Batteries supplied with bcd396xt last 1 hour

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SCPD

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Is this normal ? Did I get faulty rechargeables? I went put and purchased some extra energizer rechargeables but was thinking why would Uniden supply batteries of they only last an hour±.
 

detroit780

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Batteries

Try recharging them. Maybe the charge was low


Is this normal ? Did I get faulty rechargeables? I went put and purchased some extra energizer rechargeables but was thinking why would Uniden supply batteries of they only last an hour±.
 

ka3jjz

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And keep in mind that there's a certain amount of conditioning that's necessary before rechargeables start to last longer. That's one of several reasons why folks never charge the batteries in the scanner, but use an external charger like those from Maha.

Mike
 

wtp

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say yes, to external charging

i have 12 batteries that i use between 2 radios, 396t and 396xt.
each use 3 batteries so i have a set of 3 in the radio and a set charged
the other day i noticed that one set was only going about 3 hours
so i used the charger to check the capacity of each
and found that 2 batteries are much lower than the rest
so i regrouped them 2100 in two groups of 2000 in another and 1700 in the last
one low capacity cell can really bring down the group
if you charge in the radio you have no way of knowing if it one or three that are too old or bad.
Rechargeable Batteries and Chargers
looked like some good reading.
 

SCPD

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Of course I charged them. In my ni-mh charger. There on cycle #3 and worse only lasting 45min. Also the charger usually takes 5 hours to charge my batteries however with the Uniden batteries there done charging in about 20min...?

Sent from my SCH-I605
 

ka3nxn

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Yes, this is very normal. I have 2 of these scanners and battery life at best is miserable. I hope the fixed this issue in the new 436's

Jaime-KA3NXN
 

jackj

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wtp, that paper on rechargeable batteries was interesting reading but he made a couple of erroneous statements.

There is little difference between the voltage discharge curve of NiCD and NiMH cells. Their current capacities are quite different but they both maintain a pretty flat voltage curve over most of their discharge.

The unloaded terminal voltage of both NiCD and NiMH cells at end-of-charge is somewhere around 1.45 to 1.47 volts. However a few hours of being removed from charge that voltage will drop to around 1.2 to 1.25 volts. Some electronic devices designed to run on 6 or 12 volts will now be running on 4.8 or 9.6 volts and might not operate correctly. I have a couple of TV remotes that appear to put out a lot less infrared light, at least you have to get closer to the TV for them to work. Try using rechargeable batteries and if they work, great.
 

rivardj

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The 20 minute charge time indicates the batteries that came with the scanner are bad.

Purchase two sets of Eneloop Low Self Discharge cells for your scanner, you won't be sorry.

One more thought, are there settings for battery warning and shut down levels in the scanner? If so they may be set too high. Most rechargeable cells are considered depleted at around 1.0 volts per cell. If your scanner uses 4 cells the low battery shut down should be set slightly above the 4.0 volt mark for maximum run time. And the warning should be set a little above that.
 
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wtp

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to jackj

i was just trying to show that some are concerned about batteries in general. to be honest i did not read every word there but there were some good points.
and we did not even bring up if something goes wrong when charging...yet!
 

tilt404

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Just got the same scanner and the ones that came with mine 2300mAh last me all day. I don't charge them in my scanner though, I use a panasonic charger I use for my other NI-MH batteries.
 

KW4HKY

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Is this normal ? Did I get faulty rechargeables? I went put and purchased some extra energizer rechargeables but was thinking why would Uniden supply batteries of they only last an hour±.
Same results here. They will get marginally better after a few charges.

I switched to ENELOOP batteries. They last a bit longer and are supposed to have a 2000 charge life.
 

rivardj

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tilt404,

What are your back light setting and any other setting dealing with battery status. I am just trying to figure out why some say their batteries are good for most of the day and other only get an hour or so.

I do not have this Uniden scanner. I have a Radio Shack Pro-106 and found that if I completely disabled the display back light my batteries lasted almost twice as long.

OK, I just looked at an on-line manual for this scanner. There is a switch in the battery compartment that needs to be set for the type of batteries being used. If using re-chargeable batteries the switch must be in the NiMH position, switch to the left. Incorrectly setting this switch might be the cause of apparent dead batteries when in fact they have more life left.

Alkaline cells are around 1.5 volts and NiHM are around 1.25 volts at full charge. In short they have very different discharge profiles.
 
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RoninJoliet

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I have a Uniden 396XT, use Energizer 2250mah, charge them in 9 hrs in the Energizer charger , they read 4.25 when installed in the scanner and last 12-14 hrs trunking digital.....
 

SCPD

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I have a Uniden 396XT, use Energizer 2250mah, charge them in 9 hrs in the Energizer charger , they read 4.25 when installed in the scanner and last 12-14 hrs trunking digital.....

That sounds right for me too, but still don't get why the batteries that came with it which were still wrapped new don't last. Ill report back tmrw what the status is on the supplied batteries. I disabled all lighting on the scanner so lets see what happens.

Sent from my SCH-I605
 

wtp

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battery save

it only works when you hold on one freq. from the manual.
"when "On The scanner goes into low-power mode when
you monitor a conventional channel that has no
activity on a frequency.

i add that because some here think it save the batteries when scanning.
the other thing is the switch in the battery compartment could be looked at as charge on(nimh), charge off(alkaline)
 
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jonwienke

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Battery life should be about 8 hours, plus or minus depending on backlight settings, amount of traffic received, speaker volume, etc. If your batteries are going from dead to showing full charge in 20 mins, you have bad battery(ies). You want to have a spare set or two so one can be charging, another charged, and one in the scanner. I also recommend the low-discharge eneloops.
 

SCPD

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Advice don't use the LED ALERT. the stock batteries are working fine and have been for the last 5 hours. My problem was setting alert LEDs per group
 

jonwienke

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LED doesn't use that much power. The real problem is either batteries or charger. 20 minute charge time is completely wrong.
 

JStemann

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I'm seeing a lot of replies saying if the batteries show full charge in 20 minutes or so then they are bad. What if we're using a rapid charger? While I can't find my specific charger on the energizer site, the ones listed there show recharge times ranging from 15 minutes to 8 hours. My charger will flash red if I have a bad battery, otherwise it's done in about 15-20 minutes. After that recharge, I'll get about 8-10 hours before the low battery alert starts chirping on my 396xt. This is using (usually) energizer batteries around 2300mah, although I think my last ones were radio shack brand.

Jeff
 
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