Kenworth W900 Posted November 28, 2011 Report Share Posted November 28, 2011 (edited) Turnigy TQ4 Quad Charger Review Item type = Battery charger Brand = Turnigy Price = £140 (Component Shop) ‘£140 for a charger?! I could buy a gun for that!’ You could indeed – many people have been known to use One Hundred and Forty Great British Pound Sterling to buy airsoft guns. I don’t deny it, nor condemn it. However, it just so happens that I have decided to spend mine on a fancy charger. ‘It better be fancy for £140 – does it cook you breakfast before a skirmish?’ Anywho, enough of that This is my review of the ‘Turnigy Power Systems TQ4 4x Port Smart Charger’ - henceforth referred to as ‘QuadCharger’. Background: Okay, so at moment I am at Aberystwyth University (Aber). Ordinarily I get my stuff, especially airsoft related gear, delivered back home in Gloucestershire. Not least because my ‘airsoft gear’ often constitutes gun parts or even guns and of course Universities don’t tend to look too kindly upon that sort of thing. However, since this was only an innocent little battery charger and because I knew that Component Shop (CS) was based in Bangor, north Wales I had it sent to me in Aber. The postage is free on orders over £100 from CS which was some small relief to my wallet at least. Royal Fail actually managed to get it to me in good time – which can only be expected since Bangor is only 2 hours away from Aber. I still had to pay them the £1.50 collection fee for the privilege of walking across town to collect it at my local post office (but that’s another story). Unboxing: It will probably all come in a large plain brown box like mine did from CS. Inside, nicely packed, are the two constituent boxes (that’s assuming that you ordered it with the power supply, its £103 without). One box for the 12V power supply unit (PSU) and one for the QuadCharger. Again, upon entering both of these boxes everything was nicely packed up. The PSU is not in fact 12V. According to the front of it, it’s a 13.8V DC unit. Now, this makes no difference and I believe that it’s just common practice to round it down to 12V even when certain things aren’t exactly that. Reason being that the QuadCharger only requires 12V and therefore 13.8V is perfectly adequate for the job. In fact, any 10-18V rated DC PSU will suffice. This may be important to you because if you already happen to have something like it you may want to purchase just the charger and save yourself £40. Tbh, it’s quite likely that with a bit of time and effort you could find a suitable PSU for less than £40 somewhere else. I couldn’t be bothered to find out but you may want to save yourself some dough. In the QuadCharger box comes the charger itself and plenty of gubbins - wires and other danglies mostly. To be precise: -pair of plug in battery clamps -TP/FP adaptor lead and board -JST/XH adaptor lead and board -Tamiya (large) charging cable -JST charging cable -Futaba charging cable -Crocodile clip charging cable -18AWG charging cable -In depth manual -CS receipt (probably) Aesthetics and Appearance: The weight and size are not perhaps quite as large as you might imagine. It’s a fairly small device, not a lot bigger than many smart chargers out there, perhaps twice the size. Not 4x the size as you might expect. The appearance of the QuadCharger is fairly smart but still quite utilitarian. The plastics used feel a bit cheap and look cheap with that terribly dull grey colour. Features and Functions: 1. Lipo charger · Charge mode (regular Lipo charge mode) · Balance mode (Lipo charge function which balances the cells as it charges) · Fast Charge mode (you guessed it, faster Lipo charge function) · Storage mode (smart function which monitors your Lipo then decides whether to charge or discharge it to leave it at a safe voltage for storage) · Discharge mode (discharge mode, it will balance your Lipo as it goes) 2. NiMH charger Charge mode (regular charging method, full range of options) Discharge mode (discharges NiMH batteries) Cycle mode (Discharges and charges cyclically, see below) 3. NiCd charger Charge mode (regular charging method, full range of options) Discharge mode (discharges NiCd batteries) Cycle mode (Discharges and charges cyclically, see below) 4. Other The QuadCharger also has various functions surrounding Lead-acid, LiFe and LiLo batteries. I won’t go into them here since they aren’t really all that relevant to most airsofters and tbh I haven’t explored any of these said functions. Cycle Mode: This feature is applicable to NiMH and NiCd batteries. Basically, this feature is designed to refresh your battery by charging it and discharging automatically in a cycle. The number of times it repeats this cycle is selectable – between 1-5 times. You can also select whether you wish it to start by charging or to start by discharging. For the record this function is a little obsolete for NiMH batteries since they don’t really need to be discharged at all let alone cycled. It has been known though that half dead NiMH batteries can be revived in the same way as NiCd batteries. If you have a battery that seems to be on its last legs and isn’t kicking out its full potential a few cycles of charging and discharging from a good charger such as the QuadCharger can do wonders. Also, brand new batteries can benefit from being run through a few times before their inaugural use on the battlefield. Of course you could just do it manually, but it’s nice to know that you could just leave it to do its own thing for a few hours and when you come back your brand new NiMH or NiCd battery is ready to start its life in your arsenal. Save Slots: The Save/Load feature of the QuadCharger is another notable function which I have already found very useful. Basically, you can choose a range of options for a particular type of battery and then save them for later use. Now, if you’re as lazy as I am this is a great feature because it can save time once you have taken the effort to save your preferences for the first time. It says there are 5 save slots but that is for each individual charger so that’s 20 in total. For my purposes I took the time and have already saved in my preferences. I have saved them in identically on all four chargers to make it easier. If you have many different types of batteries then this won’t be possible, you’ll just have to make a list of which ones you have saved in which charger. Or not bother at all and just enter in the details of each battery as you go along. As it happens I only currently operate 5 types of battery anyway: 1. 11.1V 3200mAh Lipo 2. 11.1V 1200mAh Lipo x2 3. 7.2V 3600mAh Lipo 4. 9.6 1600mAh NiMH x3 5. 8.4 1500mAh NiMH x4 As you can see, in my case I only have a few types of batteries but often multiples of each so this is a great function for me. The best part is I don’t even have to remember which slots they are in - I just put them in order from beefiest to smallest. Thus, my huge 3200/11.1V, which my Thompson uses, is saved in slot number one and my 8.4V minis are in slot five. I would suggest you do the same, it makes things easier. Usability: The trouble with the QuadCharger in terms of usability is that you have the ability to play with dozens of cool features but you only have four buttons to control it all with. When you think about it there are hundreds of potential combinations available to suit your charging needs but it can take time scrolling through them all with just ‘Start/Enter’, ‘Batt type/ Stop’, ‘Inc’ and ‘Dec’. For the record, here is a quick guide to the buttons: ‘Start/Enter’ – generally used to choose which field you want change next. Also used to advance to the next stage of the charging process whereby you hold it down for 3 seconds. ‘Batt type/Stop’ – used to cancel charging. Also used to go back to the previous menu. ‘Inc’ – unsurprisingly this is used to increase a value (when it’s flashing). You also use it to scroll through various options. ‘Dec’ – you guessed it, this decreases a value. Again, you also use it to scroll through options, in the opposite direction to ‘Inc’. In the ideal world there would be a better control panel with a few rows of buttons. Although I suppose with only four buttons it is in some ways simpler and easier. Noise: This isn’t really an area I saw myself putting in my review. It is definitely noteworthy that the fan in this charger is really quite loud. It has the effect of making the charger sound as though it is working really hard all the time. Of course, in reality the charger is doing just fine - airsoft is one of the less demanding hobbies upon chargers like these. Tbh, as CS notes you won’t be charging your batteries on the kitchen table anyway (hopefully) so it’s not really a problem. If anything it’s a comfort that the fan is always working to avoid overheating of the internal mechanisms. Also noteworthy is the annoying beeping and buzzing that this charger makes whilst scrolling through options and/or when it is moaning at you about something. As it happens you can turn them off which has certainly helped me enjoy this charger more – however I would suggest that you at least leave the ‘Buzzer’ option ‘ON’ though because it is the more important one that will let you know if anything is going wrong. The Manual: The manual is in depth, providing plenty of incite into all of the QuadCharger’s functions. It’s not in Chinglish but it certainly isn’t crystal clear either. Try to imagine a geek let loose with a technical thesaurus - over complicating simple things. Then try to imagine that said geek is 10 years old – making little sense at all in places. Of course, I have managed to understand/decipher most of it, so you can see that it’s not exactly the enigma code. Nevertheless you may find the following section useful… ‘Pearls of Wisdom’ This section is for all the discoveries and breakthroughs I have made with my QuadCharger which if you get one in the future may be useful for you to know: 1. I was trying out the balance function and tried to use one of the balance boards only to find it didn’t fit my Lipos. It took me ages to figure out that it was because the package includes two different types of balance boards. The balance board you will want to use with your Lipos is the one marked JST/XH. Ignore the TP/FP one. 2. Whilst on the ‘User Set Program ->’ screen you can press ‘Start/Enter’ once and then scroll through a list of general options pertaining to the QuadCharger itself rather than batteries. One feature you may find very useful is the ‘Key Beep/Buzzer’ screen. Here you can turn off the annoying beeping and buzzing which accompanies every single setting change. 3. Whilst selecting values for items such as mAh capacity you may find it useful to note that you can press and hold ‘Inc’ or ‘Dec’ to scroll faster towards your desired figure. Rather than pressing the button 30-40 times. Value for Money: There’s no getting away from the fact that £140 is a lot of money. Ultimately, you can save yourself some dough by just buying a single port smart charger that will have nearly as many, if not the same, features. Having said that, for anyone that a multiple charger could be useful to i.e. teams, shops, sites, team tech guys, air-smiths and people with too many guns (I fall under this category ) it is certainly a good choice. Let’s face it, £140 is only twice what you might pay for a decent single port smart charger (£60-£70). But since the QuadCharger has 4 ports you are getting twice the value for money. Plus, remember that this replaces both your Lipo and NiMH/NiCd chargers. So you wouldn’t need any other NiMH chargers either. The best part is that if you keep your original basic Lipo and NiMH chargers then they automatically become your backup chargers. And everyone knows it’s always best to have a backup plan. On the flip side, since this is four chargers in one – I guess there is always a danger that you are putting all your eggs in one very expensive basket. If it breaks, due to say spilling water over it, you are pretty screwed. However, do remember that this is four separate/independent chargers in one. Therefore, if one fails via a technical error, the others won’t be affected. Conclusions: I haven’t saved many thoughts for this section. One thing I will say is that this charger goes by many names. One of these names happens to be the ‘Turnigy Quattro’. This has led, singlehandedly, to a great sense of vindication at having spent £140 on a charger… …before a skirmish I get to burst into my workshop and yell ‘Fire up the Quattro!’ as I flick the PSU switch and listen as the QuadCharger’s fan roars into life. Scores: Usability = 3/5 The user-friendliness is little lacking at first but once you get your head around it its pretty good. Features and functionality = 4/5 No 5/5 simply because it doesn’t have anything extra to top what other decent smart chargers offer. It does still have more features than you can shake a stick at though Appearance = 3/5 It does look quite awfully bland and the materials used don’t feel spectacular. On the other hand, I suppose I am just being picky - it’s a charger, it doesn’t need to win any beauty contests. Value for Money = 4/5 For £140 it depends whether you need a fancy four port charger or not. I don’t need one per se but even so I still felt that this charger was worth it, all things considered. Overall = 4/5 So, overall then it’s simply a case of asking yourself, ‘Do I need a charger like this?’ ‘Well do ya punk?’ If the answer is yes then I feel the QuadCharger is a good choice. Any and all questions welcome regarding the QuadCharger Just reply here or PM me. I haven’t had it long so the only questions I’m not gonna be able to answer are those concerning its longevity and reliability – it looks fairly sturdy but only time will tell. Apologies to those expecting more piktors. I will endeavour to get pics up at some point to complete my review. In the mean time, Component Shop's pictures and various ones on the net show it off well enough. Plus, check out the HobbyKing youtube video below for a better look at it. Links: CS Lipo chargers page: http://www.component-shop.co.uk/html/lipo.html CS QuadCharger info page: http://www.component-shop.co.uk/html/tq4.html YouTube review – Hobby King: Conversion guide for 24S batteries. I’m only linking for intrigues sake. Do NOT do this. Not that you would ever need to in airsoft (Look at the size of the battery he links up to it ): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rYuAcivabZ8&feature=related Edited November 28, 2011 by Kenworth W900 Quote Link to post Share on other sites
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