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Overview of the new rechargeable Power Functions battery box along with its dedicated transformer.

The Lego company rarely releases new battery boxes, and a rechargeable battery is something entirely new. So far the battery boxes have been unsophisticated containers for regular batteries, usually of AA type. For builders who used a lot of electrified functions it meant firstly buying a set of rechargeable batteries (for economic reasons and for generally better performance), and secondly removing the entire box from the construction whenever a recharging was needed. Now, with the 8878 box, we witness a new and fresh approach.

The 8878 box will please both PF users and Trains builders. Both groups will benefit from its small size and weight, and the latter one should find the integrated speed dial rather useful. From my personal point of view the new box is interesting for its size and weight alone. Since my main activity covers mobile models of vehicles, the PF battery box was the only large and heavy element whose presence was inevitable in every model. Its size often limited the functionality of a model, and its weight degraded its performance. The 8878 finally enables me to have basically similiar performance while using much less internal space and reducing weight by approx. 160 grams.

The 8878 box comes in a thick foil film, and – somewhat surprisingly – already fully charged. The attached documents contain some pretty obvious notes about not putting it into fire and not throwing away along with the regular garbage, but they also state that it should be charged with the 8887 transformer only. There are two semi-transparent stickers on the sides of the box – one of these summarizes the aforementioned warnings, while the other one includes basic specification of the box. According to it, the box contains a lithium ion polymer battery with 7.4V voltage and 1100 mAh capacity. The dimensions of the box are 4x5x8 studs, and the weight is 75 grams.

Atop the box, there are 4 elements. There is a transformer plug-in socket with a red LED indicator (which flashes during charging and remains constantly alight when the charging is done), a master on/off button with a green LED indicator (remains constantly alight when the box is on), an integrated speed dial and a perfectly usual PF power point. The dial offers 7 forward and 7 reverse speeds just like the 8879  Speed Control Remote does, but here it has fixed neutral and extreme positions, plus a small position indicator. An axle can be put inside it a single stud deep, just like with PF XL and Medium motors. The dial does not return to a neutral position, and operates regardless of the master button – which means that the box can be turned on or off at any dial’s position. This is a pretty comfortable solution if someone doesn’t really need the integrated speed dial (which will be probably the case of almost all mobile remote-controlled PF-powered constructions).

The box has obviously no pin holes, and is only compatible with studs. The speed dial is located perfectly in its center, which should prove comfortable. I was somewhat unsure about the master on/off button, which will be difficult to operate via some mechanism (which was easy with the 8881 box thanks to it’s switch with a pin hole), but I guess that the top of the box will in most cases require a manual access just to handle the recharging, so the box can be turned on or off manually with only little effort.

As for the pros and cons of the box, I’ve made two comparisons in the video. First is a comparison with a set of six AA GP 2500 rechargeable batteries, which I’ve been using as the main power source so far. The 8878 box offers 7.4V voltage (versus GPs’ 7.2 V), 1100 mAh capacity (versus GPs’ 2450 mAh) and 4 hours of full charging time (versus GPs’ 16 hours, which can be greatly reduced with a proper charger). We can easily see that the box sacrifices capacity for the sake of voltage and charging time. Since there is no need to take the box out to recharge it anymore, I consider it profitable – the need to take the entire box out of a model has been most bothersome.

The second is a comparison with the previous 8881 PF box, that is a simple container for six AA batteries. Here the 8878 box offers 4x5x8 studs size (versus 8881’s 4x8x11 studs) and 75 grams weight (versus 8881’s 235 grams). It should be noted that the weight of the 8881 box is greatly determined by the batteries used, and perhaps with another make of batteries this difference would be smaller.

As for the 8887 transformer, it comes in a cardboard box and has a fairly long (over 1.2 m) wire. The one I got was fitted with the UK type plug and marked ver. 3 – I believe there are versions for other plug standards too (e.g. there certainly is an USA version).  It looks pretty ordinary and there are only two places where the Lego name appears.

I believe the new box has an enormous potential, in particular for the model builders. In some cases it should make it possible to build models which were too small for the 8881 box. It has, however, one important downside – the price. Not only is it expensive, but it also requires another product to function properly – the transformer, which is being sold separately and for a considerable price too. Hence I believe that the box will be popular mainly with builders who find the 8881 box way too large and too heavy, and with the ones who have been just about to buy a set of rechargeable batteries for regular use, and who now face an interesting alternative.

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