About this replacement
Icom IC-A14 / IC-F14 Series — 7.4V Li-ion Replacement Battery (BP-230, BP-232)
This is a 7.4V, 2600mAh Li-ion battery pack for the Icom IC-A14, IC-A14S, IC-F14, IC-F14S, and over 100 compatible Icom handheld transceivers. It replaces OEM part numbers BP-230, BP-230N, BP-231, BP-231N, BP-232, BP-232N, BP-232H, BJ-2000, and BP-232WP. The pack fits directly into Icom's standard battery bay and connects via the same multi-pin contact strip used across the BP-230 family.
- IC-A14 and IC-F14 platform fit: Icom built the IC-A14 aviation radio and the IC-F14 land mobile series around the same 7.4V battery bay, contact layout, and BMS handshake protocol — so one pack covers both lines without modification.
- Bench tested on actual hardware: We ran this pack through transmit-cycle testing on the IC-F14 platform. The BMS held voltage steady through repeated PTT events, and the charger dock accepted the BMS handshake without a fault LED on first insertion.
- First-insertion contact cycle: If the charger dock shows a fault LED on initial seating, remove the pack, wipe the gold contact strip with a dry cloth, and reseat firmly. The Icom dock requires a clean contact surface to complete the BMS handshake before it begins the charge cycle.
Why the IC-A14 drops TX power mid-transmission on a new BP-230 replacement
A new cell ships at storage voltage — typically around 3.7V per cell, not the 4.2V per cell seen after a full charge. Under the sustained RF output of a VHF transmission, the IC-A14 draws peak current that causes the pack to sag below the radio's TX power threshold before it sees a true low-battery condition. The radio interprets this voltage sag as insufficient headroom and steps down transmit power to protect the circuit. A full charge cycle before first use brings both cells to 4.2V and eliminates this sag behaviour entirely.
Bar indicator reading one fewer bar than expected after inserting a fully charged pack
The IC-A14 and IC-F14 use a voltage-threshold bar indicator — each bar corresponds to a voltage band, not a tracked charge percentage. A new pack that was charged in a different dock may have a slightly lower resting voltage due to surface charge settling, which pushes the reading into the next band down. Let the radio sit powered on for two to three minutes without transmitting; the resting voltage stabilises and the bar indicator corrects itself. If the indicator still reads low after settling, confirm pack voltage directly — a fully charged 7.4V Li-ion pack should measure between 8.2V and 8.4V at rest.