the battery in my 10+ year old FT-270 is degrading now. I’ve been thinking about a more modern replacement handheld but nothing seems to tick all the boxes for me in terms of both physical and RF resilience. Yes, I know it’s big, old and heavy, but the mirror tells me I am, too!
In a bored moment on a rest-day between hills on our current GM SOTA tour, I came across this: https://ebay.io/m/uz6fAt Has anyone tried these and, if so, how did you find them?
Cheers,
Denis MW0CBC
Hi Denis
These are two batteries that replaced my old one for the FT270. The one on the left is the latest and came with it’s own charger. Both still working well. Don’t know anything about the one you have a link to.
73 Allan
You can still buy the original Yaesu batteries on the interwebs:
https://www.hamradio.co.uk/yaesu-fnb-83-pd-2232
My solution was to go with the FBA-25A adapter box for fitting AA batteries, and then using NiMH rechargeable AAs to fill it up. Normal Alkaline AAs are pretty naff and will run down really quickly, and I’m not rich enough to try Lithiums, but good quality NiMH AAs are reasonably inexpensive, easy to charge, and easy to get your hands on.
The best ones to get are Panasonic Eneloops or Ikea Laddas in 2450/2500 mAh capacity. The eneloops are made in the same factory as the Ikea batteries, and in my experience, there isn’t a whole lot of performance difference between the two (they’ve also been sold under a couple of other brands including Sanyo & Fujitsu).
As I mentioned in another thread recently, the NiMH AAs are a tiny wee bit wider than regular Alkaline AAs, so they just need to be placed a wee bit more carefully in the FBA-25 tray - I find placing them in with the seams facing up helps them fit a wee bit more comfortably.
A very nice man in GM/ES 3d printed this for me.
Genuine FNB-83 on right, 3d print + 2x 18650 + UK £2 coin for scale.
The 3d print is sized for 18650 with protection. I have none of those so will make some extra springy battery contacts. I’m waiting for some Nickel strip from a fellow club member.
I have removed the weather-proof gasket from the old FNB-83 to help seal the printed case. Just visible in this photo.
You can’t charge this in the VX-170 but it will be twice the capacity and half the weight.
I would be very interested in the a copy of the code to print one…
This one. There are a few options but these seemed best, even with sizing for protected cells.
…get a newer mirror 
Geoff vk3sq
Hi Allan,
can you remember where you bought that pack? I think the ones ML&S are currently selling are perhaps the old NiMh things but perhaps I’m wrong?
Cheers,
Denis
Thanks guys for all the suggestions. I’d really prefer to avoid something that needs another charger etc given than we spend 2+ months on the road in our 6m campervan van with threee dogs every year. Space is really tight. I’ll give it some further thought I think… I’m really good at over-thinking things 
Hi Denis.
I’ll have a look for you
Sorry Denis. I can’t find where I bought the batteries from. I don’t think they came from Martyn Lynch and I suspect I bought from E-bay or Amazon. I don’t use anything else.
I can’t find the Lithium-Ion one anywhere (left in the photo) but I found the battery which is on the right of my photo on Amazon when I ran this search ‘FNB-V83 FNB-V94 Ni-MH Battery for Yaesu FT270’. Priced at £27.86. Your existing charger would work with this. There are loads on E-bay below and above that price.
These days I tend to carry the lighter Yaesu FT-65 with spare battery and a Sotabeams filter just in case…the good old FT270 didn’t need that. It also has 70cms when requested by Viki BWA 
Sorry I can’t help any further and there are some good suggestion above regarding alternative battery carriers. Good luck.
73 Allan GW4VPX
Make sure you buy a GENUINE Yaesu one.
Thanks for looking for me. I’ll take another look around the web and see what I can find. I too am trying to lighten the load a bit as I’m getting older but the FT270, as you know, is bomb-proof and just works. Maybe time to select a radio for each hill, based on the known presence (or otherwise) of radio masts etc.
Cheers,
Denis, currently in Braemar, awaiting delivery of a new battery for the campervan. It’s almost six years old and wouldn’t start at 5°C in Glenshee yesterday morning. Fortunately, I carry a jump pack.
Fortunately, you’re also close to ES’s best almost free (
) recovery service. 
The battery in my 3L diesel at 6y11m old was starting to be rather sluggish when cold. It was most obvious if you hadn’t run the car for 5days or so.
This was after just one, cold night but we’d not driven far in the previous few days which likely didn’t help. All sorted now so hopefully the last van issue for this trip… other than the small fire yesterday morning….!
