Original RED charger and 3rd party battery

[Van den veegaete Quentin]

Hi All,
my question is: can I use a 3rd party battery with the original RED charger ?
Everything I know and think about the matter says yes as long as the voltage, wH, and amperage numbers jive.
But wanted to check with the forum to see if anyone has any info or thoughts I need to consider.

 

[ericyoung]

It's not quite that simple - if you read Red's charger manual you'll see the charging is intelligently managed. If the cell structure and circuitry is the same, then in theory, you might be OK. But anytime you mix and match chargers with batteries of different brands and models, it's taking a risk of something going wrong, and LiIon batteries are a potential fire hazard (see all the flight restrictions). Of course it may work fine, but then there's no way of knowing if you are reducing the batteries useful life.

Personally I wouldn't take the risk. If you want to use cheaper batteries, then get the matching chargers from the same manufacturer, or third party ones specifically designed for your make and model of battery. Teaming random batteries with random chargers is asking for trouble.

 

[sander kamp]

I've been using the Global Media Pro batteries in combination with the Red Chargers and they work most of the time fine. Of course I have no way of knowing what's going on inside the battery but since the Red batteries are failing at a faster rate then the GMP ones I tend to think a matched set isn't critical.

What sometimes happens though is that the Red charger gives up on fully depleted batteries and gives a red light, refusing to charge at all. When I then use a different (slower, cheaper) charger the battery charges again.