i have two battery chargers and they dont seem to charge most of the batteries

Fameart batteries have been the worst NiMH batteries I have bought, same issue as you, after charging they're flat in hours or days, rather than weeks or more. I have batteries years older than the Fameart ones that still hold charge better. I only buy the eneloop style battery now.

Maybe their chargers are similarly poor?

Frameart are probably some cheap chinese stuff without quality as you see, Sanyo make eneloop and have always been high quality commercial grade. Sanyo makes less expensive cells which are great, Panasonic, Energiser, Duracell are good brands. Buy quality like the sanyos you have. I would check each cell with a volt meter to see if any are dead or have reversed polarity from over discharge. the kids are probably running them dead until the toys dont run, this kills Nicads, nicads are fully discharged at a high voltage , just under 1.2v a cell. in a drill its when the tool slows, draining them all the way easily can reverse a cells polaity, so maybe its the way the kids are using them

Looking up this charger it is a fast 1-2 hour one and this type are all well dodgy. If it thinks the cell is knackered, ie it measures a voltage a lot less than 1.0v or a reversed polarity, it might refuse to start charging at all. The cell might be still OK but needs to be slow charged for half an hour in a traditional slow charger first to get the volts up to near nominal. This defeats the object of having a fast charger. I've destroyed a number of previously good NiMH cells on chargers similar to this due to overheating as the methods of measuring a full charge are not reliable.

the rusty one

What is the problem? I can't work it out from the rambling narrative.

Rechargeables have a finite life. When used in multiples and connected in series the chances are one battery will become flat before the others and will be reversed charged this doesn't do that cell any good and will shorten it's life. As the cells become older natural aging also makes the capacities different, this just makes the above problem worse.

Looking up this charger it is a fast 1-2 hour one and this type are all well dodgy. If it thinks the cell is knackered, ie it measures a voltage a lot less than 1.0v or a reversed polarity, it might refuse to start charging at all. The cell might be still OK but needs to be slow charged for half an hour in a traditional slow charger first to get the volts up to near nominal. This defeats the object of having a fast charger. I've destroyed a number of previously good NiMH cells on chargers similar to this due to overheating as the methods of measuring a full charge are not reliable.

the rusty one

Yes, I keep an old slow charger for starting off cells that are rejected by the 'intelligent one' too. I think the intelligent one does get them filled more reliably once the cells are recognised though.

There's simply no way to tell from what you've posted. First thing to do would be to put your unrechagreables into a slow dumb charger, as fast 'intelligent' chargers often refuse to charge cells for dumb reasons.

Going from rechargeable to alkaline is just not a good plan. Once you've figured out what's going wrong, you'll be glad you didn't.

NT

We were somewhere around Barstow, on the edge of the desert, when the drugs began to take hold. I remember misterroy saying something like:

Junk the s*it cheap ones and get some Eneloop-alikes, from here

I've occasionally fount some rechargables won't start charging if they're really flat - right down to almost nothing. I presume the circuitry in a smart charger has to detect some sort of voltage coming off the cell, just to know that there's something in the charger. Without that, it either wouldn't start the charge cycle or might refuse on the basis that the cell is faulty. I've found (as you say) that a swift tickle with a dumb charger can put enough juice into a flat 'un to convince the smart chanrger to start charging it.

Well, that's probably right, isn't most stuff these days?

Why do you say that?

I have a large collection of fameart (Rapid electronics sell em) and have not had any problems. I an Ansmann charger, though.

MBQ

So why are "Eneloop-alike" OK but "NiMH alike" are "s*it cheap"? Is it your brains that are s*it?

MBQ

Because not all NiMHs are low self discharge (i.e. like eneloop, cyclenergy etc)

I have heard other recommendations for the Vapex ones, but it's a little odd that that site lists both 2100mAh and 2300mAH "instant" batteries, when vapextech's own website only lists 2100mAh "instant" ones.

I know.

The way I read it was that he was recommending "eneloop alike" in place of genuine eneloop at the same time as saying fameart were cheap s*it NiMH, presumably because they were not a major brand. "eneloop alike" could just as easily be described as "cheap s*it eneloop". Do you really believe all low self discharge NiMH are created equally?

MBQ

We were somewhere around Barstow, on the edge of the desert, when the drugs began to take hold. I remember "Man at B&Q" saying something like:

You ignorant wanker.

We were somewhere around Barstow, on the edge of the desert, when the drugs began to take hold. I remember Andy Burns saying something like:

He's just annoyed because he's also bought Fartart batteries.

Would you care to answer the question?

MBQ