NGY 24 Report post Posted January 1 On 11/8/2020 at 9:11 AM, imkidd57 said: FYI... I noticed a post by someone who created a 3D-printed shell for the new LiPo battery type, thus disposing of the need for the original LIP-4WM case with its extra thickness. 20 hours ago, imkidd57 said: OK so I made two ;-) Was pretty straightforward from the instructions given on the original site. It's a very well-designed shell for the parts Nice job. Yet another beautiful example of what 3D printers can do. I had one thought, that might be a practical enhancement to these battery packs above. (You can skip this next paragraph, and jump over to the point - this is just for some background of where the idea came from). Years ago I was "rejuvenating" my old Sony battery packs for my ancient MZ-R3. Nothing fancy there really, just two Ni-MH cells stuck together with a metal clip, a plastic place holder and some glue. Any standard AA size Ni-MH rechargeable batteries would work there naturally, I just wanted to keep the original look, and the original pack's "extra feature" of holding the two cells in the right position and polarity. I "skinned" the new OEM cells, and wanted to cover them with a plain black heat shrink tube. But obviously the regular heat shrink tubes that electricians use didn't make it, because those are too thick, making the pack too fat. Then I found a seller on eb@y who sold heat shrink tubes especially made for battery cells, transparent and opaqe, in several colors from clear to black, and very thin just like the OEM cells' shrinks. Using those tubes, the original clamp/placeholder and some new cells, I had completely original-looking battery packs, that fit the MZ-R3 battery compartment perfectly. So the idea is, with a minor modification to the original 3d design (making it slightly thinner, like between the marks on this photo), the new cell can be wrapped into this heat shrink, that would "hide" the cell (or not, if someone prefers transparent tube), and the same time keep it in place and also protect it. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
imkidd57 0 Report post Posted January 2 Thanks NGY - that is a great suggestion. In practice, the critical tolerance for fitting into the MD compartment is the thickness of the LiPo component (the 'front-to-back depth' of the one on your image). It's definitely worth a try though... could you provide a link to the eb@y seller's items? Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
NGY 24 Report post Posted January 2 Sure. Those items I purchased several years ago are not visible in my account history anymore, but there are many others as I see, and now even shipping directly within the UK, so you might not need to wait weeks, for a little extra money. As listings/sellers come and go on eb@y, for future readers here is my search term: "battery heat shrink tube", that gives tons of items. One > here < seems to be a good seller, for example, having a lot of products and providing good product information. A word on which size to choose: this tube can shrink to about half of its original, flattened size. You measure your new shell and calculate the circumference, then choose the closest tube width. For example, I used 23 mm wide for AA cells and 30 mm wide for 18650 cells - 18650 diameter ~18 mm, circumference ~57 mm, tube width 30 mm (2*30=60). Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
imkidd57 0 Report post Posted January 4 Thanks NGY... the width of the shell is 23mm so ordered some 29mm and 32mm diameter material that’s due to arrive in 4-5 days. Film thickness 0.1mm Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Perus 0 Report post Posted Wednesday at 08:42 AM Hi! Just wanted to share my (DIY) replacement for the LIP-4WM which quickly was made while awaiting a fully working LIP-4WM It might look a bit scary for some of you /Per Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
