Whats Inside？- Quntis 18W USB PD Charger Unboxing & Teardown Review

USB Power Delivery is a fast charging technology, supported by certain iOS / Apple and Android / Google devices, that delivers much higher levels of power than standard charging. And it enables consumer to use just one lightning-fast charger for their smart phones, laptops, tablets and other devices.

18W USB PD fast charger has been gaining popularity in smartphone market for being open stardard, powerful and versatile. Besides USB Power Delivery standard, some 18W USB PD charger also complies to other fast charging standards like QC 3.0, QC 2.0, FCP, APPLE 2.4A etc.

Apple introduced USB PD charging with the launch of the 2015 iPad Pro 12.9" and with OS X laptops in the MacBook Pro as of 2016. The iPhone 8, iPhone 8 Plus, iPhone X and XS/Max can rapid charge with any USB PD charging accessory. However, most people don’t take advantage of it because Apple includes cheap 5W chargers with almost all of its iPhones, until Sept, 2019, when Apple finally announced that iPhone 11 Pro and iPhone 11 Max will ship with an 18W USB-C plug and a USB-C to Lightning cable.

For those iPhone users(and users of other phone brands), who need fast charing,18W PD charger can be a great upgrade which improves user experience. 

Here we got a Quntis 18W PD Charger, lets take a look at it. We made a teardown of it to show you the internal electronics.

I Unboxing & Quick Test
Front: Classic Quntis design featuring a clean white box with blue accent. Product pic of PD charger(18W) + USB C to Lightning cable (6Ft), which is a good combination cause if u buy usb-c to lightning cable or PD charger alone, u will still have to get the other if u want fast charging. This combination is a solution, u don’t have to spend extra money or worry about compatibility.

Back: Apple device models that support fast charging, ETL、CE、RoHS、PSE certification marks, and a barcode of MFi certification.

Sides: Made for iPhone/iPad/iPod logo. These MFi logos communicate to customers that this electronic accessory has been designed to connect specifically to iPhone/iPad/iPod, and has been certified by the developer to meet Apple performance standards. There are specifications on the other side for customer’s reference.

II Product Design

A groove design for better grip - sleek, simple and clean. It is made of flame-retardant PC+ABS material, with a gloosy finish to the main body.

Net Weight: 49g/1.73oz

Output protocol analysis by ChargerLAB POWER-Z KT001: Result shows that it supports protocols like APPLE2.4A、USB DCP、QC2.0、QC3.0、AFC、FCP、SCP etc. PDO information reveals the USB-C port also supports quick charging output in 5V/3A、9V/2A、12V/1.5A and 3-5.9V/3A(PPS)、3-11V/1.6A(PPS).

III Teardown

The casing uses ultrasonic welding technology, plastic molecules were activated to create new cross-links among molecules and this created a high-strength joint. The charger case is very firm when we tried to pry open it.

Inside are lots of thermal silica gel used between the internals so that they don’t move around. The printed circuit board(PCB) and the end of the pins inside the housing use contact connection.

Pull out the PCBA modul and heck the PCB board layout, on the top of it are fuses, filter capacitor, planar transformer and optocoupler. The components are glued for structural rigidity.

A number of components are listed neatly at the bottom of the PCB board. An input rectifier bridge and a main controller chip on the primary side, a chip on the secondary side, and sufficient safety distance is reserved between the primary side and secondary side.

Take a closer look at the chips:

Bridge Rectifier

Primary Side Main Controller Chip comes from Chipown, model PN8161, a highed integrated chip with current-mode control modulator and built-in 690v MOSFET, specifically designed for high-performance off-line converter with minimal external components. The PN816I offers complete protections including output over voltage protection, Cycle-by-Cycle current limiting (adjustable OCP), and overload protection (OLP) and soft start. QR-PWM, QR-PFM, Burst-mode operation and low consumption device structure help to meet the standby enengy saving standards and achieve higher efliciency. Excellent EMI performance is achieved with frequency modulation. The device provides an advanced platform well suited for low standby-power and cost-effective flyback converters.

Chip PN8307H from Chipown, with current-mode control modulator and built-in 690v MOSFET.

PN8307H consists of a synchronous rectification controller and an avalanche-rugged N-channel power MOSFET, specifically designed for a high performance AC/DC flyback converter to replace traditional rectifying schottky diode. PN8307H integrates a much lower voltage drop MOSFET to increase output current capability and efficiency, which makes the converter's efficiency meet the standard of Energy star Class VI. PN8307H offers complete additional functions including UVLO, Preventing fàlse open, minimum turn on time etc.

Components are soldered and glued onto the PCB board: NTC thermistor, time-delay fuse, filter inductor, filter electrolytic capacitor etc.

Using an NTC thermistor as surge suppressor

A time-delay fuse, size 2A 250V.

Filter inductor wrapped by heat-shrink tube

Two filter electrolytic capacitors, 400V 15μF with a PWM chip power supply capacitor , 100V 10μF

A power supply capacitor, 50V10μF.

PC817 Octocoupler & A blue Y capacitor for interference suppression.

The USB-C port is centered, and fixed onto a small daughter board parallel with the main PCB board.

Next to the USB-C port is a filter electrolytic capacitor,  specification 16V 470μF.

On the other side of the USB-C port, there is a solid capacitor, 16V 470μF. Separated from the the USB-C port by an insulating baffle.

The synchronous rectification MOS tube used for VBUS switching is from SAMWIN, Model number SW15P03.

Detailed specifications of the SAMWIN SW15P03 MOS tube

On the other side of the daughter board is a USB PD protocol identification chip.

 

Above are all the components.

 

IV Conclusion

Quntis 18W PD charger is powerful, portable, compact and sleek in design with rounded sides for better grip. On the inside, the charger is carefully designed with neat layout - The chipown primary side main controller chip PN8161 and chip PN8307H has greatly simplified the design.

In terms of performance, it supports PD3.0、PD3.0 PPS、APPLE、SAMSUN

BC1.2、FCP、QC3.0 protocol, and tests show that it also supports AFC/SCP, which can meet the power demand of phones, tablets and laptops.