Battery issues after three months

David Wilson · Aug 25, 2016

I've been flying my H since late May, excluding a month or so down for camera repairs, and now I'm noticing a significant drop off in battery flight time. My two original batteries drop so fast now. They are pretty much done after about 12 minutes. I would estimate I have 70-80 flights on each battery. My other batteries are newer and are still good for 15-16 minutes, which still isn't that great. I really like 20 minute flights and was hoping for that from the H. Twelve minutes just isn't cutting it. And now flying with the Skyview goggles, time goes by so much faster. Twelve minutes feels like about five. We need a higher mah battery!

JCFlippen · Aug 25, 2016

David Wilson said:
I've been flying my H since late May, excluding a month or so down for camera repairs, and now I'm noticing a significant drop off in battery flight time. My two original batteries drop so fast now. They are pretty much done after about 12 minutes. I would estimate I have 70-80 flights on each battery. My other batteries are newer and are still good for 15-16 minutes, which still isn't that great. I really like 20 minute flights and was hoping for that from the H. Twelve minutes just isn't cutting it. And now flying with the Skyview goggles, time goes by so much faster. Twelve minutes feels like about five. We need a higher mah battery!

Someone said Venom will be bringing out H batteries - not sure what mAh though.

Markinter · Aug 25, 2016

I've been looking at getting one of those battery trays for $54 and an 8000mah battery for $65. It's supposed to fly just under 30 minutes.

Rayray · Aug 25, 2016

Markinter said:
I've been looking at getting one of those battery trays for $54 and an 8000mah battery for $65. It's supposed to fly just under 30 minutes.

My LIPO 8000 does about 20 or so, maybe still too new. I have a LIHV 8000 but afraid to use it 'cause of warranty.
Hopefully, other batts will be on the market by and by. (My stock batteries do about 17-18).

Note that I do not run my batteries as low as I could.

Markinter · Aug 25, 2016

I agree 12 minutes flight time with goggles feels like nothing. I land at 14.7

David Wilson · Aug 25, 2016

Rayray said:
My LIPO 8000 does about 20 or so, maybe still too new. I have a LIHV 8000 but afraid to use it 'cause of warranty.
Hopefully, other batts will be on the market by and by. (My stock batteries do about 17-18).

Note that I do not run my batteries as low as I could.

I've seen the battery trays. Where do you get the 8000 battery?

DroneClone · Aug 25, 2016

Rayray said:
My LIPO 8000 does about 20 or so, maybe still too new. I have a LIHV 8000 but afraid to use it 'cause of warranty.
Hopefully, other batts will be on the market by and by. (My stock batteries do about 17-18).

Note that I do not run my batteries as low as I could.

How will they know you used it?

Robert Berchtold · Aug 25, 2016

DroneClone said:
How will they know you used it?

drone clone, off topic what charger do you use

Brandon Lowe · Aug 25, 2016

Did your batteries sit fully changed for a month? That is not good for them. They need to be charge at storage levels if they are going to sit more than a couple days.

Robert Berchtold · Aug 25, 2016

I was new to the Yuneec and there was nothing in the instructions that told a new user anything about the care of a Lipo battery so I had to learn the hard way. Now I have purchased two new batteries and need to buy an aftermarket charger and all adapters, would like to charge two bateries at a time and be able to really take care of them. Any suggestions on a charger and adaptors to to that would be greatly appreciated.

Brandon Lowe · Aug 25, 2016

Look here. I have 4 of these and they work great.
Battery Charging Plug

Just make sure you have them plugged into the charger before hooking them to the battery. Like any charge cord that can short out the battery if you plug the battery in first and the banana jacks touch.

Markinter · Aug 25, 2016

DroneClone said:
How will they know you used it?

Higher than normal voltage probably would show in flight log. 17.2 compared to 16.8.

Brandon Lowe · Aug 25, 2016

Markinter said:
Higher than normal voltage probably would show in flight log. 17.2 compared to 16.8.

I'm sure it would and bye bye warranty. I will hold of on these until after my warranty.

Sparkorc · Aug 25, 2016

David Wilson said:
I've been flying my H since late May, excluding a month or so down for camera repairs, and now I'm noticing a significant drop off in battery flight time. My two original batteries drop so fast now. They are pretty much done after about 12 minutes. I would estimate I have 70-80 flights on each battery. My other batteries are newer and are still good for 15-16 minutes, which still isn't that great. I really like 20 minute flights and was hoping for that from the H. Twelve minutes just isn't cutting it. And now flying with the Skyview goggles, time goes by so much faster. Twelve minutes feels like about five. We need a higher mah battery!

Have the two battery's ever been run down to low volts because that can shorten the battery longevity significantly, I rarely go below 14.7 volts or defiantly landing as soon as 14.6 volts is indicated.

I also check internal resistance on each cell of the battery when new and again periodically this can give hopefully a early warning when the battery is starting to fail on one particular cell, I have observed that even a brand new battery can differ on internal resistance against another new battery of the same make tested, its quite possible your two battery's did not have good internal resistance in the beginning hence their short life.

Rayray · Aug 25, 2016

Markinter said:
Higher than normal voltage probably would show in flight log. 17.2 compared to 16.8.

Exactly, even up to 17.4 i believe.

David Wilson · Aug 25, 2016

Brandon Lowe said:
Did your batteries sit fully changed for a month? That is not good for them. They need to be charge at storage levels if they are going to sit more than a couple days.

No, I've been using lipos since they came out for our hobbies many years ago. Never charged for more than overnight for the next days flight.

David Wilson · Aug 25, 2016

Sparkorc said:
Have the two battery's ever been run down to low volts because that can shorten the battery longevity significantly, I rarely go below 14.7 volts or defiantly landing as soon as 14.6 volts is indicated.

I also check internal resistance on each cell of the battery when new and again periodically this can give hopefully a early warning when the battery is starting to fail on one particular cell, I have observed that even a brand new battery can differ on internal resistance against another new battery of the same make tested, its quite possible your two battery's did not have good internal resistance in the beginning hence their short life.

I always land by 14.6 or 14.7. I did once fly one down to about 14.2 but that was one time only and that's still not too low.

Intelien · Aug 25, 2016

Robert Berchtold said:
I was new to the Yuneec and there was nothing in the instructions that told a new user anything about the care of a Lipo battery so I had to learn the hard way. Now I have purchased two new batteries and need to buy an aftermarket charger and all adapters, would like to charge two bateries at a time and be able to really take care of them. Any suggestions on a charger and adaptors to to that would be greatly appreciated.

I have started looking into a better system after reading up on the LiPo batteries. I found this mod on youtube looks easy enough so I may just try it. However after reading the comments appears it disables the 5v USB port needed to charge the ST16.

Rayray · Aug 25, 2016

David Wilson said:
I've seen the battery trays. Where do you get the 8000 battery?

Hobbyking International, if they are back in stock.

Intelien · Aug 25, 2016

Sparkorc said:
Have the two battery's ever been run down to low volts because that can shorten the battery longevity significantly, I rarely go below 14.7 volts or defiantly landing as soon as 14.6 volts is indicated.

I also check internal resistance on each cell of the battery when new and again periodically this can give hopefully a early warning when the battery is starting to fail on one particular cell, I have observed that even a brand new battery can differ on internal resistance against another new battery of the same make tested, its quite possible your two battery's did not have good internal resistance in the beginning hence their short life.

From what I read a LiPo battery chemistry changes over time. So you will always have a difference in internal resistance.