Generally speaking, yes. In fact, that's the primary reason it's done. For best results, you should also deep discharge following a 24-36 hour grid charge.

"borrowing" someone's is not practical. You have to access the hybrid pack and install a compatible harness and fan cable or buy a compatible harness for $115 + $80 core charge.

The "cheap" solution is to build your own grid charger, remove the pack from the car and charge/discharge it over a weekend. You can do it all for about $60.

 

Ahh, I didn't realize you needed to install something extra onto the battery, I thought it was a matter of taking your charger device and hooking it up to the existing cables... I saw where you could build your own, but even being a bit of an electronics guy didn't trust that I'd be able to do it without destroying something that I can't afford to fix yet, when the battery is removed will the car still start/run or should I just leave it parked?

 

Yep. Honda provides no provision for maintaining the pack. The 12V IMA fan requires a PWM signal to drive it, so the harness is purpose-built for both purposes (charging and running the fan).

Electrical knowledge that's helpful but not required:
V = I X R
P = I X V
The difference between serial and parallel

A comfort level with cutting, stripping and joining wires with wire nuts and/or crimpers is necessary.

Mechanical aptitude for pack removal:
1) 4 10mm bolts to remove rear seat.
2) flipping the safety breaker off to isolate the pack.
3) about a dozen T30 screws to remove the cover. Do not bend or deform the cover in any way.
4) 4x 14mm bolts mounting the pack, 2 electrical connectors and 2X 10mm terminals.

Detailed instructions.

I just worked up a BOM... sorry... it's not $60... It's about $75.

 

My battery had the IMA. I did the Grid charge / drain down routine, and its been recal and IMA light free for 1 year now! The battery works great

I'm guessing every battery is different but its definitely worth a try. You may need to cycle your battery like 2-3 times from full to empty to reset the chemistry. (read up on NiMH battery reconditioning)

 

Am I just dense and missing the instructions on how to build the charger itself?

*edit* nevermind, I think I found some over on Insight Central, there are 102 pages, surely someone at some point in all that gives build instructions lol

 

Actually, mine is even more simple. You bolt the power supplies to the board, wire them in parallel to the AC source and wire their outputs in series. Since you're pack will be out of the car, a simple box fan directed through the pack will provide more than enough cooling.

The discharger is even more straight forward.

The extension cords are to make "harnesses" for charging and discharging. Female end from the pack, male end on charger & discharger. Of course, you'll want to double and triple check the polarity, but once you're sure, the 3 prongs will ensure you never hook it up wrong.

 

Ah, I guess I was overthinking the "circuit" people were talking about timers and automatic disconnect and things to swap from charge to discharge etc, I guess you just manually control all that stuff, but once I have the parts you picked it'll be a simple matter of just hooking it all up

 

There is only one charger that will do the auto cycling, and that's the Genesis One, which is now owned by Hybrid Revolt and costs $800 + more for the discharger. Personally, I think he bought it to price it high enough to encourage pack replacement since that's his main business. Hybrid Automotive has a "discharge ready" version, but he's had that "ready" for at least the last 9 months with no obvious progress on WHEN.

When you're doing it on the cheap, it's manual control all the way. If you'll notice, I don't even have fuses in there. You might want to add an AC fuse for a few $.

If this works for you, you'll want to consider investing in either your own upgraded charger (you'll need to add a 12V PSU and a fan controller board) and a custom harness. At that point, you'll probably weigh the time vs. cost benefit and conclude it would be a lot easier to just buy and install the HA system for simplicity.

 

Alright, thanks, I'll look into ordering the parts in the next two or three weeks, nothing imperative right now and have other things the money could go towards atm

 

Took a good look at the supply list and have a few questions

At first I was gonna ask what the copper board was for, but rereading realize you're mounting the chargers to it, why mount them to a copper board? Why not a 2x4 or whatever? Grounding?

Second, why 4 bulbs but only 2 light sockets?

Also, why 2 multimeters? are you somehow permanently mounting the DMMs to the assembly?