Charger adapter for Xbox 360 battery pack

 

The battery charger in the Xbox 360 controller isn't exactly robust.  From time to time it would stop charging the NiMH battery pack.  This is a quick and dirty hack for a temporary charger that helps to charge the battery pack so that it can resume normal charging again.

I made this adapter from a 2 cell screw driver charge cradle.  Ironically there are no fancy electronics for charge termination.  The charger uses a small transformer and rectifier diodes without filter capacitor.  I would not recommend leaving the battery pack on the cradle for more than a few hours.

Charging indicator

I added a charging indicator.   The output voltage is a tad bit high for my liking. The negative terminal of the battery pack has a silicon diode in series for a bit of voltage drop and as a way to detect charge current. During charging, the transistor monitors the voltage drop across a silicon diode and turns on the high efficiency green LED.

I measured the dimensions of the cradle and the battery case using a slide caliper and 3D printed their counterparts using PLA+.  The cradle contacts are small strips of iron that was used to crimp the mesh bag for my onions.  The battery contact was dremel out from old ISA slot with 0.1" pitch. 

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The small PCB is soldered to the contacts and sit directly over it.

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Metal strips from onion bags are used as
the contacts  for the drill cradle

The previous version was hand made from an old dental floss case and through hole parts

Files are released on github