Dented battery - only a nimh though

[emilianoksa]

.I wonder if somebody could kindly give me some advice. I recently  managed to get a nunchuck 9.6 into my LCT AK74U. It's doable if you have the tops of both halves of the battery pack  meeting in the middle in stick configuration and then manipulate the wiring.,  I had to fiddle with it a lot to get it in and close the dust cover. The problem was not with the wiring but with one of the cells. After I had finished tested this, I noticed that there was a small dent on this cell. It wasn't sharp and deep but a very shallow depression about 4mm max across. To be honest I would never have identified it visually and only discovered it by touch. The shrink wrap had not been broken and the dent is hardly visible. There was no damage to the wiring. The dent could actually have been there before I put the battery in,  without my noticing. I am just assuming it had something to do with it being a tight fit in the AK. It hasn't been dropped or banged against anything.

Since I know nothing about battery maintenance I thought I would ask here. Could this compromise the integrity of the battery? Do I need to stop using it, and get rid? The gun worked OK with it in place. It was a genuine improvement on the 8.4 battery I had been using. The dent is quite difficult to see even in good light, the inside has not been exposed and there is no venting. But they do say you should always get rid of a damaged battery.

I would be grateful for your advice. Think I might put it on charge and keep on eye on it.

 

[Lozart]

As far as Nimh batteries go if it isn't leaking it should be fine. They don't tend to explode in quite the spectacular fashion that LiPos do!

 

[emilianoksa]

Thanks mate. I appreciate the reply.

 

[Adolf Hamster]

it's an nimh, you should chuck it and get a lipo dent or no

 

[Immortal]

I always say "if in doubt, chuck it out" where batteries are concerned. Batteries are cheaper than what they go in...

 

[Lozart]

I always say "if in doubt, chuck it out" where batteries are concerned. Batteries are cheaper than what they go in...

Very true but I'd add that it would be worth working out WHY the battery got dented in the first place. If it's something in the way it goes in the gun then you'll just be throwing batteries away like they're going out of fashion!

 

[Steveocee]

Batteries are cheap enough to be considered a disposable item. You should do just that. If it is dented then it will have caused some, probably not major damage to the unit as a whole but the local cells will most likely be less than optimum and not hold full charge.

It's really not worth chancing whether it looks, sounds, feels or tastes right. Just chuck it and grab another.

 

[emilianoksa]

I will use a battery tester or multimetre on it to check power. They are useful things to have anyway.

As for short circuits my nimh smart charger would warn me if there was one.

Looking at it again, I may have overreacted. It really is the shallowest of depressions and it occurs between two cells so the slight indentation is probably in the space between them. I'd post a photo but it is very difficult to catch it properly with a camera. 

Thanks very much for your replies.

 

[Druid799]

I’d say it’ll be fine as well , over the yrs I’ve used plenty of dented ‘ordinary’  batteries in loads of different things with no negative side effects , and when you come down too it that’s all nimh’s are , just a string of normal batts .

 

[emilianoksa]

True.