Outdoor Solar Lights

I have some solar garden lights (the cheapo $4 type from Walmart), each comes with a replaceable NiCD AA battery inside. Can I replace this battery with an NiMH battery? From what I read, this *might* work, but the NiMH batteries might never get fully charged.

That is correct. A solar garden light is one of the few places that NiCd does better than NiMH. First of all, NiCd takes the heat better. Second, the NiMH optimally needs a train of high current pulses to charge, even if the average current is low. NiCd can be trickle charged, which is a very simple connection to a solar cell. Some newer solar lights have an electronic circuit in them to do the pulse charging for NiMH, but if the light came with NiCd, it likely does not have this circuit.

Related posts:

1. Solar light garden batteries Are they interchangeable?
2. Are regular & solar rechargeable batteries the same? Can both be used in solar garden lights?
3. How can I replace spokes for my garden lights?
4. Anyone know if you can replace the batteries in a solar powered outdoor light?
5. Can somebody tell me about solar batteries?

This entry was posted on Thursday, September 24th, 2009 at 1:02 am and is filed under solar garden lights. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.