| Joined: | Mon Apr 2nd, 2012 |
| Location: | South Lakeland, UK |
| Posts: | 4066 |
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I have almost completed re-celling one EN-EL4 battery.
I still have to seal the case closed but it's in a charger as I type doing a re-calibration to see if that gets rid of the 'age 4' in the camera menu, battery condition report. Yes, I have had it in the D3, it works as expected, although it was very tight to get in and out, without the casing being glued together.
Part of the reason this project stalled was because I was very concerned about the tight space for the connections. While I am reasonably dexterous I am really out of my comfort zone working on such small and critical things like the internals of an EN-EL4 battery.
I hate disclaimers... but seriously, unless you actually possess the experience and skills of working with compact electronics, leave the EN-EL4 battery well alone. It isn't easy and remember, you will be working with FULLY CHARGED LIVE BATTERIES; they can occasionally explode and definitely can and do catch fire.
I have taken some more photographs which I will process while I wait for the calibration.
I had some difficulty in getting the case to close, there is zero spare space in the plastic housing. I had wrapped a small ring of red insulating tape around each cell to identify the live (positive) end, even that had to come off because it was preventing the casing from closing properly. Also I used 'Gorilla Glue' to join the cells together to make it easier to handle the cells, the Gorilla Glue foams slightly and therefore expands. I had to file all the excess glue away as well.
If I do another of these, I will make a small jig to hold the batteries together when they are glued. I used one half of the casing and that ended up contaminated with foamed glue which is the devil to get off, especially while avoiding damaging the casing. Like I say, there is no room for anything except the cells.
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Robert.