HOTA D6 Dual Charger: Unboxing and review

🔗 / mrd_rc 🔗 www.MrD-RC.com
In this video we take a look at the HOTA D6 Pro AC/DC Dual Charger. This is a 200W AC/650W DC charger that has 2 output channels. It also has a neat little trick, where it can inductance charge you supported mobile phone. It can charge 1S to 6S and quite a few different types of battery chemistries. Is this a good charger for you? Check out the video and see if it fits your needs.
If you like it, you can get yours here: bit.ly/MrD_3oc...
Plus, this discount code should work up until the 31st of December, 2021: BGD6PRO1203
This item was supplied by Banggood for review. However, the thoughts are my own.
✈️ Contents ✈️
00:00 Introduction
00:41 Unboxing
02:43 Comparing the charger to others physically
03:45 The physical characteristics of the charger
06:39 The basic display layouts
07:58 System menu options
13:10 Battery menu options
15:39 Charging a battery
16:38 Running off the mains AC power and charging 2 batteries
17:48 The different mode background colours
18:58 Conclusion
Thank you for watching this video. Time is precious, so I hope that you got some benefit from this video. If you have any questions, please leave a comment and I'll do my best to answer. Please try to keep questions relevant to the video in, as they may also help others who have the same question.
✈️ In this video ✈️
🔗 The HOTA site: www.hota-exp.com
⚙️ HOTA D6 Pro Charger: bit.ly/MrD_3oc...
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Thank you for your time, and don't forget to fly it like you stole it!

[@wiwibaguette6683]

Bro my guy this is the most detailed vid I’ve seen on the d6 charger well done mate

[@MrD]

This charger is still going strong to. Great bit if kit.

[@TomasJuricek]

Thanks for the review. As for the languages: Simplified Chinese (used in China), Traditional Chinese (used in Taiwan) and Japanese ;)

[@MrD]

Thanks Tomas 👍🏻

[@rparts1]

You're welcome glad I can help ...keep up the great videos!

[@MrD]

Thank you Ralph. I really appreciate it 👍🏻

[@NLRevZ]

If I understand correctly, it should be able to charge higher voltage packs with a lower voltage pack as the supply? Say, charge a 6S with a 3S or 4S pack as the input? I'm looking for a charger with which I could discharge any full packs down to storage level (ish) while using that power to charge the depleted ones I'd have at the end of a day out with the RC cars up to storage level as well. :-)

[@MrD]

Yes that will work. Just don’t forget to set the input battery limits in the system menu. That will stop the input battery from being over-discharged or exceed watts specs.

[@NLRevZ]

@@MrD Thank you for your swift reply. I've read into these some more and it appears people are reporting two things I am still curious about: 1. discharging a battery to storage non-regeneratively is only done at a maximum of 15W through its internal resistors; have you used a ballast on this charger to do faster discharging or have you not tested it? 2. Charging a depleted LiPo up to storage seems to be buggy, where some people report that instead of full charging speed it maintains that same 15W on the charge cycle as well, which would be unintended behavior. Have you tested this as well?

[@MrD]

1. Yes most chargers discharge through the resistors at a slow rate. I've not tried to speed this up at all. To be honest, most of the time I don't need to use this as I fly most packs down close enough for storage. 2. This may not necessarily be a bug. It depends on how discharged the packs are. I have found it does charge slower up until a certain level, then will speed up. But I don't see this as a bug. I see it as protecting the battery.

[@NLRevZ]

@@MrD Yeah, I know about most chargers initially charging slowly, but I've read reports of the charger staying at the 'discharge rate' of 15W max across a storage charge, which honestly could be a firmware bug. I can't imagine it being a widespread issue on these chargers though, because surely I'd read more of such reports right? Have you verified that it does indeed ramp up to nominal charging rates after a while in the Storage mode?

[@MrD]

To be honest, it’s something I do extremely rarely. I had to try and recover some bad batteries. And am sure that the power did ramp up. But it was a while ago. The storage charge features are something that I hardly ever use.

[@sleepingbearffg5008]

Hey great video from a great man..love your videos.. such a great help! God bless thumbs up

[@MrD]

Thanks again buddy.

[@MrVek7]

Just found out why in the balance setting the cell voltage was set at 3.76 not 4.2

[@fpvraver]

Nice review 👍👏 Thanks for an honest review. Is there a more updated charger or different charger you would recommend over this one ? I feel like they’re should be new chargers coming soon ? I have been looking at this charger for a year hoping they would come out with an updated version.

[@MrD]

Thanks, I really appreciate that. To be honest, most chargers seem to do the same thing. The variance is in the power (especially if it’s AC) and the build quality. I don’t have many chargers to give it a definitive comparison to. I wouldn’t mind checking out some others, like ToolkitRC or more recent ISDT chargers.

[@mervintthomas]

Hey once i finished charging my 2200mah lipo, it said charging complete but shows only 1750mah on the display. The volts is full but the mah just shows 1750 and not 2200mah. Is this normal ? I m a beginner

[@MrD]

Yes it’s normal. It is approximately how many mAh the charger has put in to the battery. They batteries are never completely flat. Going by the voltage is safer than the mAh, especially when discharging/using the packs.

[@hillscanlon2717]

Very good charger been looking at buying one for a bit, Thanks 😊

[@MrD]

No problem. I’m sure in this video you can see everything it can do. So far it’s worked like a charm.

[@chrishard7616]

Can this output the data for plotting in graphs when charging etc?

[@MrD]

No. There is a USB port for uploading and another for charging devices.

[@chrishard7616]

That’s a shame as I really like being able to plot the data and store it for future analysis. I wouldn’t want a charger without it now!

[@roscomonk]

Hi Darren how long to charge say a 2200mAh 3s battery from maximum discharge to fully charged. Also how long to charge from storage to full charge please. Thanks

[@MrD]

All LiPos take about the same time to charge; when charged at the same Amperage. A LiPo is recommended to be charged at 1C, which is 2.2A in the case of a 2200mAh pack. They usually take around 45 mins. LiIon should be charged at 0.5C, and take around 1.5 hours. This charger won’t be any quicker or slower than any other charger.

[@roscomonk]

@@MrD

[@roscomonk]

@@MrDthanks for your reply, Hi yes I understand the mathematical equation but I was lead to believe the smart charges charge lipo’s a lot quicker than the older chargers, mine can take 2-3 hrs as the current drops off as the battery gets charged. So hopefully this will be a lot quicker?

[@MrD]

That sounds bad. Even my old chargers only take 40-50 minutes to charge a LiPo. If it takes yours 2-3 hours. I think you’ll see a big benefit.

[@martr]

Amazing charger, but has one flaw. If you set the current on on channel, it becomes the default for the other. It drives me nuts.

[@MrD]

Yes, I have noticed this. But sometimes it can be useful. Especially if you’re charging a load of the same pack. Again, something that could be fixed with firmware. I’m going to see if I can get in contact with someone from Hota and suggest some things to make these chargers better.

[@MrVek7]

Hi Darren I’ve just bought this charger on charger a battery selecting the balance in the charge menu is this not to fully charge the battery whilst balancing it or not just when I select this is just says balance done with in secs I am charging my battery’s from storage or do u select charge if so does this not balance them

[@MrD]

The balance setting is just to balance the cells. If you want to charge the pack, use the charge setting. It will balance at the end of the charge.

[@Alexander-fs6pw]

@@MrD Great video - thank you. Just piggy backing off of this question a year later - so essentially, when you put it to charge normally it will balance the cells toward the end, and the "Balance Charge" mode is more of it's own thing if you specifically only want to balance the cells?

[@smylej189]

Nice video brother. I've owned this charger for the past two years, although it's called a hobby mate i believe. It's been very reliable. Ps waiting for your inav 4 install video 😋

[@MrD]

Awesome Kyle. Sounds like there’s plenty of life in these chargers too. Haha, that will be on the list once iNav 4.0 stable is released 👍🏻

[@joshuamei7465]

Nice video! Can this charger run 8A on both channels to charge a 3S Lipo using AC? Also, when it says 200W AC, does that mean it is split between both channels so it is 100W per channel? Thanks

[@MrD]

Hi Joshua, The manual states up to 15A per channel. Yes the 200W is split between the two channels.

[@Tom-wl9sx]

Not bad maybe I'll buy one 😉

[@MrD]

They do seem pretty decent.

[@danielmccullock1249]

Great review, thanks Darren. Is there a maximum Ah that this charger can be set to? I was recently donated some 12Ah 6s packs and my current charger is limited to 8 Ah. Cheers

[@MrD]

I’ve not checked on the screen. But you will be limited by the watts with packs that size, if you want to charge them at 1C. By my calculations: - 100W, using the AC power, should give you a 6S charge rate of around 4A - 325W, using and external DC power source, should give you around 12A That is watts / volts of pack = amps for a basic charge rate. It will be slightly off due to inefficiencies and conversions. But, it will give a ballpark figure. However, I will check on the charger to see what the maximum charge rate can be set to.

[@MrD]

The charger will go up to 15A on the menu.

[@danielmccullock1249]

@@MrD thanks mate. Not too concerned with having to charge at a lower rate for these batteries. I did find the manual and it says 15Ah max. Cheers

[@slottygw2wvw842]

They don't give you Balance boards those cheap chimps!!!! why