A 15-20 min recharging system for sealed cylindrical flashlight-type nickel-cadmium batteries is now available for electronic newsgathering and other applications. This charger can recharge various sizes of battery packs - sub C, D and larger and offers the advantages of greatly reduced recharging time, negligible battery capacity fading, and up to 10 times longer battery cycle life. The principle employed is to alternate high-energy charging periods with automatically varying lower-energy discharge pulses that in effect act as ″burps.″ The system includes specially manufactured and matched batteries. Five significant problems that are encountered with sealed nickel-cadmium batteries and conventional chargers are overcome with the system.