Polymer Lithium Ion battery charger MAXIM max1555 - why is this not available??

[danjel]

I tried to get a quote from Maxim to buy 350 of their max1555 chips but they rejected it since the part has lead in it and they won't sell to non-franchise distributors.

It seems crazy to me that this is the only battery charging IC I can find like this and they won't sell it to me.

The only place I have found it so far is at sparkfun.com and of course they are selling it at rip-off prices. Anyone know any other sources? maybe alternative ICs?

 

[blueroomelectronics]

Ahh you want 350, nevermind

 

[danjel]

I need 350 of them not 1. At that price Sparkfun has about %500 markup.

 

[blueroomelectronics]

True. Problem with Maxim is so very few distributors.

 

[DirtyLude]

What about the MAX8903A / MAX8903C / MAX8903D?

 

[danjel]

Thanks for the suggestion but neither of those are stocked by Mouser/Digikey and they are also more expensive (and too large... have extra un needed features)

 

[DirtyLude]

Maybe tell us what features you do want, then.

Is it part of a battery powered device or standalone?
If it's stand alone, how about the MCP73833? I have a couple charges made with them.

If it's part of a device: MCP73871

Both of those are available at Digikey.

 

[kchriste]

What about **broken link removed**? They seem to have them in stock.

 

[Speakerguy]

Maxim sucks. Try seeing if TI or Linear have anything that will work for you. Here is one TI device I found....

https://www.electro-tech-online.com/custompdfs/2010/03/bq24026.pdf

 

[danjel]

Nice find on the TI! That looks like a direct equivalent.

Requirements:

-Charge via USB and charge via AC adapter.
-Battery is a LiPo like this Lithium Ion polymer Batteries - 1050mAh [POW0102B1B] - $7.50 : Seeed Studio Depot, Arsenal for interaction engineering
-Minimal external parts