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Setup guides, troubleshooting, battery care, mounting compatibility, and FAQ for Outbound Lighting bike lights including the Trail Evo, Portal Helmet Light, Hangover Helmet Light, Blade Tail Light and Detour Road Light.

I charged my light overnight and it's not full, why?

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I charged my light overnight and it's not full, why?

Entirely depends on your USB charger's specifications... (read more)

Since we made a non-proprietary charging system (USB) it means you can use any USB charger with the lights. The problem is that all USB chargers are different and there are a TON of different power protocols and negotiation methods, so for example, if you plug your Evo (10Ah battery internally) into a 0.5A charger (like a the tiny white cube that comes with iPhones) then it will take 10 / 0.5 = 20 hours minimum to charge the light. By contrast, if you plug it into a 5V/3A or a QC3.0 charger it will charge at 6x the speed of the 0.5A charger and thus only take ~4 hours total including trickle charging.

What's trickle charging? This is an inherent property of Li-Ion batteries that every single charging system has to deal with, where the amount of charge you can push into a battery tapers off as it approaches fully charged. As an example, if your light is completely dead, it will charge at 3-amps from a 3A charger, but as it gets above ~85% full it will drop the charge current significantly until it reaches 0-amps when full, so generally speaking the first 85% of the battery charges way faster than the last 15%, thus the "trickle charging" that occurs when close to full. 

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