Best brushless whoop battery charger
• Chris
In this article I want to show you my top picks for brushless whoop LiPo battery chargers. Unfortunately there is no one, best battery charger for all whoop classes, but rather one best charger per cell count.
The optimal brushless whoop charger in my mind would be one where you can can attach 1-3S batteries, six at the same time, each one on a separate channel. The charger would have an internal power supply so it can be powered from the outlet but would also allow to be powered from a bigger LiPo battery.
Each of the channels would have their own current and HV setting. The charger would display the current charging rate, capacity charged and current battery voltage.
Further it would allow to charge/discharge batteries to storage voltage. Unfortunately such a charger does not exist (yet).
Now that you know how my perfect charger would look, you might understand why I picked the following options.
Best 1S LiPo battery chargers
Hands down, the best 1S charger in my opinion is the WhoopStor 3 by Vifly. You can charge six 1S batteries with either BT2.0 or PH2.0 connector at the same time. The charging current can be set from 100mA up to 1.3A. This settings is applied to all channels.
You can power this charger via barrel plug, XT60 plug or USB-C. The maximum input Power is 26V so you can use your 6S batteries to power this charger. When charging from USB-C, it needs to be a fast charger, 5V only will not do the trick.
This charger has 4 different voltage settings: 4.35V, 4.2V, 3.85V and 3.8V this means you can also use this charger to discharge your 1S batteries to storage voltage, which is a feature so many 1S chargers have been lacking. Discharging will generate heat, which will be dissipated via the integrated fan. When maximum discharge power is limited to 1.1W per port.
This is my goto charger, often times I’ll just take it with me on the go and use it as a field charger.
As much as I like this charger, it is not perfect. There are two features I’d really love to see:
- Show charging state: When charging, it would be great to know how many mAh have been charged into the pack - a bit of an oversight in my opinion, since this should be easy enough to display
- Internal resistance: This feature would make it the absolut perfect charger in my eyes, if I could know the internal resistance of my batteries, it would help me to easier compare different batteries to each other, but also keep track of the health of the batteries.
Both those features could be displayed in the row where the charging current is displayed and the device would simply rotate through them. I have spoken to Vifly and they told me, that they might consider this for the next iteration.
A nice touch is, that you can get this charger in different color themes schemes.
With a price of around $35 there is absolutely no reason to not own this charger. This is one of my favorite whoop products of all time, I can’t hype it enough and I am looking forward to the next iteration.
The king is dead…
For a long time this was my goto 1S charger - the Ultra Power UP-S6AC. It allows six, 1S batteries to be charged at the same time. Each of the batteries is charged on a separate channel, so you can plug in batteries of different charging states and capacities at the same time.
The UP-S6AC supports four of the most popular 1S battery connectors: JST PH2.0, JST RCY, Micro Lossi and JST ZH - for most of us PH2.0 will be enough.
You can adjust the charging current for each channel up to 1A, further you can chose if your batteries are HV (high voltage - charged to 4.35V) or regular LiPo’s (charged to 4.2V).
This battery charger comes with an integrated power supply, so you can simply power it off of mains. Alternatively it also has an XT60 plug, allowing you to charge in the field from a larger battery (up to 4S).
The display shows the charging state - how many mAh have been charged into each of the batteries - and how many Amps each of the battery is currently being charged with.
If you are also using 2S batteries, there is another version of this charger, which only only has 4 channels, but it allows you to also charge 2S batteries from their balance lead.
In my opinion the only downside of this charger ist, that you can not put your batteries into storage mode. My workaround for this is to fly them empty charge them again, closely monitoring them and unplugging them at around 3.8V.
There are also various 1S charging solutions that can be powered from a USB port. I am not a big fan of those: They lack basic settings, like for example setting the charging current and monitoring the charging state. Further you need some kind of USB power supply or power bank to use them. They are okay if you are just starting out and got them with your copter or RTF kit but they are a great first upgrade that will make your life so much easier.
Best 2S LiPo battery charger
2S batteries are a little bit in-between. Unfortunately there is no good 2S only solution, at least none that I know off.
When you also use 1S batteries and want to be able to charge your 2S batteries on the go and from different charging states, I recommend the Ultra Power UP S4AC. As mentioned in the 1S section, this charger has 4 separate channels and allows to charge 1S or 2S batteries from their balance lead.
Unfortunately there is no real, dedicated multi channel 2S charger, if you want to charge six, 2S batteries at once, I highly recommend going with a parallel charging board and a dedicated charger - same as for the 3S batteries.
Best 2S-82 LiPo battery charger
When it comes to 2S und up, there are no cheap solutions for multi channel chargers. A parallel charging board and a dedicated charger are always a good option though.
When you know what you a re doing, parallel charging is very safe - I wrote an article about parallel charging which I recommend you read, if you are interested in this method. It allows you to charge multiple batteries with the same specs and same charging level at the same time - in parallel.
There are parallel charging boards that come with XT30 plugs. This parallel charging board in particular allows six, 1-3S batteries to be charged in parallel.
Other than the parallel charging board you will also need a dedicated battery charger. I can highly recommend the ISDT Q6 this battery charger can be powered from your flight packs (up to 6S) or from a dedicated 12-24V power supply.
I am now using the ISDT Q6 for almost two years without any issues. Very reliable and good value for money. I would highly recommend this charger for anyone starting out with the hobby.
The only downside is, that the power supply is not included, so you need to make sure to get one that can output enough power to fulfill your charging needs. For example this 24V, 400W one.
If you are looking for something stationary with internal power supply, I would recommend the ISDT K2 Air, a dual channel LiPo battery charger with built in power supply capable of charging with up to 500W per channel when powered from a DC power source. It allows you to charge two completely different batteries or even run two completely different parallel charging board setups. For example you could charge six 2S batteries on one channel and six, 3S batteries on the second channel, both with their own parallel charging boards.
This is definitely the most expensive, but also most versatile solution. The dual channel ISDT K2 Air charger will accompany you for a long time on your endeavors in the RC hobby.
The nice thing about this charger is, it’s flexibility - you can use it stationary, powered from mains, or on the go powered from a flight pack or your car battery.
Chris is a Vienna based software developer. In his spare time he enjoys reviewing tech gear, ripping quads of all sizes and making stuff.
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