I have recently purchased 2 batteries from Autel, and was wondering if I should open them and use them before I put them in storage? Or just keep them in the sealed box from factory because I want them as back up batteries for later
Battery question
- Thread starter BigDave9mm
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Jagerbomb52
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The batteries should be in what is commonly called winter mode. You can check them out in your drone and App firmware to see what kind of charge they have or just go by the LED power lights on the battery. Most of my batteries I check them once every 2-3 months. Some need a boost some do not. I would not charge to full until you really need it. 40-50% is fine for long term storage.
Outstanding thanks ever so much! I am afraid that soon we will not be able to purchase anymore EVO 1 batteries so I am trying to stay ahead of the shut down, I just lost 2 batteries that controller said defective and came home, only had 25 cycles on them!
Keep in mind that typical LiPo's go bad in approximately 100 cycles OR 2yrs; and the problem is whichever comes first no matter how you store them. LiPo is great for its strengths (light weight, massive storage capacity for its size and weight), but terrible for longevity.
I hate to say it, but your best bet really is to sell your EVO 1 while it still flies and get a newer model. Autel is a fraction of the size of DJI, you probably won't be able to find any 3rd party battery resellers/rebuilders after the EVO 1's batteries are no longer available and you might as well just fly the EVO 1 and enjoy the batteries that you just bought; storing LiPos long term is like storing gasoline long term; neither are going to work properly after about 6 months or so in storage.
Jagerbomb52
Well-Known Member
Hmmmmm then why am I still flying my vintage X-Star premium to this day with the last 3 batteries from the 4 I started out with?
I would say proper battery management on my part.
I agree batteries will become hard to find for the older models but don't just give up on them. You paid for them so enjoy them, they will last a very long time with proper care.
2016-2022 and mine is still getting at least 18-20 minutes from each of my 3 batteries.
Oh I agree 100%, storage has a lot to do with it, but that still doesn't mean the average lifespan is not around 2yrs; there are of course exceptions to the average but it is the average because that's how long most of them last; there will always be statistical outliers. Also, keep in mind that newer drones use higher capacity batteries which get hotter during their discharge cycles which shortens their lifespan. Even the manufacturers typically state 2-3yrs in their documentation even with proper battery care especially for the newer drones.
My DJI P3 batteries worked like the day I bought them right up until I sold the P3; almost 4yrs later. My DJI P4 on the other hand had batteries swelling and overheating within one year and only about 50-70 cycles. Both drones and types of batteries I stored/charged/discharged the exact same way. The difference was the DJI P4's batteries had higher capacities and got much hotter during the discharge cycles.
My EVO 2 6K I've only had approximately 1.5yrs and I already have one battery that suddenly drops to 20% remaining after about 5min in the air. I almost feel like the newer drones are either using lower quality components for their batteries, they are simply packing in way more capacity into smaller spaces, or the vendors are engineering them to fail sooner than later because batteries and new drones are big business for them.
So just like everything, it seems like drone batteries simply are not built like they used to be. If it is a capacity problem then as an example my EVO II's battery holds 7100mAh compared to the X-Star's battery which holds 4800 maH.
Fly-a-holic
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IMHO the X-star's batteries are charged at too high of a rate and MOST of the cells were of cheaper quality. I got my eyes on a 100c 4s pack to replace the cells with. I will post the results when I get a chance to rebuild it.
Fly-a-holic
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Jagerbomb52
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Jagerbomb52
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One thing I did was use a regular RC charger a lot. I rarely used the stock charger. Not sure if that helped them last longer. Like I said I had 4 but one developed a bad cell and I was never able to revive it to fully charge so it became bonfire material.
This thread is focusing on charging methods. I agree that heat and how fast batteries are charged is ONE of the issues that shortens their lives. But also consider that when we label a battery as "bad", it isn't necessarily bad. What happens is that the cells inside get out of balance. The battery management system (BMS) in the drone reports it as bad, when in actuality it might just be out of balance.
Look at it this way...if you have say 4 cells in a pack that is supposed to produce 8.5 volts, but your drone can operate in the range of 7-9 volts, but because the engineers designed it to fly OPTIMALLY at 8 volts, they likely create within the firmware an alarm that says to the drone "better land NOW" Of course, that doesn't mean it CAN'T fly within the 7-9 volt range, just that it is commanded to land immediately.
If you have a battery that has one cell out of balance so that the sum of it's voltages don't reach 8 volts, the BMS will report a bad battery. But what in reality needs to happen is just to put all the cells into a balanced state.
No doubt many batteries have been thrown away because they report as "bad", but in fact just need to be reconditioned and balanced. We tend to look at our battery pack as one battery, but it really isn't. I sense a good niche market for anyone willing to provide this service.
Look at it this way...if you have say 4 cells in a pack that is supposed to produce 8.5 volts, but your drone can operate in the range of 7-9 volts, but because the engineers designed it to fly OPTIMALLY at 8 volts, they likely create within the firmware an alarm that says to the drone "better land NOW" Of course, that doesn't mean it CAN'T fly within the 7-9 volt range, just that it is commanded to land immediately.
If you have a battery that has one cell out of balance so that the sum of it's voltages don't reach 8 volts, the BMS will report a bad battery. But what in reality needs to happen is just to put all the cells into a balanced state.
No doubt many batteries have been thrown away because they report as "bad", but in fact just need to be reconditioned and balanced. We tend to look at our battery pack as one battery, but it really isn't. I sense a good niche market for anyone willing to provide this service.
Jagerbomb52
Well-Known Member
Heath and I spent a lot of time working with Autel back in the days when they actually had support and people who new what they were talking about to write up a PDF for battery management for the X-Star batteries. It was posted here many times for the new users to follow and was approved by Autel. Some followed it and some did not. Guess who complains about bad batteries. 
Jagerbomb52
Well-Known Member
This is the last battery I got from Autel. Still at 100% with 39 charge cycles. My other two are at 93% with around 60 charge cycles. Just topping them all off to storage for another month.
I agree, unfortunately the DJI and Autel chargers do not offer an option to do a deep charge / balancing cycle. I used to fly RC helicopters prior to drones and with those batteries you had full control over everything including the charging and balancing settings. If one cell went out of balance you could focus on that cell and try to bring it back into balance independently of the other cells.
It might be possible with the drone batteries as well if you know the battery pinouts and if the balancing circuit is in the charger and not in the battery. Drone batteries are much more complex than the simple 1S-5S batteries I used in helis, so I haven't bothered to learn their specific architecture. For me safety is everything so when it says its bad I don't try to revive it; instead what I do is include the cost of batteries in my client service proposals to ensure I recoup the replacement battery cost each year.
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