Sudden Battery Drain

Raybro · Oct 31, 2015

Maddog said:
Ok, thanks! I'll try that.

Not sure how that will work. You may be able to find the tlogs then mail them to yourself. Or if you use google drive you could drop them in there and open them up on the PC.

J R · Oct 31, 2015

JonW said:
What are you in SD Jerry? 2000?

Jon,

About 1,500-1,600' here.

Jerry

J R · Oct 31, 2015

Raybro said:
The last battery call out at the end was 30% at almost 13 minutes.

Ray,

You must have been one of the bright guys in school! I bet you got to ride on the long bus!

Seriously, Thanks for looking that up. I didn't even think about doing that!

Jerry

Raybro · Oct 31, 2015

J R said:
Ray,

You must have been one of the bright guys in school! I bet you got to ride on the long bus!

Seriously, Thanks for looking that up. I didn't even think about doing that!

Jerry

Well, what I don't know is if you can use it when the Ipad is connected to the PC. I didn't realize the Ipad won't let you browse the files.
Kind like going from a Phantom to a Solo....2 different animals.

J R · Oct 31, 2015

Raybro said:
Well, what I don't know is if you can use it when the Ipad is connected to the PC. I didn't realize the Ipad won't let you browse the files.
Kind like going from a Phantom to a Solo....2 different animals.

You're quoting the wrong post Ray.

Jerry

Maddog · Oct 31, 2015

Ray, iPad/iPhone will not allow you to view files like your Android. Did some research and discovered iOS locks down the file system.
For now I'll email them and work on getting them unzipped.

Thanks for all your help!

Maddog · Oct 31, 2015

Okay, some success finally. I emailed logs from my last 2 flights to myself. Unzipped them and MP finally open and played them.

I'm now reading threads about how to read them.
Thanks everybody for all your help. I know this has all been covered before but I was just having trouble finding and putting everything together.

Ducj5150 · Dec 30, 2015

The Juggler said:
I also experienced this yesterday. RTH is set to 75ft. This was my first flight since installing gimbal and updating to latest software. I got the Battery warning notice at 25% (which I normally ignore), but it dropped to 10% very quickly after. On its RTH descent it triggered 'failsafe' landing and it landed, took off again to about 5 feet, and then landed again. I thought perhaps it was because I hadn't used that battery for about 2 weeks. (using Solo App Beta on LG G Pad)

I just had this happen I normally get to within 10 feet of the ground and play with turns and minor adjustments to flight and land at 15% but I went from 30-25 to 10% in a matter of 1 minute. I have only about 15 flights on whole setup with gimbal on. hoping this isnt the trend, definitely love it. Time to save up for batteries and chargers...

VLAHECO · Jun 8, 2017

The same here Chuck. I crashed my drone because of that reason. I don't use anymore that battery. I tested after the crash and the same thing, once the battery reaches 25% it drains so fast to 1%. It is very dangerous. The battery is like 5 months old. I don't know how often we need to replace batteries.

Dmitry · Jun 9, 2017

VLAHECO said:
The same here Chuck. I crashed my drone because of that reason. I don't use anymore that battery. I tested after the crash and the same thing, once the battery reaches 25% it drains so fast to 1%. It is very dangerous. The battery is like 5 months old. I don't know how often we need to replace batteries.

You must reset the battery's memory to 12.8-12.1 volts with a discharge device

Hassentassen · Jun 9, 2017

Lithium batteries don't have a memory effect like old style batteries used to have. Discharging a lithium battery too far will damage it and perhaps kill it. As stated in the Solo manual, if the battery reaches 0%, discard it.

In any other device using a lithium battery, such as a laptop or cell phone, electronics will shut down the device to prevent damage to the battery before it discharges to far. In the Solo I assume they have foregone such safety measures so that you can in stead try to land your drone safely, than save your battery.

Normaly if a battery discharges too fast, it either has one or several bad cells or its health is deteriorating from many charge cycles or reckless usage. If you still have warranty, try to get it replaced by 3DR.

Doug Benson · Jun 10, 2017

Maddog said:
I'd like to add a battery problem to this thread:

Two days ago I went flying near my house. I fully charged one battery 15 minutes before I fired Solo up.
I started Solo, hit fly and it climbed to about 10 ft., which is normal.
I looked at the controller and it said battery was at 88% ! What?
The flight went ahead normally and I landed shortly after hitting 25%.
I sent a repair ticket and logs to 3DR and this is what they said regarding the battery issue after viewing the logs:

..Both batteries start at above 94% of charge. No issues there.
(2 flights that day)

Really? No issue?
Has anybody else had this "non-issue"?

Regarding battery life: about 2 weeks ago I was flying slowly above a storm damaged warehouse. At 7 minutes I got a 25% warning.
I landed manually 90 seconds later (Solo was only a block away at 100 ft) and battery was at "fail safe".

I have never gotten more than 15 minutes flight time since installing the gimbal. That was part 2 of my repair ticket. I got the following response regarding flight time:

..15 minutes of flight time is normal if the gimbal is installed.
I never saw that in any of the advertising for Solo- all I saw was 20-25 minutes of flight time. If I knew it was 15 minutes with gimbal, I would never have bought it.

You can't do much in 15 minutes, taking into account start-up time, flight to and from filming location, and perhaps hovering time while you set up smart shot.

I am not a happy camper...

Posted a new thread today on same topic, lets see what we find out.

Dmitry · Jun 10, 2017

Dmitry said:
You must reset the battery's memory to 12.8-12.1 volts with a discharge device

I do it and many do it!
This is not a new topic

Dmitry · Jun 10, 2017

Battery - Lower Threshold %

Bufford · Jun 10, 2017

RikMiddle said:
90 feet, I notice when that kicks in, solo seems to go into full tilt boogie like it's late for dinner.
so much so, on this example I forgot to mention, controller spit out "failsafe" on it's way home.

I now have 3 batt's , so I'm starting to think 30% and I'm headed home from now on...

Yup, better home then waiting to see if its gonna last you, I also do the 30% return flight and no problems if out a ways.

DavidPhillips · Jul 20, 2017

Chuck said:
I had a weird thing occur today. I was out at a local park where I test fly sometimes. I had a guy come up who was very interested in the Solo. Seems he crashed his Phantom Vision+ recently and needed a new gimbal and camera. He was talking to me about Solo and whether that would be a better option for his money. I was showing him features of the Solo and did a couple of smart shots, and saw my battery was down to about 32%. I was maybe 100ft. out and maybe 150ft. up, and went to show him RTL. My Solo did as it should, and started up. My RTL is set at 195ft, and as you know it goes up pretty quickly. Within 20secs. of starting it's ascent, I got the 25% battery warning, the critical battery warning, and the audible beeps from Solo itself. I watched the battery plummet to 10%, hit pause to regain control, and landed it myself with 1% battery showing on the screen. I was so intent on landing safely, I never got to check the battery voltage screen to see what it read. Now, I normally return and land with between 23% and 28% left. I have never had the battery drain so fast, even from 30%. My question is, do you think the rapid ascent when RTL was activated caused such a fast drain of the battery? I know going up rapidly uses a lot of juice, but this kind of drain has never happened before. Has anyone else experienced this? I thought maybe the battery percentages were off on the screen, but when I hooked the battery up to the charger, only 1 LED was lit. It seems to be charging ok, and I will put it in and test it in the morning with some very low and slow flying. I was just wondering what everybody's thoughts was on this. Thanks in advance for your help.

Bad battery would be my initial thought. Hover test it and compare times to other batteries.

I had one fade out like that last week about 8 minutes into a mission and had to let it land in failsafe. I tested it hovering in 25 mph winds that evening and it went down in about 90 seconds.