What Is Your Battery Maintenance Procedure?

[Aussie in AZ]

I must confess, I thrash my racing quad batteries. But they are cheep and easily replaceable.
My Solo batteries on the other hand are not cheep (albeit when BB have a sale they are) and getting harder to find.

Mine get treated like this;

1 - I never fly under 20% remaining but quite often only get down to 30-40% due to not needing to fly any more.
2 - I always charge the batteries back to approximately 50% for storage and they can sit for weeks before being used again.
3 - I have the batteries numbered and use them in turn (hence the reason they might sit for weeks at 50%)
4 - I keep them indoors in my air conditioned home (never left in the hot garage or car)
5 - I only charge them the batteries needed the night before or on the day that I need them.

My question is this, Am I doing everything correct to keep my batteries in tip top condition or is there something else I should do or something I should do differently to prolong their life expectancy?

 

[andrew.baker.142]

Sounds like you are doing everything perfectly.
You might find that your batteries will benefit from a discharge below 10% once in a while to reset the battery management circuitry.
If you use your personal LiPo charger rather than the stock 3DR charger, keep the charge current below 6A.

 

[RichWest]

The only thing left is to occasionally drain the battery down to a "reset" capacity of the smarts, my memory says it was 8%. This is for the smart side of the battery and overall capacity.

Another tip that I've used and seems to be true, battery break-in. On your first few usage of a new battery run them down lightly, no extended hard throttle and only down to 50% capacity. I have my batteries numbered as well, my initial set #1 and 4 are still in full rotation whereas #2 and 3 are dead. Guess which ones weren't treated correctly... Those batteries have over a 1-1/2 year of usage.

 

[Aussie in AZ]

Thanks for the info guys. I use the stock 3DR charger. I'm not sure of the advantages of using my LiPo charger as you can't connect a balance lead (please correct me if I am wrong here).

Other than wearing out the motors on the Solo, how do you discharge them to bellow 10% for the smart battery "reset" and does it matter whether you do that from a full battery or a not so full battery?

 

[RichWest]

I built a discharging station, a series of 12VDC turn signal lamps of approx. 130 watts total. Easy to build with an improvised plug to the battery, wire and wooden board. You have to monitor the battery as it is discharging, voltage meter can be placed inline for accurate voltage reading.

I've been told that many li-po chargers have an auto discharge function. So that may be want you want instead. Search the forum for further reference info.

 

[Maddog]

Thanks for the info guys. I use the stock 3DR charger. I'm not sure of the advantages of using my LiPo charger as you can't connect a balance lead (please correct me if I am wrong here).

Other than wearing out the motors on the Solo, how do you discharge them to bellow 10% for the smart battery "reset" and does it matter whether you do that from a full battery or a not so full battery?

Where in Az are you located?

Some people modify the connectors on their lipo chargers so they have extra chargers for charging multiple batteries at the same time. That way they don't need to buy another 3DR charger.

No balance connections needed with the Solo batteries.