"smart battery" adapter?

[Roger Caplan]

I'd like to use 3rd party lipo packs with my solo.

I'm thinking of using something like this, permanently mounted on the solo:

Smart Battery Systems (SBS) with SmBus V1.1 support for 7.4V / 11.1V / 14.8V Li-Ion battery packs

, and then plug any "regular" lipo pack's power and balance connectors to the board.

Would this work? Has anyone tried it?

 

[Maddog]

Welcome to the forum, Roger!

I don't know if it will work but why would you want to?

 

[Roger Caplan]

3rd-party, non-smart battery packs are cheaper, and I can use my existing balancing chargers with them.

 

[Maddog]

How are you going to attach them to Solo?

 

[Roger Caplan]

a custom 3d-printed tray.

 

[Maddog]

How much cheaper? Seems like a lot of trouble to save some money. How will you connect them to Solo power?

 

[Roger Caplan]

connecting them to solo would be done using the existing power and smbus connections.

 

[PdxSteve]

I'd like to use 3rd party lipo packs with my solo.

I'm thinking of using something like this, permanently mounted on the solo:

Smart Battery Systems (SBS) with SmBus V1.1 support for 7.4V / 11.1V / 14.8V Li-Ion battery packs

, and then plug any "regular" lipo pack's power and balance connectors to the board.

Would this work? Has anyone tried it?

It could potentially work as long as it truly follows the smbus specs so solo can get correct data from it. One thing you'd have to do though is program the chip with the individual parameters of your battery pack. They aren't plug and play. You'd also want one per battery pack and not just one for all, since it keeps a running tally of the current state for the battery it's connected to. Like after you fly, it knows how much you flew the battery down. If you just hook another battery up, it will use the old batteries stored value and not the battery you just plugged in, unless you reset it each time which seems self defeating.

 

[Roger Caplan]

aha, I didn't realize those things maintain state... yeah that makes it much less attractive, I mean at $40 a board...

thanks!

 

[PdxSteve]

You could also use an arduino or another i2c capable device to program the SBS (and read from it) instead of that TI interface hardware they are trying to sell, which they also don't have in stock apparently.

 

[PdxSteve]

aha, I didn't realize those things maintain state... yeah that makes it much less attractive, I mean at $40 a board...

thanks!

Especially when you can get batteries for about $80-$90 now.

 

[IceFyre13th]

Do any of you read spec before you decide to use something?

Maximal continuous discharging Current
7A 7A 8A

Nice burned up board you will have there..........and I see nothing on that site that has enough Amp capacity to do what you want.

But, maybe a board out of an old Solo battery would work.................................

 

[hackbard23]

Do any of you read spec before you decide to use something?

Maximal continuous discharging Current
7A 7A 8A

Nice burned up board you will have there..........and I see nothing on that site that has enough Amp capacity to do what you want.

But, maybe a board out of an old Solo battery would work.................................

wanted to post this too, quite in this minute

 

[Marich]

You could also use an arduino or another i2c capable device to program the SBS (and read from it) instead of that TI interface hardware they are trying to sell, which they also don't have in stock apparently.

Not really sure about this, but...
What if you slaughtered an old Solo pack for the board then used it as a permanent mounted board for relatively cheap lipo packs? Isn't this basically what the op intended?
One mystery I have solved, I think, is the mystery of the discharging battery. We know Solo batteries seem to discharge themselves to around 50 percent capacity, and fact is they do!
I think. During a email conversation with a 3DR tech a few weeks ago, I was told the battery had a "sleep" mode. Apparently once it's pulled fresh from the charger it enters this mode so it's ready to power on instantly (but why wouldn't it be anyway) - and after a few minutes of no activity goes to sleep just like a laptop or tablet. At 50% it finally shuts off.
So. While we've thought our batteries are inactive while stored they're actually sleeping, snug in their cozy backpacks...

 

[Rusty Jones]

I would just be happy with faster charging and a way to discharge without flying.

 

[Roger Caplan]

@IceFyre13th the link I posted was meant as an example of the type of device to use, not that exact model or brand or anything. I should have said "an SMBus-compliant smart battery controller".

 

[User Name]

I would just be happy with faster charging and a way to discharge without flying.

They do charge rather slowly, but given the questionable long term availability of batteries, I don't mind if they're babied on the charger.

On the issue of discharging, March confirms what I've suspected - that they DO discharge themselves. All 8 of my batteries consistently loose a dot every 1 to 2 weeks down to a 50% charge and then stop. This is likely intentional to make sure the batteries always drain to safe long term storage level.

 

[John Githens]

I'm going to add a link here to the thread "maybe a dead battery fix". Might be informative and useful (save money on batteries; avoid worry and terminating a flight sooner than you want).

My latest suspicion (not quite an Assumption) is there are times when I have been in a hurry to unplug or replug a Smart Battery, which left the internal battery system in an unfortunate state.

I have also seen my Solo Controller's display switch back and forth from 100% to a much lower percentage (appropriate to that flight). Another possibility is related to my recent, long job in cold operating conditions (although 40-45 F doesn't seem like it would pose a problem).

No doubt readers of this thread can speculate freely as to what may be happening, both internal to the battery as a system, and how the battery system interacts with the Solo Controller. Mind Candy!