Arduino charge NIMH during use

Other Hardware Motors, Mechanics, Power and CNC
1

Hello together,

first of all i appologize if this is the wrong section. Maybe someone could move.

I created a robot based on Arduino. This robot gets powered by 12V NIMH akku pack. Because I don't want to detach the battery for charging, I'm looking for a solution to attach my existing external NIHM charger to this battery. I don't want to disassemble the battery pack from the robot.

I searched a few hours but all I found where solutions to build an Arduino based NIMH or solar charger.

I don't know lot about electronics and still learning.

I already use a NIHM charger for this akku (Tamiya plug) which provides different type of adapters (Tamiya, power jack etc.) (http://www.conrad-electronic.co.uk/ce/en/product/237739/VOLTCRAFT-100-240-VCharger-ForNiCd-NiMHRechargeable-batteriesMax-charging-current1-A?ref=searchDetail)

Today I use a DC/DC stepdown regulator between battery and arduino.
Can I just place a power jack plug-in to my robot and connect it to battery pack? Or will this damage the Arduino when I attach the charger?

I can adjust the voltage and current of the charger. For 12 NIMH cells, it will load with approx 14V. Also I can decide if it loads with 0,5 A or 1A current.

Please advise me how I could charge my battery without detach from arduino.

2

If you are using a DC-DC converter from the battery they the somewhat higher voltage it reaches
during charging won't be an issue.

The main issue you will have is over-discharging the battery since the DC-DC converter will be able to drain
the battery down to near 5V to power the Arduino, and suh over-discharge damages batteries. So make
sure you have some way of noticing when the battery gets low.