Solo battery turns itself on ????

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I've got a solo battery that automatically turns itself on. I can turn it off, and a few seconds later, it comes back on. The button is not sticking. And strange thing, if I connect it to the battery checker I bought from a guy here on this forum, it will read all the data, says it has 1 cycle, and when I turn it off, checker screen goes off, and the battery stays off. But if I unplug the checker, it will come back on. Weird, or what? maybe it's possessed?
 
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My second batch of batteries (4), circa 2017, have a tendency not to turn off at the first attempt. Strange part is that everything shuts down, just that the battery indicator stays on showing capacity. Hit the power button a second time and it turns off. IIRC, they are of the 11/15 production.

I lean toward conspiracy...;)
 
Mines possessed! I can do the second press, still comes back on after a few minutes. Did a full charge and it seemed OK, but walking by my battery box the other day, saw a light showing. Sure enough, it was this battery. Stayed off for more than a week after full charge, then, back on ??? Now have it back on charge, and will leave it for 48 hours, and see what happens. Strange stuff. I've got 4 still sealed in the original boxes, I wonder what they are doing?
 
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Ok now this is an interesting topic! Now I have a strange feeling I'm being watched by possessed conspiracy batteries on my charging shelf. I've never noticed random lights on myself but then again I've never really payed that much attention to em after I power em down, they're in an area where alot of led lights are so if they had turned on I probably just thought it was the router, PC or maybe 3d printer.... Gonna start storing em in lipo bags again in case they're possessed by a fire loving demonic entity ;-)
 
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Speaking of fire loving, I have yet to hear of a Solo battery going up in flames, and I'm not sure I've heard much about puffed up battery housings from swollen cells. I've got 7, all still in reasonable health, most of which I keep in a vented 50 cal ammo box in a vacant corner of concrete floor in the basement just in case, but I'm wondering if anyone has had an issue with one?
 
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This is the only battery I have that does this. When it automatically comes on, it's showing it's current charge, which is about 4 or 5 lights. Push the button, turn off. A few minutes later, back on. Hold button, goes off. Lay it down, come back, and presto, it's back on. Plug in the battery checker thing a guy from this forum sells, and it shows 57% charged. Now here's the strange part. Press button to turn off, while battery checker is still plugged in, and the battery goes off, and the checker goes off, and it NEVER tries to come back on. But if you unplug the checker, battery comes back on! It's now been connected to a charger for 48 hours, so I'll unplug it, and see what happens.
 
I have yet to hear of a Solo battery going up in flames, and I'm not sure I've heard much about puffed up battery housings from swollen cells.
I was thinking the same, never heard of one just flaming unless by crash or by hand... I have a couple of mildly puffed batteries that are no longer used for flying, well beyond 300 charging cycles. They bulge on the nameplate side of the battery, I can spin them if on a flat surface.

@Frank Foster - The circuit board holding the switch and LEDs is a daughter board. A fairly simple and cheap board. I don't believe it has any logic. The battery's mother board, controls everything - protection, power distribution and charging....as well as the LEDs. Likely the source of our similar issues.

One thing I would test, when it turns on by itself, is if it is actually fully powered or like mine and Rob's false on. Plug in your tester and see if you get any feedback. Let us know....

And again, just curious, what is the date code for the battery?
 
I'll look it up when I unplug it from the charger. Haven't messed with my Solo's in quite awhile. Got hooked on the RC truck stuff. Just got done working on my Arrma Kraton.:)
 
Rich, sorry about the tangent, but I'm wondering did those puffy cell(s) happen even treating those batteries nicely or did you maybe discharge them too far a few times, store them in too low a charge state or some other thing? They seem to be so stable, which maybe speaks well of the cell quality. I've got a couple 1 cycle batteries made in 2015 that I've had stored at 50% charge all that time with no maintenance other than checking them now and then (neither was ever lit up!), one of which I decided to charge up and fly last week in 25 deg wx between the snow flakes, and the thing lasts about like it is new, allowing for the cold. I'm pretty impressed with them compared to batteries I've flown in other quads. Anyway, just wondering.
 
OK date 10/08/2015 Left on charge overnight and until this evening. Shows 99% 16.6 volts, 5131 mah. Also still says 1 cycle. Now I probably should have mentioned this earlier in this thread, but this particular battery was never used, and found to be flat empty, o volts. I was gathering up all my lipo's to store in a chest outside my home, when I checked this one and found it to be fully discharged. I charged it till the lights went out, and put it away. That's when the auto start thing started. Since I did the overnight thing, it seems to be acting normal. Has not cut on yet. If it does, I'll check to see if it's just the lights, or if it's really on. Thanks Guys. I have 6 or 7 of these batteries, and have had no problems with puffies, etc. etc.
 
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I guess the thread is dead....so.
Rich, sorry about the tangent, but I'm wondering did those puffy cell(s) happen even treating those batteries nicely or did you maybe discharge them too far a few times, store them in too low a charge state or some other thing? They seem to be so stable, which maybe speaks well of the cell quality. I've got a couple 1 cycle batteries made in 2015 that I've had stored at 50% charge all that time with no maintenance other than checking them now and then (neither was ever lit up!), one of which I decided to charge up and fly last week in 25 deg wx between the snow flakes, and the thing lasts about like it is new, allowing for the cold. I'm pretty impressed with them compared to batteries I've flown in other quads. Anyway, just wondering.

Not dis'ing on the Solo batteries, I flew my original set of four for over 2 years...$600 worth. So yeah, Solo batteries have worked well in my setup. My old white bird's smart batteries would die in a year, one of the reasons I leaped over to 3DR.

I've always been a 25% landing and never below 20% on purpose. I did store this set at that drained level and then recharged the night before flights. I typically fly in warm/hot weather. The occasional cold weather at no lower than 30's and always kept them warmed prior to usage.

Back in late 2015 the recommendation was to break-in the LiPo batteries properly. The method was to fly gently down to 50% for the first few flights. Two of the four were treated that way prior to knowing the recommendation. The other two I ran hard straight out of the box, they are the ones that puffed and died early on. From my experiences the two broken-in properly had a longer life and more flight time in general.

I've gotten 6 from the BH bargain days, still new. I imagine they will perform well, but not like 2019 new. Performing a proper break-in, in my opinion, is key to maximize battery life and performance. I'm fairly certain 50% storage charge is important to battery life. Not sure if depleting to 5-10% to land is an issue, but it is not something I'm comfortable with to gain a minute of flight time.

Cold temps are brutal on older batteries, not sure of the long term effect would be otherwise from new. If I had snow around, I'd sacrifice all my batteries to capture those moments. As it is for me, it's just really f'ing cold and dreary most of the winter.

Just my experiences and by no means an expert on the subject. Always glad to hear of others experiences.
 
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Interesting that the lack of "break in" easy flying seems to be what caused enough rapid outgassing in those batteries to puff them. I guess I haven't had that experience yet, although I don't tend to run full throttle for extended periods very frequently or make repeated rapid direction changes to surge pull lots of current very often... and as I think about it, I generally like to "test" a new battery's capacity by flying easy and timing the flight. So maybe I've broken them in without realizing it. I do like to fly in 30+ mph winds just for fun.
I'm a real believer in always storing at 50% +0/-2% charged... I'll charge back to that level right after getting home from flying and not charge up full again to fly until the morning of the day I'm flying. I know some guys store at a low charge or full charge for lengthy periods but there's no doubt that shortens battery life. I also seldom go below 20% before landing and swapping batteries.
While it only makes sense that the internal chemical reaction continues whether the battery is in use or not, that reaction after 4 years at 50% charge (2 since I purchased them from BH and 2 on someone else's shelf before that) doesn't seem to have had a very significant effect on capacity. Those two "new" 2015 batteries are back in storage again until a couple of my flight batteries run out of steam or next year, whichever comes first.
 
Batteries are funkie. I have an industrial application using lead acid gel batteries, they sit trickle charging and are not utilized for months at a time. We were getting about 2 years from them, assumed the high storage temps were the cause to their short life. We implemented a weekly load test, a resistive load that simulated operating conditions. Now with the weekly load testing, the batteries are getting 4-5 years life.

I know LiPo's are much different tech. I think however they perform better if cycled frequently once they've been "opened" up. Like in the example above, exercising them seems to extend their usable capacity and hopefully their working life.

My second set of batteries overlapped my first set in rotation, I was flying longer outings but less frequently. Even with storage charging to 50%, this set's performance has been so-so in comparison to flight times. Reading of others experiences here on the forum, I bought into the 2 or 3 year old battery theory as the reason... Maybe they are right, who knows...

Again I'm no expert on batteries and can only share my observation based on my experiences. In the end it's just a conversation among friends that have a common interest. I really wish the conversation was about $50 NIB 2019 batteries and how amazing it is to have +20 minute flights...;)
 
I've been looking through previous posts from over the past couple of years and maybe I just haven't found it yet... Is there a description someplace of how the battery management circuitry calculates "actual capacity" as displayed on the madhacker's analyzer doodad? Maybe it stores discharge current vs time and voltage level and just does a little math? It seems to be a pretty good indicator of battery health...
 
Neither the MadHacker or Solotool is an "analyzer", they are just simple readers. The BMS in the battery does all the math by comparing cell to cell differences. Even so, the known capacity is programmed into the BMS as the reference for calculations. At least that's how I understand how this all works. I prefer pie, not pi...

Either way, the battery percentage indicated is not linear. Why the bottom 2/3 battery usage time is nearly equivalent to the top 1/3 of its capacity as to time.

You'd be better off reading older posts at RCGroups or DIY Drones about batteries, smart or otherwise. The "smart" battery dumbed down the whole process...which is good by me.
 
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