Ansmann battery chargers - cheap Chinese junk or German quality ?

[Gabriel]

My Ansmann energy 4 started arching and smelling strange last weekend while charging 4 AA batteries, having a look inside made me think Ansmann bought it from a very cheap Chinese factory.




Nerver heard of Samcon, Natcon or Chang capacitors before, Ansmann for sure saved a few bucks buying low quality parts.


The to220 heatsink looks like a mess.




One of the springs has come loose, springs are used instead of soldered wires to connect the powersupply to the wall contact.
Even though these springs sit stationary it has somehow come loose,they do not move even when changing wall contact type.

Also, look hook how dirty the board is.


Lots of flux left, buying Ansmann you don't get cleaned boards.






This is the spring that caused arcing.


This picture show better how dirty the board is, it looks like 'fine sand' that is stuck in the flux residue.


Topside of logic board looks nice.


Underneath you can see a few manual touchup jobs on some chips from the factory.




The Ansmann kids at this factory has been playing with white paint.

But wait there is more too see, Ansmann struggles with their quality.






Paying top $ does not give you quality products.

Had I bought this on Ebay I for sure would think I bought a cheap copy but since I got this from Rs Components I would think this is a genuine Ansmann product and that it reflects the quality of Ansmann products.

Pretty sure a charger from ebay or dx will be same or better quality.

Any comments more then welcome.

[Kiriakos GR]

Re: Ansmann battery chargers - cheap Chinese junk or German quality ?

Never had this model but I do have all the others. LOL

All ANSMANN products are made in China, and the failure rate of their chargers is not that high either.

I have open and repair some of them.
Their PCB and all internals was ok.
Damage can occur in the Mains inverter due Mains over-voltage spike or capacitor failure.
Other reason could be trying to charge damaged NICAD in which the charging never ends and PCB gets cooked by high temperature.

[Agent24]

Re: Ansmann battery chargers - cheap Chinese junk or German quality ?

Had not heard of them before. It is not uncommon for 'good' companies to outsource to China and sell crap.

At first I thought it was a knockoff from http://www.assmann-wsw.com/en/products/ who sell connectors but I guess not.

[mariushm]

Re: Ansmann battery chargers - cheap Chinese junk or German quality ?

It really doesn't look that bad. yes, the capacitors are so-so, especially that 85c capacitor, but otherwise the layout looks good, they use nice components, current sensors for each battery, good microcontroller.

The spring can be replaced with a wire.. just scrape the insulation over that copper trace and solder a wire.

The "dirty" on the boards is just flux that wasn't cleaned properly.

I'm puzzled about that lead that goes into the heatshrink of the fuse... what's the lead for, what component, where does it go?

[budm]

Re: Ansmann battery chargers - cheap Chinese junk or German quality ?

It is the lead of the spring, the two springs are used for making contact to the AC PLUG L and N. He should check and see if that fuse is still good.

[ben7]

Re: Ansmann battery chargers - cheap Chinese junk or German quality ?

It is the lead of the spring, the two springs are used for making contact to the AC PLUG L and N. He should check and see if that fuse is still good.

Yes I don't like the springs.

Also, in a short circuit or overload, the springs could heat up and cause a fire hazard, along with the fuse's cover being poked by the spring lead.

[Gabriel]

Re: Ansmann battery chargers - cheap Chinese junk or German quality ?

A few more pictures






Spring lead is almost touching metal end of fuse on the right side in this picture.

It is the lead of the spring, the two springs are used for making contact to the AC PLUG L and N. He should check and see if that fuse is still good.

Fuse still ok.

It really doesn't look that bad. yes, the capacitors are so-so, especially that 85c capacitor, but otherwise the layout looks good, they use nice components, current sensors for each battery, good microcontroller.

The spring can be replaced with a wire.. just scrape the insulation over that copper trace and solder a wire.

The "dirty" on the boards is just flux that wasn't cleaned properly.

I'm puzzled about that lead that goes into the heatshrink of the fuse... what's the lead for, what component, where does it go?

budm is spot on, the lead is the spring end - took a few more pictures for you to see.

Had not heard of them before. It is not uncommon for 'good' companies to outsource to China and sell crap.

At first I thought it was a knockoff from http://www.assmann-wsw.com/en/products/ who sell connectors but I guess not.

Hehe reminds me off Kramers licence plate.

Never had this model but I do have all the others. LOL

All ANSMANN products are made in China, and the failure rate of their chargers is not that high either.

I have open and repair some of them.
Their PCB and all internals was ok.
Damage can occur in the Mains inverter due Mains over-voltage spike or capacitor failure.
Other reason could be trying to charge damaged NICAD in which the charging never ends and PCB gets cooked by high temperature.

Everyting can fail I guess, I just thought that Ansmann would be better quality - I have noticed this charger is quite warm and that it sometimes gives me error charging Ansmann 9V batteries.

[Gabriel]

Re: Ansmann battery chargers - cheap Chinese junk or German quality ?

Never had this model but I do have all the others. LOL

All ANSMANN products are made in China, and the failure rate of their chargers is not that high either.

I have open and repair some of them.
Their PCB and all internals was ok.
Damage can occur in the Mains inverter due Mains over-voltage spike or capacitor failure.
Other reason could be trying to charge damaged NICAD in which the charging never ends and PCB gets cooked by high temperature.

Have you tried the MH-9000 from Powerex ?

I see you have the powerline 4 pro I was thinking to buy but I think I will not choose Ansmann again.

[Kiriakos GR]

Re: Ansmann battery chargers - cheap Chinese junk or German quality ?

Powerline 4 pro is their latest, and cost about 35 EUR retail.
At that price point of Ansmann, Powerex sales have been exterminated in Europe.

I am not here to influence your thoughts, but as consumer to consumer I will say that few things can go wrong when you have two years warranty in Europe.

[Gabriel]

Re: Ansmann battery chargers - cheap Chinese junk or German quality ?

New 9V battery charger, still looking for a new AA and AAA charger.

Charges 7.2V,8.4V and 9.6V perfect for my metall detector.

[Gabriel]

Re: Ansmann battery chargers - cheap Chinese junk or German quality ?

Having a look inside the Powerex C490F.


Looks very clean, I like that the 9V contacts is a attached directly to the board instad of using springs as Ansmann did.


The two biggest electrolytics caps are made by Jackcon, the one in the left corner is a Fuhjyyu sadly.


Very nice layout, no mess and very clean.




Looks splendid.



Comes with wall charger and 12V vehicle charger.



For charging 9V batteries Ansmann uses these 4 springs that connect to ..

..these

..so you can fit batteries here.

[Gabriel]

Re: Ansmann battery chargers - cheap Chinese junk or German quality ?

Sent a mail to Ansmann.

Hi

I bought a energy 4 and it started to arching and smell, looking inside your build quality is not the best using low quality capacitors and these quite useless springs for AC plug.

I uploaded some pictures of my defective unit for you to see.

https://www.badcaps.net/forum/showthread.php?t=36645

Does all your energy 4 units use the spring solution for AC plug ?

As you can see the spring almost make contact with the metal end of fuse, have you changed this in newer build of the energy 4 or does all energy 4 units have this problem ?



Thanks

And Ansmann reply.

with this device (which is out of production for a few years) we had no complaints about the springs or the capacitors.



Best regards

[Rulycat]

Re: Ansmann battery chargers - cheap Chinese junk or German quality ?

The guy doesn't seem to understand that you're making the complaint!

[kaboom]

Re: Ansmann battery chargers - cheap Chinese junk or German quality ?

And Ansmann reply.

with this device (which is out of production for a few years) we had no complaints about the springs or the capacitors.



Best regards

Just like Antec "never had complaints" about their StupidPowers?