Same here. I came close to buying a Key Lime (without the box) a few years ago, but ultimately I wasn't able to.
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Blueberry iBook Clamshell (1st Gen)
- Thread starter AphoticD
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dont worry,
I have a nice stock clamshell thats almost NOS
https://forums.macrumors.com/thread...at-turned-into-something-interesting.2055518/and a clamshell thats not very stock
https://forums.macrumors.com/thread...iy-ibook-g3-clamshell-g4-cpu-upgrade.2105654/
I wanted a working battery but even the ones in China cost $80, which I thought it way too much, so I decided to put in new Samsung cells, following the 8bitguy's Youtube vid and taking into account the other poster's experience on here.
First thing to say is that the 8bitguy infuriatingly leaves out all the juicy bits, starting from how to crack open the battery casing and lastly putting it back together again. I'd love to see his work, because I don't think it can be done in a neat way. The case is just not designed to be opened and closed.
After all the soldering the top lid wouldn't fit back on, so I put some electrical tape around it. Luckily it fit in the laptop just about alright. Even more luckily, it charged up without problems, I got 4.5 hours of use out of it. Maybe with some more calibrating it will go up, but I'm happy as it is. If it doesn't start a fire and burns down my flat after all, it was a fun job (would have been even more fun if the case went back on) and only cost 40€ for the Samsung batteries.
First thing to say is that the 8bitguy infuriatingly leaves out all the juicy bits, starting from how to crack open the battery casing and lastly putting it back together again. I'd love to see his work, because I don't think it can be done in a neat way. The case is just not designed to be opened and closed.
After all the soldering the top lid wouldn't fit back on, so I put some electrical tape around it. Luckily it fit in the laptop just about alright. Even more luckily, it charged up without problems, I got 4.5 hours of use out of it. Maybe with some more calibrating it will go up, but I'm happy as it is. If it doesn't start a fire and burns down my flat after all, it was a fun job (would have been even more fun if the case went back on) and only cost 40€ for the Samsung batteries.
Well done @naujoks ! It's a bit of a tough fix to do, so kudos on your perseverance.
My [rough] rebuild posted on page 3 of this thread is still working 100% after 7 months of use. Tiger reports the Full Charge Capacity as 3936mAh. The full initial level after the first calibration was 4192mAh. So the drop is really minimal and within normal range. Still no signs of overheating or swelling/exploding. I think it's safe to say I had success with the LG HG2 cells.
My clamshell is a solid performer with the mSATA SSD, overclocked CPU and maxed out RAM. Unfortunately the display's backlight is getting pretty dim. Next up, I'll try poaching a CCFL tube from a cracked 12" iBook G4 display I have in my spare parts.
My [rough] rebuild posted on page 3 of this thread is still working 100% after 7 months of use. Tiger reports the Full Charge Capacity as 3936mAh. The full initial level after the first calibration was 4192mAh. So the drop is really minimal and within normal range. Still no signs of overheating or swelling/exploding. I think it's safe to say I had success with the LG HG2 cells.
My clamshell is a solid performer with the mSATA SSD, overclocked CPU and maxed out RAM. Unfortunately the display's backlight is getting pretty dim. Next up, I'll try poaching a CCFL tube from a cracked 12" iBook G4 display I have in my spare parts.
Which size were the cells you used in your battery? Mine are 2700mA and Coconut Battery reports them as something like over 2500mA (though battery health is shown as only 80%. I don't know if things will change after a few charge cycles). I'm getting well over four hours out of them, more than my modern laptop, so I'm happy with that.
I'm just waiting for my mSATA to arrived. I'm using the absolutely brilliant Tenfourfox browser. If the SSD helps to speed things up just a little bit, it would be great.
[doublepost=1538391363][/doublepost]EDIT: Coconut battery now reports battery health at 100%, Maximum Battery Charge 3644 mAh and Original Battery Capacity 3200 mAh
Which size were the cells you used in your battery? Mine are 2700mA and Coconut Battery reports them as something like over 2500mA (though battery health is shown as only 80%. I don't know if things will change after a few charge cycles). I'm getting well over four hours out of them, more than my modern laptop, so I'm happy with that.
I'm just waiting for my mSATA to arrived. I'm using the absolutely brilliant Tenfourfox browser. If the SSD helps to speed things up just a little bit, it would be great.
[doublepost=1538391363][/doublepost]EDIT: Coconut battery now reports battery health at 100%, Maximum Battery Charge 3644 mAh and Original Battery Capacity 3200 mAh
The cells are listed as 3000mAh. Are these rating multiplied somehow when there are 8 cells in series?
Here is the output of Coconut Battery 2.6.6 (available here). Interesting, the clamshell is picked up as 109 months old (9 years) because the age is calculated by the serial number and the decade (1990) was not taken into account.
I'm not sure if the number of cycles was reset when I rebuilt the pack, because 130 would be about right. I've used it quite a bit over the months and my usage pattern for any of my portable macs is to run them off battery power until flat and then recharge while I'm not using it (most of the time). I feel this will result in the best conditioning of the battery instead of just running off mains power all the time and just topping up the charge in that 98-99% region.
I left my clamshell on the shelf for about 6 months and now the battery I rebuilt last year won’t charge past 1%...
I figure the cells dropped too low for the controller to recognize and now it’s just not attempting to charge. The light on the charger goes amber and the OS shows that it’s charging, but it gets nowhere.
I’ve tried PMU reset and the OS9 Battery Reset 2.0 extension, but no difference. Any thoughts?
Would the 9V battery trick help in this situation? If so, how would I do that exactly?
I figure the cells dropped too low for the controller to recognize and now it’s just not attempting to charge. The light on the charger goes amber and the OS shows that it’s charging, but it gets nowhere.
I’ve tried PMU reset and the OS9 Battery Reset 2.0 extension, but no difference. Any thoughts?
Would the 9V battery trick help in this situation? If so, how would I do that exactly?
sadly I had this exact same thing happen to the 10 cycle battery in my clamshell
it charged up to 100% and then lasted really well but wont charge beyond a 1-2% now IIRC
whats this 9V trick you mention? it rings a bell but I dont think iv tried it, I might give it a go myself depending on what it is exactly
(it sounds like you stick a 9V battery across + and - to jump start the pack?)
sadly I had this exact same thing happen to the 10 cycle battery in my clamshell
it charged up to 100% and then lasted really well but wont charge beyond a 1-2% now IIRC
whats this 9V trick you mention? it rings a bell but I dont think iv tried it, I might give it a go myself depending on what it is exactly
(it sounds like you stick a 9V battery across + and - to jump start the pack?)
Hey @LightBulbFun, jump starting is the idea. I think it was @weckart who mentioned it earlier(?)
I had a wacky idea... I plugged my clamshell battery rebuild upside down into a tibook and whaddya know.. it’s charging and well past 10% already!
We’ll see what happens next...
Hey @LightBulbFun, jump starting is the idea. I think it was @weckart who mentioned it earlier(?)
I had a wacky idea... I plugged my clamshell battery rebuild upside down into a tibook and whaddya know.. it’s charging and well past 10% already!
We’ll see what happens next...
View attachment 857965
ah very cool! I did notice that the pinout for PPC Batteries at least seem to all be identical
I know I and someone else have gotten away with sticking a De-decased iBook G3 Snow battery into a DLSD LOL
ill have to see if I can do the same with my iBook Clamshell battery and one of my later PPC Laptops
I had a wacky idea... I plugged my clamshell battery rebuild upside down into a tibook and whaddya know.. it’s charging and well past 10% already!
We’ll see what happens next...
They say that necessity is the mother of invention, after all.
Is the charge controller built into the battery or is it part of the DC circuit in the PowerBook? I would be concerned about over/undercharging based on what the PB expects to find. Li-Ion batteries have a habit of making a very loud protest when misused.
They say that necessity is the mother of invention, after all.
Is the charge controller built into the battery or is it part of the DC circuit in the PowerBook? I would be concerned about over/undercharging based on what the PB expects to find. Li-Ion batteries have a habit of making a very loud protest when misused.
The TiBook and clamshell battery seemed to be a lucky combination. The battery charged to full, the light went green and I popped it back into the clamshell for a happy Blueberry iBook!
I’m running through the first cycle now. The test will be if the iBook can charge it from flat again.
From memory, just open up the iBook battery along the seam as little as possible until you can see the relevant contacts. Attach a 9v battery for no longer than 15 seconds, detach, reseal and then get the battery into the iBook ASAP and see if it will charge. It is a race against the clock.
I wish I could remember the actual details but the page I found has long since gone to the interweb graveyard in the sky. The process, it was stressed, in the article is VERY dangerous and a last resort. Li-Ion batteries can go bang.
Still working like a brand new battery with 5 - 6 hours of operation.
I spotted another untested Blueberry clamshell on the ‘bay for a decent price and grabbed it so I now have another unit in decent condition. My plan is to dismantle both units and swap over a few parts like the DC-in board and LCD panel (which has a better looking backlight) to make one near perfect condition unit.
Hello,
Just found this thread and I wonder If i can get some help and advice since you seem very knowledgeable. I just obtained a ibook g3 clamshell blueberry. My first "vintage" apple product. I got one that was in near mint condition. I ran into a few problems. Resources online are scarce since this product is so old.
Row of keyboard didn't work. Thankfully keyboard ribbon was an easy task, I cleaned the connection pins with 99 iso prop and that did the trick. Keyboard works in full again.
It has OS X panther, and after a few boots, i got the dread system folder not found. I didn't have any panther disk, only the original os 8 install disc, so I had to wipe hard drive and install os 8. I ordered panther CDs off ebay, and awaiting those. I actually reset he pram and this happened right after
Battery, battery is my biggest hurdle. Okay so I did all the usual reset of PRAM and SMC. I think thats what it was called. I did the keyboard combo at startup and then also the reset button near the hinge area. I also downloaded the battery reset tool or whatever it was called (the program from apple) that didn't fix it. I have the same problem i think you did. Charging port is amber when machine is off, but when i power it on, its green. When panther was working, it shows time until charging, but never showed an estimate. For reference the battery is the original. Now i buy a new battery ( at least it was suppose to be new) off ebay. Actually original to my knowledge. Sold as brand new but still obviously 20 years old now. Here is the interesting thing. Under OS 8 the original battery just showed an X on the battery icon on the top taskbar. When i put the new battery in, it showed a charging battery icon. But the battery would never charge, and I guess OS 8 didn't show a percentage just progress bars on the battery menu items. I left the new battery in overnight and it did not charge at all. Another interesting thing, is the originally battery, the top and bottom are kinda curved and rounded. The new battery the top and bottom parts are square shaped and not rounded. Not sure if apple revised the battery, or if this is not an original battery.
I hear replacing the pram capacitor might be a helpful option or maybe replacing BATTERY CHARGER BOARD? I am not sure, and I am def not as technical as you are. I also can solder.
Sorry for the long comment, but I am hoping that I can get some help here as i cant find it much anywhere else. Any suggestions or advice is appreciated.
Hi guys, I'm trying to open up my aftermarket clamshell battery to jump start and it seems to be very well glued together. Do you have any opening tips? I'm slightly worried about using a hacksaw.
Hello,
have you solved that diode issue with the DC-in board yet? I'm also working on a non firewire blueberry iBook G3 and got the same symptoms - the D1 was blown. I've replaced the diode and the supercap but that didn't make any difference even for me. I've even rebuilt the battery and to my surprise, it also stopped charging and it's stuck at 0% now 😂. I don't have a TiBook tho...