What’s up vapers!
SirRisc here with another gear review!
The Gyrfalcon ALL-88 was sourced from Enova/Gyrfalcon!
Premise.
I honestly had never heard of Enova, or Gyrfalcon for that matter.
But I’m glad they got in touch, because the person I’ve been emailing with is an absolute delight.
The company itself has a plethora of battery-related products and claims to produce their own batteries.
Whether or not this is true is something I haven’t been able to check for myself, but I did get a chance to start using one of their chargers.
The all new ALL-88, an 8-bay charger aimed at the more professional market.
Don’t let that fool you though, a regular consumer like you and I has benefit in using a good charger and this one might be the thing if you have a lot of batteries around.
So how does it fare?
Let’s find out!
Specifications.
- DC12V/4A Input
- Output voltage: 1.5V, 3.6V, 4.2V, 4.3V, 4.35V x8
- Output current: 100mA, 250mA, 500mA, 1000mA (1A) x8
- Compatible with: Li-ion / IMR: 10180, 10440, 14500, 16340, 17500, 17670, 18350, 18500, 18650, 26650, 32650 and Ni-MH / Ni-Cd: AA, AAA, AAAA, C
- 8 independently monitored and regulated bays
- Bright LCD display, 8 separate screens
- Separate power supply unit
Packaging.
The charger comes in a rather large box, immediately giving away that this isn’t a small charger in itself.
The box is predominantly black with a blue logo, white lettering and a blue line across the front.
On one of the sides you’ll find the operating parameters and on the other side the compatibility of batteries.
On the back is where you’ll see the “features”, essentially the specifications of the charger.
The power supply unit (or PSU for short) comes in a separate box in plain white.
The cable to connect it to the mains is wrapped in a simple piece of cardboard.
Performance.
It’s been quite a while since I’ve reviewed a charger and this isn’t without reason.
See it’s hard to tell you a lot about the charger from a userperspective; it either works well or it doesn’t.
A mod or an atomizer has a lot more intricaties to write about, without having to go into the technical stuff.
Adding to that I’m anything but a specialist when it comes to chargers, so please do take everything I write in this review with a small grain of salt. (That doesn’t mean “get salty”.)
There’s a secondary reason I haven’t reviewed chargers, and that reason is the Efest Blu6.
I have two of the Efest chargers because they work so well. And yes, I know it’s Efest and their batteries are pretty much always rewrapped and feature bloated specs.
But their chargers are fucking great, I have yet to find an issue with either of the chargers.
But this review isn’t about the Efest charger. I’m mentioning it because I will use the Efest charger as a comparison, a criterion if you will.
The Gyrfalcon ALL-88 is a big charger. It’s about twice the size of the Efest charger but it does feature two more bays.
With 8 large bays, it’s made for intensive use and that makes it a charger ideal for vapeshops or RC specialists.
For a user like myself who is neither an RC specialist or running a vapeshop, it may seem like a bit of overkill.
Well, not quite. I’ve got a pile of 29 x 18650 and 4 x 26650 in rotation so I could use a few more bays sometimes.
The thing with larger chargers is that a regular user will almost never use all the bays at once.
With the Efest charger this made sense because of the fact that it only does 2A charging on the two outer bays and 1A max on the others, but is limited to 4A max total.
The ALL-88 is a bit different in this regard, it’ll give you a full 1A on all bays and can actually push 8A. This means all the bays can use the maximum charging current.
It will also monitor and charge all 8 bays separately to ensure a stable current on different chemistries.
What this means is that you could have Li-Ion batteries in bay 1 and bay 2, but Ni-Mh batteries in bay 3 and bay 4 for example.
You’re be able to charge both chemistries at the current you select, and up to the voltage you select.
This is another perk of the ALL-88, selectable voltage. You could potentially have batteries that require a lower voltage like LiFePO4 batteries at 3.6V.
Since the bays are all independently monitored and regulated, the ALL-88 can charge a mix of batteries without issue.
One thing I don’t like about the ALL-88 is the lack of an autostart.
The Efest charger is easy in the sense that I can just place the batteries in the bays and it’ll select the chemistry automatically and start charging them to 4.2V.
The ALL-88 requires me to set the voltage and current before it actually starts charging. In itself it’s a small hinderance, and actually serves as an added layer of safety.
When the batteries reach their desired charge however, the ALL-88 will stop charging and continue to monitor the battery.
Once the voltage drops below 4.1V it will start up again and continue to trickle charge the battery until it reaches 4.2V again.
Something that makes the size of the ALL-88 a fair bit larger than most other chargers isn’t just the presence of 8 bays.
The displays on top of the bays are big orange lit LCD screens that contain a slew of information.
Unfortunately the illumination of the displays is a bit on the weak side, the middle two displays have a significantly less bright illumination than the outer displays.
But it does suffice to make all the screens easily readable, and it doesn’t really hinder the functionality besides when in a bright environment.
So what info can you find on the displays? Well, a lot really.
There’s a battery indicator which will move when the battery is charging, a clock which shows you how long the battery has been charging, the selectable chemistry of the battery and the realtime voltage of the battery.
Underneath that are two selectable meter-type rows that allow you to select the charging current and the charging voltage.
Everything is selected with the buttons that sit below the displays, which coïncidently are illuminated in red and blue depending on the function.
The buttons will blink in blue when the charger is working, and burn red once the battery has reached its charge.
There are also an additional two buttons down the middle which serve as a functionality and Current/Voltage selection respectively.
While there is a lot about this charger that makes it look complicated, it really isn’t as complicated as you’d think.
In fact once you get to grips with all the options on the charger it becomes easy.
There’s one more thing that makes the charger bigger than the others, and that’s the length and width of the bays.
While the Efest can charge 26650 batteries on both outer bays, the ALL-88 can actually fit them in every bay.
This means that you can charge 8 x 26650 batteries at once, and at the full 1A current.
If you’ve been paying attention you’ll notice that I also wrote length of the bays. What this means is that the ALL-88 can actually charge longer batteries than 18650 or 26650.
It can handle batteries with a length of up to 72mm, making it suitable for most LiFePO4 batteries used in vaping (though most LiFePO4 batteries in vaping are locked into the mod and have an onboard charger).
Given that the bays are so long, it may have trouble with shorter batteries.
Well… not quite. Enova/Gyrfalcon has considered this by adding 4 extensionpieces for the clamps, that can be mounted to fit shorter batteries like AAA.
Something that is always an issue with chargers is heat dissipation.
The Efest charger tends to run a bit on the hotter side when the 6 bays are filled and charging, and unfortunately the ALL-88 isn’t much better.
Though I will say that it doesn’t run equally hot and it doesn’t run hot when only a few bays are in use.
The fact that the PSU is separated from the actual charger keeps a big part of the heat away from the charger itself.
Unfortunately I don’t have a cool infrared device to measure heat and show you brightly colored heatmaps (that stuff’s expensive), but from a userperspective the heat isn’t present as much as in a NiteCore I2.
Aesthetics.
In terms of aesthetics, the ALL-88 isn’t a bad looking charger.
Despite it’s rather large size, it’s quite low and that helps with keeping a low profile on the desk.
The displays are quite pretty, but the middle two displays do suffer a bit from lower light.
In bright illuminated areas this may pose a problem but generally I’ve found that it doesn’t really hinder anything.
I’ll let the photos speak for themselves…
Pros and Cons.
Pro.
- 8 bays can charge at 1A each
- Possible to charge 8 x 26650 batteries
- Independently monitored and regulated bays
- Low profile
- Selectable chemistry/current/voltage
- Trickle charge when battery drops below a certain voltage
Con.
- No autostart
- Lower light in two middle displays
- Springs need a bit of smoothing at first (improves with useage)
- The many options can be a bit daunting at first
- Clamp extensions can be hard to mount
In conclusion.
The Gyrfalcon ALL-88 is a very complete charger that performs really well.
Throughout the review I’ve compared it to the Efest Blu6 multiple times because that is my go-to charger, and I can honestly say that it performs equally.
The fact that I can now charge 8 batteries at once at 1A makes for a very pleasant experience, especially considering the fact that I have so many batteries in rotation.
While it isn’t without faults the ALL-88 does what it’s supposed to do, and it becomes quite easy to use once you get your head around the options.
The lack of autostart is the only thing that I really miss in comparison with the Blu6, but it’s only a small hinderance and actually provides an extra layer of safety.
All in all, I’d probably get a second one of these if I had more batteries in rotation (though that would probably tick off my wife to the point of divorce, haha).
In closing I would like to thank Gyrfalcon/Enova for sending out the Gyrfalcon ALL-88!
If you’re looking to buy one of these chargers, I just noticed Gearbest has picked them up.
Thanks for reading, join me next time as I take a look at Yostatech LivePor80! A surprisingly well-built mod!
Need to reach me? Head over to my website.
Interested in what I vape daily? Check out my Instagram.
Want to know more about DIY? Head over to ELR.
#staycloudy !
SirRisc disappears in a cloud of coconut and lemon scented vapor
DISCLAIMER: This review is based on personal opinions and is not intended as a promotion, endorsement or advertisement.
The publisher is not sponsored, affiliated or compensated in any way.