Review: Hobbymate D6 PRO dual-channel battery charger

Review: Hobbymate D6 PRO dual-channel battery charger

I bought this charger to upgrade my toolkit rc 1-channel charger that I’ve used to keep up charging my FPV batteries. After a while one one-channel charger is not enough, as it takes too long to charge up 10 packs needed for a decent FPV session. This is a 2-channel charger, that is you can charge 2 batteries with it at the same time. Each channel is rated at 15A and from what I’ve tested it really can handle running 2x battery charge at 15A each. The menu navigation is done via a channel selector button and a click-wheel. Interface is very intuitive and easy to use.

This charger can charge all Lithium batteries with pre-built settings for Lithium high voltage (LiHV), Lithium Polymer (LiPo), Lithium Ion (LiION) and Lithium Iron Phosphate (LiFe) batteries. It also allows to set up a totally custom charging setup with LiXX option (use at you own risk). Be super careful using LiXX feature; if it is set incorrectly it may destroy your battery or even catch it on fire.

I primarily used LiPo preset. This preset allows user to Charge, Discharge, External Discharge, Storage Discharge and Balance.

  • Charge balance charges the battery to preset voltage (allows you to set range between 4.01 and 4.25V per cell)
  • Discharge Discharges the battery while generating heat
  • External Discharge discharges the battery into another battery (no heat generated)
  • Balance just balances the cells. Cool thing about balance feature of this charger is that it allows to balance the battery at any voltage, not just at highest voltage like other chargers.

When buying this charger one thing to look for is a good power supply for it. To be able to take advantage of its full potential (15A double channel charging) a 24V 650W DC power supply is needed. The charger also must have a female XT60 connector – this is the only input available on this charger. If you do not have a 24V charger, 18-24V range works well also, however I had trouble running charger at max power at those input voltages. One thing to watch out for – at default settings the charger has minimum input voltage set to 24V, so if you want to run it at lower input voltage, you must go to the settings menu and set the minimum voltage to a value that is below the voltage of your power input (i.e. if you use 20V DC input, set the value to 18V).

The charger has a cooling fan built in. It does not get hot at all storage-discharging 2 4s LiPo batteries at 1A setting.

A very nice feature of this charger is that it shows voltage and internal resistance of each cell while the battery is charging. Unlike other ones there is no need to run a separate test for that or navigate extra menus.

Finally, the coolest feature of this charger is that it does wireless charging for your phone. Just put the inductive-charger enabled phone on top of the charger and it will automatically charge the battery of your phone wirelessly.

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