Stentura Battery

[Allan Dyer]

Why a Stentura needs a good battery:

A Stentura needs a good battery for a couple of reasons. First, if the cord gets knocked out then the machine will keep going.

The other reason is the machine was designed for use with a battery, even when plugged in. If there is a power surge, then a good battery will absorb it and protect the main board. Aslo using a completely dead battery can short out or overload the charging circuit and blow out the main board.

Years ago we got aggressive about making sure that when we overhauled a machine the customer purchased a new battery, if they needed one. We sell a lot more batteries but have actually lost money over the years since we have stopped selling $1500 main boards to our customers every few months.

We sell batteries for $50, and recommend that you keep a new battery in your machine.

Using your machine plugged in all the time shortens the life of your battery, but everybody does it because the battery won't last all day in a deposition. If you plug in all the time your battery will last about a year. Yes, I know there are a lot of people out there with 10 year old batteries in their machines.

There is four digit date code on your battery. 2396 means battery was made in the 23rd week of 1996.

A bad battery stop your machine from operating properly such as it won't turn on correctly, disk errors, realtime stops working, and others. You usually find out about this in the middle of a deposition.

Cycle charging your battery each month will extend the life of your battery.

Call me if you have any questions

Allan Dyer
OTEC
206-284-7492

[Glen Warner]

Allan was my steno tech, but alas, he passed a couple years ago.

For those of you still using Stentura battery packs, StenoTech can either sell you a new one with better batteries inside or rebuild the ones you have.

On this end, I bought a Stentura battery charger and two of the new rechargeable Stentura batteries. When the "Charge Me!" indicator on my writer starts flashing, I put the other battery into the charger, and by the time it's charged, the battery in the writer is almost ready to to give up the ghost (usually a few hours).

In short, I haven't plugged my ProCAT Flash in for more than an hour since ... 2019.