Ap1300 User Guide Page 7 of 16
4.4
BATTERY PACK HANDLING PRECAUTIONS
WARNING!
Battery Handling Precautions
The battery pack is fitted with an internal safety fuse, but the user must take care to avoid
short-circuiting the contacts by preventing them from touching any metallic object. For
example, the battery pack should never be carried loose in a pocket where it could rub against coins,
keys or other metallic objects.
Short-circuiting the contacts of the battery pack will cause a heavy current to flow, which may lead to
excessive heating of the battery pack or any metallic objects connected to it. This could cause burns,
or start a fire.
WARNING!
Do Not Try To Open The Battery Pack
The standard battery pack contains five Nickel-Metal-Hydride Cells. Exposing the cells
increases the risk of leakage or short-circuiting.
CAUTION: It is strongly recommended that the external charger is disconnected whenever the
battery pack is removed or replaced.
Please observe local standards for the handling, transport and disposal of Nickel-Metal-Hydride Cells.
4.5 BATTERY
PACK
CAPACITY
The Ap1300 is supplied with a 1.8Ah NiMH battery pack. This battery pack should be recharged while
installed in the printer. This takes about 15 hours with the Trickle Charger, or about 3 hours with the
Fast Charger. The capacity of the battery pack when fully charged will normally be sufficient to print
normal text along about four full rolls of paper. However, the amount of printing which can be
achieved depends greatly on the printing density, idle time and other factors such as the ambient
temperature and the history of the battery pack.
With the printer awake but idle, a fully charged battery would last for up to 10 hours, but the built-in
sleep mode shuts down the printer completely, reducing energy consumption to a negligible rate.
In the event of the battery becoming exhausted, the printer will automatically protect its own control
circuitry by entering sleep mode if the instantaneous battery voltage drops below a threshold (e.g.
during a particularly heavy section of print). In this case data stored in the buffer is lost.
The battery pack should be capable of up to 500 complete charge and discharge cycles, though this
may be reduced in very repetitive applications. If a particular battery pack appears not to be holding
charge as well as expected, it may be worn out and should be replaced by a new one. Please consult
the factory for further details and recommended battery treatment.
During battery charging, especially fast charging, the printer may become quite warm. This can
crease the paper within the mechanism. The system designer may wish to feed out some paper
before printing begins, either controlled from the host, or by the user pressing the paper feed button.
4.6
PRIMARY CELL CRADLE
Also available, as an accessory, is a battery cradle suitable for 4 x AAA primary (non-rechargable)
cells. If the standard rechargable NiMH battery pack becomes discharged and there is no time, or no
available mains charger, to recharge it, then the AAA battery cradle may be used to power the printer
for short periods.
N.B. The cradle is suitable for four AAA 1.5V primary (non-rechargable) cells only.
4.7 ALTERNATIVE
POWER
ARRANGEMENTS
Alternative arrangements, such as direct power from a vehicle 12V or 24V starter battery, or direct
power from a high capacity voltage source, will be made available in due course. Please contact the
factory if your application requires such power arrangements.
