how many amps does each cell charge at?

[Spector NS5 RD]

i know evolv says one amp charging, just wondering if that amp gets split 3 ways (.333). Or does the board only charge one cell at a time, giving that cell the full amp, then move down to the next lowest voltaged cell, so on and so on?

[VapingBad]

Sort of, the 1 A is at 5 V and that will be converted to the battery voltage so at lower volts like 9 V it will be more like 0.5 A and at higher 12.3 V it would be more like 0.4 A.  The charge current goes through all 3 cells through the thick battery wires, they are all charged at the same time, balancing works by discharging the high cells through the thinner wires on the balance connector and works on a cell by cell basis.

[Spector NS5 RD]

I thought it charges and discharge(as needed) through the taps? So youre saying it takes the usb voltage and boosts it to around 12 volts and charges through the main positive and negative......then skims off excess voltage from a cell or cells that charge too quickly, to keep everything balanced.

[VapingBad]

Yes

[awsum140]

But keep in mind that 1 amp limitation.  The best way to look at it is by watt hours of the source and battery versus the available current.

[Mad Scientist]

I agree with awsum140. At least the way my mind works, it's easier to think about it in Watt-hours. A one Amp USB charger delivers basically 5 Watts. Conversion losses and charging efficiency are a bit of a wild guess on my part but it's darn close to 100% for a lipo -- lets be conservative and say 90% total efficiency. Also a "dead" battery isn't actually "dead" but more like 80% discharged. So a 10 Wh battery would need 5 x 0.9 x charge time = 10 x 0.8. Solving for charge time yields charge time = 8 / 4.5 = about 1.8 hours to charge. Substitute the Wh rating for your battery for the 10 in the example and you can estimate charge time needed.