Battery Charger Recommendation

[combat chicken]

Hey guys. Not sure if anyone has posted a discussion on battery charger recommendations ,for LIPO's primarily, but I'm looking for something that can charge basically any type of chemistry.
Why am I asking you ask? Well my Hitec charger decided to take a dump today so with no charger not much flying.
Here is what I'm looking for. Something that first of all will not break the bank. I am just putting together my first high voltage bird(Pilot Edge 540). I currently fly NiMHs on my other birds but will probably be transiting over to LiPo's on those eventually so will be doing more and more of this type of chemistry. Don't necessarily need to charge multiple batts at the same time. Looking for the standard features that balance, store, etc type functions.
Thanks in advance for any advice.

 

[pawnshopmike]

Which Hitec did you have? My Hitec x4 Eighty is still going strong after 4 years.

 

[combat chicken]

Which Hitec did you have? My Hitec x4 Eighty is still going strong after 4 years.

X1 I believe Mike. Plugged it in and big spark and the magic blue smoke occurred followed by a smell of plastic burning. Quickly unplugged and tossed out the shop door before any flames began to show. Had it about 3 years.

 

[Komet163]

I've had my powerlab 6 for a few years now great charger does all my lipos from 2s 450's to 6s 5500. with balance board and dual converted powersupplies I can do my 3 large batteries in about 1/2 hr

 

[pawnshopmike]

I've had my powerlab 6 for a few years now great charger does all my lipos from 2s 450's to 6s 5500. with balance board and dual converted powersupplies I can do my 3 large batteries in about 1/2 hr

I've heard great things about Powerlab chargers. If my Hitec X4 Eighty ever dies I'll probably look at a Powerlab of some kind.

 

[Bunky.F.Knuckle]

I have the iCharger line of chargers. I use a 308 and 406 Duo charger.

I would recommend either of the above I have. Simply because they have dual ports, and you can charge any pack your heart desires. 1 side can be a lead acid battery, and the other side can be a LiOn.

Very much like your 4 port charger, the iCharger has charge rate limits. Given enough power from your supplies, you can charge each port on the iCharger at 30 or 40A. That will take over 2000W of power to do so.

I also had an iCharger 3010B. Great little charger. I used the crap out of it, and sold it early this year.

 

[Jetpainter]

I have a PowerLab 8 and love it. For this coming season I'm planning to add the new "Bump Controller" to it. It's a pretty cool user interface that does all kinds of interesting things and also will give you the capability of controlling and monitoring the charger from your phone or tablet with Bluetooth. A few friends of mine are Beta testers so I got to check it out a little this fall.

 

[Alky6]

Have the ichargers as well, the 206b and 306b and have worked flawlessly for me. Also use them with a paraboard from buddyRC. can parallel charge up to six batteries at once. However, I have no other experience with any other brand of these multi-chemistry computerized chargers, so I cannot provide a comparison.

 

[dhal22]

I'm going to buy a Powerlab 8 next.

 

[Smitty]

All I fly are A123s so my input probably wouldn't matter. I use a Cellpro Multi 4, have had it for 5 years and not one problem and it will charge anything.---Smitty