendor. If I rebuild another battery I may seek these out. Still rated 2000mAh, but, the extra volume makes that more believable.

OK. Reached fully charged. FWIW, the rebuilt battery weighs in at 105g, vs OE 115g. At the least, this seems like a viable option to refresh tired, or dead, OE batteries. It remains to be seen how well it works in general use.

BTW, while the originals are 113450 (or something close to that), it might be difficult to use 113450 as replacement cells, as the originals use flat conductors that are spot welded to the cells. The 1mm thinner profile of the 103450s left me some useful room for the insulated wires that connect the new cells.

Great! looking forward for the report on how many shots you get on real life usage, is great info to have at hand when my 14/n battery finally die.