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Explorist 500 Battery


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I was just going looking at my old cell phone a Motorola t720 and was looking at the extented battery I have for it. Then pulled out the battery from the Explorist 500 I have and the batteries are the same size and it fits in the Explorist. The t720 battery is 3.6v 1100mAh, the Explorist battery is 3.7v 1300mAh. I don't think that would make much of a difference in usage time, if you are out and about and need a battery. So i'm charging up the t720 battery and am going to run some tests to see how long it lasts and post some results.

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Do the terminals line up the same as the explorist battery and has the polarity been tested? You can do this with a VOM before trying it out in your explorist. IF the voltage is reversed you can damage your GPSr.

The other test is to put it in and see if the GPSr works, and if the charge indicator displays.

It was not stated, but is it a LiIon and not a NiMH. I would not recommend using a NiMH pack.

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The battery belong to a Motorola T720/T730 cell phone. The Motorola part number is SNN5595B. I charged one up in the Explorist and now running it out to see the time. I charged on with the phone charger and when I put it in the Explorist it didn't show a full charged battery. Will let all know more when I run out the battery.

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great news, I just ordered a 1100mA/hr battery to test but apparently someone has already tried. Great now that it works I will order a couple more before the seller sees an increase in demand and raises his price. LOL

 

Now is there a charger that will charge just the battery itself so that I dont have to cycle the dead batteries through the GPS to charge them?

Edited by D0T-C0M
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I just ordered 2 new 1100 mA/hr batteries at $7.98 US each free shipping now if I can only find where to buy a charger that will charge just the batteries I'll be all set. Any ideas where I can get one? preferably in canada because I save duty charges but if the price is right I would buy from a US supplier.

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I just ordered 2 new 1100 mA/hr batteries at $7.98 US each free shipping now if I can only find where to buy a charger that will charge just the batteries I'll be all set. Any ideas where I can get one? preferably in canada because I save duty charges but if the price is right I would buy from a US supplier.

Where did you see the batteies at that price?

 

This looks like it might be the ticket for a battery-only desktop charger. As often as I would be charging it, though, I may just use the GPS.

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As often as I would be charging it, though, I may just use the GPS.

Yeah thats an idea but every time you take the battery out of a ex600 you have to recalibrate the electronic compass. Not that big a hastle just an annoyance. I'll end up just disabling it as I dont use it as much as I thought it would.

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T720 battery I had charged in the Explorist has been going for about 12 hours now. Light on lowest setting, unit was inside most of the time with no lock on birds. Next is to try a battery charged in its native charger. If this works then there is a cheaper alternative to the pricey Magellan battery.

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wlfgng13:

If you are saying that you charged the t720 battery in your Explorist and it is now working for 12 hours, you have verified that this is a replacement battery. This solves the major concerns: the 4 terminals line up, it charges, and it runs.

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The 2 batteries are the same size, all the poles are the same, and I started it at work about 10:00 am at work inside a concrete and steel building were it did not pick up on any birds. I was outside with the unit for about an hour, it pick up bird and gave me a lock. I got home and left it runninng, I live in an apartment building, no lock on birds at home. Right now it is midnight and it's still on and running. The green bar right now is between the a and t in battery, a little more under the t. Charging the T720 battery in the Explorist did not produce any overheating, when I picked the unit up while it was charging it felt room temp no warm feeling at all. Any other questions out there post them and I'll answer them to the best of my knowledge.

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If anyone is going to do a search for this battery, you should look for the 1100mAh battery not the 750mAh. The 1100 one fits the 750 one is half the height and will be to small for the battery compartment, where it ma slip and lose contact with the conectors.

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I bought four of them on eBay for about $8 each, and I find that all four fit snugly in a standard Altoids tin in their protective plastic bags with no rattling. They work fine in my eXplorist 500.

Edited by Scryer
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I received a Motorola SNN5595A cell phone battery today that I bought from eBay for $15 delivered. The case appears identical to the one in my eX500. If you took the labels off, you could not tell them apart. It charged normally in the eX500, the unit meter shows full charge and it works like the original battery.

 

In testing the terminals, at full charge, no load:

EXplorist Battery:

From the + terminal, the next shows no voltage, the next shows +4.15V, the furthest shows +4.15V.

Motorola Battery:

Fromt the + terminal, the next shows +2.65V, the next shows +4.14V, the furthest shows +4.14V.

 

Can we guess that the second terminal in the eXplorist is not functional, and on the Motorola it is used for some purpose?

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I am really glad u all posted on this topic, I almost passed up a good deal on exlporist 400 ($145). I was looking to buy a gps but had ruled out the explorist because of the battery pack. A gps that needs a power source seems useless to me.

 

Thanks again

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I have found that the Motorola SNN5595A battery lasts around 8 hours. It's capacity is not marked, but I saw somewhere that it is rated 1.1 Ah. The Magellan battery is rated 1.3 Ah.

The Motorola has the identical case, but only weighs 31g compared to the Magellan at 34g.

 

It was reported earlier that someone got 12 hours or so. Anyone else have a report? One question I have is whether having maps loaded takes more power. For my next test, I will deactivate 3d topo and compare.

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The 8 hours that you got, was that with the backlight on high, medium or low? If it was on full then 8 hours is fine, that is what I got. I got about 15-16 with light on low setting, half outside with locks and half inside trying to get a lock. I got about that much time as well when the unit always had a lock with light on low setting about 90 percent of the time. I was using the unit with DR and it had routed out a route for me to get to, NYC to Seaside Hieghts,NJ. The Motorola batteries I have are true Motorola ones and have had them for two years, they have been used in my phone before I got a new one.

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I have done the test several times, with the backlight on the lowest setting for 90-95% of the time. One thing I noticed is the Motorola battery I have has the A at the end of the model number, and others here have said theirs has a B at the end.

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I have a B at the end of my number as well. IIRC the "B" batteries have a rating of 1100 mAh as well--and it sounds like both A's and B's are the proper thickness to fit in the explorist. I can't discern that there's any difference between them beyond the letter. It appears that both work satisfactorily.

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I charged this guy all day long and when I unplug it, it shows LOW BATTERY. While it was charging, it was changing back and forth from 'charging' to 'full charge', although the battery icon, slowly, over time filled up. I'm charging via USB on a notebook computer. Anyone else having this problem?

 

leodavinci

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USB only charging could take a long time...although I would think all day would be a good ways to done. Has the unit been off while you were charging? If the unit was on, the charging would be almost nil.

 

I haven't used computer USB to recharge my batteries, but a 4xAA USB charger took a good 12-14 hours or so (and that when the battery was not fully discharged). I would suppose that the battery was pretty much empty when you began...so if you don't have the wall-wart to plug it into and must rely on USB alone, I'd leave it on all night and see if it's any better in the morning.

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Editing for the second time. I think I got it right this time.

 

The link above by Bookmonke is for the "A" model. I have the "A" model. It is the same size and charges and works like the original. However, I get 8 hours from it. The "B" model is reported to get more hours (11+/-). Good price for the"A" but I would recommend the "B".

Edited by EScout
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Oh yeah, they work fine. This is a good point to mention that I had occasion to do a rundown test with one yesterday. The OEM battery that came with my 500 gave 16 hr 8 min--IIRC that was from a 1400 mAh battery. The Motorolla battery is only 1100 mAh, but still gave me 14 hr 55 min until the low battery alarm went off.

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Here's something that I thought I'd share in regards to the battery.

 

After much searching I was having trouble finding a suitable container for my spare battery. That is until I ran across a two year old unopened Tic Tac breath mint container in one of my junk drawers. It works great. I cut the bottom portion of a sandwich baggie (just for gp) wrapped the battery once and stuck it in the container. It's a perfect fit. No slop. No need to worry about the battery contacts getting shorted and the lid stays on nicely. It works great for carrying in my pack.

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Regrading the spare Motorola batteries: On ebay, you will find rapid desk chargers that use AC & Car cords that will alow you to charge your spare batteries, say, in your car, while you are using your eXplorist in the field. They have a slot that you put the battery in. This can be helpful if you forgot to charge and are heading out the door.

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I couldn't remember the model number when I saw a bunch of batteries at Princess Auto today, and grabbed one...but its a SNN5582B. It is slim. I was wondering if these work as well...I saw an earlier reference to it, but it wasn't clear if it worked or not.

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The charger looks like a nice number to have for $6. I'm trusting the "universal" appelation; I don't know enough about the electronics to confirm that it should work with the Explorist batteries. You lose some of the convenience of charging the battery in the GPS, but for keeping a backup charged up (which is what I presume you want it for) it would seem to work nicely.

 

It's hard to tell about the battery you linked to, but I am suspicious that the "slim" designation is a lower mAh rating.

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CashemanCando:

That universal charger looks good. Almost all of the LiIon battery packs now for phones, PDAs and cameras are of the 3.6V and will work with this.

 

That slim battery will probably work, but you will have to add a foam peice to keep it in place. Capacity will be lower.

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