What is wrong with these batteries.

[gallet]

I bought some el cheapo duracell alkaline batteries as an emergency and when I put them in a new out of the box HCx, the HCx would die if I moved the scroll stick. I thought my HCx was crocked until I tested the batteries in a different HCx. So now I know the batteries are causing this.

 

But why? what could they be doing that makes the unit shut down? I've checked the voltage using the internal report and they were reading 2.7V, my nearly flat rechargables were reading 2.24V and new alkalines are 3.15V so it doesn't appear to be a voltage issue.

 

The batteries say made in USA and are marked in French and English so they look to be for the Canadian market as well. The expiry date is 2012. However there appears to be a small Chinese character next to the 'Patented/Breveté' marking

 

They also caused the same effect in a 60CSx

Edited March 5, 2008 by gallet

[eaparks]

Sounds very much like the same problem users were reporting with freashly charged lithium batteries. It would be interesting to see what the voltage is on them in (new condition) testing with a meter. Most new alkalines will be in the range of 1.5v - 1.54v. Don't remember off hand exactly what freashly charged lithiums read with a meter but the cause for them shutting down units was that they had to high of a votage output and casued the units to shut down similar to what your describing. The solution was to use them in another device such as a flashlight to drain a small amout of the voltage off and then they worked fine in the GPS. Maybe someone else can offer more information.

[+Indotguy]

Your description makes me wonder if these batteries could be counterfeit Duracells from China. Apparently some of them have been found to contain Mercury, a dangerous toxin which REAL battery manufactures have not used in years. Do a Google of "Duracell Knockoffs" for more info.

[+geokitebuggy]

Have you measured them for length? Not all AA batteries are alike. If they are a bit short, they may lose contact and cause the unit to turn off.

 

A number of the rechargeables are fractionally longer than the standard AA and will break battery terminals with time (see previous forum posts). Seems to be a particular problem with the GPSMAP 76 series. I'm really careful with mine to extract and insert the batteries without cocking them at much of an angle (tough to do on the contact with the spring).