Balance charging problem.

hoggyjay · Dec 15, 2017

Hi,
Tried to use a Turnigy ACCUCELL 6 charger and a Yuneec balance lead for my Typhoon H battery. Everything seemed to go well, Amp set to 5.4, four cells selected for 14.8V.

I can't honestly say if I selected balance or just charge. I did scroll through the menu during the charge and the cells very within 0.01 of each other.

My flight time was only 2mins before the first battery warning. I landed straight after.

Setting up on the charger again - all settings current. I did notice that the current draw or input to the battery was only 3.2 amps and not 5.4 amps which I have seen on tutorial videos.

I am back to using the standard charger for now any ideas what is going wrong?
The balance charger is connected to a 240volt domestic - 200w 12v supply.

Cheers.

PatR · Dec 15, 2017

A critical piece of information is missing from your post with the battery total pack voltage when it was removed from the charger. Less critical, but important, are how long the battery had been on the charge before being removed from the charge cycle, and what the battery voltage was before it was placed on the charger.

A few things to consider;

Regardless of the current setting a balance charger does it's job at a variable rate, which is determined by the charge state of each cell. This is determined by the charger. Charge current decreases as cell voltage increases.
14.8v is not a full charge state. 14.8v is the nominal voltage of a 4s lipo battery. A fully charged 4s battery will peak out somewhere between 15.6 and 15.8v.
Many balance chargers have user adjustable time limits to assist in preventing over charging or discharging a battery. 60 minutes is the lowest value that should be used for 1C charge rate, although a little longer (75 minutes) is common to allow for lower charge rates and cell balancing. The factory batteries often take longer than 60 minutes when charged at a 5.4A rate.

My guess is you may have removed the battery from the charger before the charge cycle was complete. If removed at 14.8v it was only partially charged.

hoggyjay · Dec 15, 2017

The charger signallled that the battery charge was completed after approximately an hour. I don’t recal the voltage of the batter when it was placed on charge. I landed the drone minuets after the first low battery warning (new pilot, don’t want to push anything). I’ll pay more attention to starting voltages and times.

The reading on the ST16 was 16.8 when telemetry was established, it dropped very quick. Possible even before take off. I have had 6 flights around 15 mine plus using the standard charger.

Thanks for your help Pat.

AH-1G · Dec 15, 2017

The ST16 will display 16.8 or so volts, but will immediately display 15.9V once you accelerate to lift off and hover. I will hover for about 10, 15 seconds check all my controls including voltage before flying away. If you can, carry a voltage meter with you and check your batteries before flight.

PatR · Dec 16, 2017

A word of advice, don't fly to the battery warning, instead pay attention to battery voltage and land at or before 14.4v. Your batteries will live longer that way and you'll never wind up too far away to make it back before the self landing feature kicks in. Sure, you'll sacrifice a couple minutes of flight time but you'll buy a lot fewer batteries over the time you own the H. You also won't ever crash because of a low battery.

As for the short flights, it could be the charger experienced a fault. They aren't always perfect. Charge them again and see what happens the next time. If you've been getting 15 minutes out of your batteries we can be fairly sure the batteries started out fine, unless you've been consistently flying until or after the battery warnings occur. If you have you may have already stressed your batteries. In such a situation they would accept a full charge but not tolerate a load and discharge quickly.

hoggyjay · Dec 20, 2017

Here is the problem -

My charger gives an audible alarm and stops with this screen

The CAPA I'm guessing is capacity? If I start the cycle again the battery reaches 16.77v and last along as the one in the standard charger.

I can cycle between settings and can see the end voltage.

What am I doing wrong?

AH-1G · Dec 20, 2017

Did you check your battery with an ohm meter after charging?

hoggyjay · Dec 21, 2017

What resistance should I be looking for?

PatR · Dec 21, 2017

What is the “charge time” limit set to on the charger?

AH-1G · Dec 21, 2017

Each cell approx at 3.94 volts. Even though this only 15.8 volts all 4 cells, the ST16 it will show 16.2 volts. Steve showed me this.
When measuring voltage, it's B to C, C to D, D to E, E to F

hoggyjay · Dec 21, 2017

Time limit is set to 180mins. No idea how to change this?

PatR · Dec 21, 2017

That’s good enough. My chargers are set to 120. Somewhere in your charger is a means to set the time. You’ll have to read the instructions to determine how to get there and make any desired changes. As you have found the time limit it’s likely changes can be made while in that screen mode. Perhaps pressing an up and down or start button