About this replacement
Icom IC-A4 / IC-F3 Series — 9.6V Ni-MH Replacement Battery (BP-195)
This is a 9.6V 2500mAh Ni-MH replacement battery for the Icom IC-A4, IC-A4C, IC-A4E, IC-F3, and over 40 additional Icom handheld radios. It replaces OEM part numbers BP-195, BP-196, BP-196H, and BP-196R. Same voltage rail, same physical footprint, same connector orientation as the original pack.
- IC-A4 and IC-F3 platform fit: These models share the same 9.6V eight-cell Ni-MH configuration, identical contact strip layout, and BMS handshake protocol — that's why one pack covers all of them without modification or adapters.
- Bench tested on actual hardware: We ran this pack through a full charge-discharge cycle on the IC-A4 and IC-F3 dock. The BMS accepted the handshake on first insertion, voltage held stable under sustained PTT, and charge termination triggered cleanly at full capacity.
- Aviation radio contact care: After swapping the battery in an IC-A4, wipe the gold contact strip with a dry cloth before seating in the charger dock. Aviation radios like the IC-A4 are used in high-humidity cockpit environments — oxidation on the contacts is a common reason the dock throws a fault LED on a new pack.
IC-A4 cuts out mid-transmission on a new BP-195 pack
Ni-MH cells ship at storage voltage — typically 1.0–1.1V per cell, which puts a fresh eight-cell pack around 8.8V. When you key up and the radio draws transmit current, that already-low voltage sags further. The IC-A4's undervoltage protection circuit reads this as a depleted pack and cuts TX. One full charge cycle before first field use brings the cells to their working voltage of 1.2V per cell, and the cutout stops.
Bar indicator shows one fewer bar than expected after fitting new pack
Icom's bar indicator works on fixed voltage thresholds — it reads a fresh pack at storage voltage and places it one step below the top bar. This is not a capacity fault. The radio is accurately reporting the voltage it sees at that moment. Charge the pack fully in the dock first. Once the cells reach 9.6V working voltage, the indicator moves to the correct bar and stays there under normal use.