Useful Flight Duration

[dondec]

Do people actually fly till the 1st battery warning? I mean is it safe? I've been bringing my H back (from 1/4mi away, 200-300 ft up, no wind) at around 14.7v, but that only gives me around 6-7 min of flight time. Add a minute for vertical landing & necessary tweaking. Haha, I could use a little more time.

Situation same for original stock and MorPilot Amazon batteries. Thanks in advance.

- Don

 

[AH-1G]

Not all of us.
I start back at 14.9 but only at close proximity. 14.7? that's really cutting it close, I'm on the ground by then.

 

[Eagle's Eye Video]

Those who do not want to reinvest in batteries more often than necessary, will want to avoid still being in the air at 14.3V (1st warning). If you take a poll, you would get a board consensus of 14.5V being the preferred landing voltage. Of course, starting back is all relative to distance. Voltage reading should be the primary determinant... not time.

Also note that as the temperature drops, so does your flight time. As we move along toward late fall / winter, you could see 5 minute flight times.

 

[AeroJ]

Yeah, I'm with the 'conservative brigade', and try and be on the ground at 14.7v. In over 150 flights on the H I have never once so much as even heard the low voltage alarm !!
Yet I find I am getting around double what you are in terms of time in the air - usually around 11-13 mins on the standard packs, and more like 8 or 9 mins on my Morpilot pack, which isn't as good as the stock ones in my case !

 

[dondec]

That's interesting AeroJ… on getting more time. I usually take it up about 200-300 then push it to around 1/3 mi away or so, take panos from there. I experimented with slower throttle to destination, to see if it gave me more usable air time. No matter what, I got more or less the same air time.

Are you using the stock charger?

- Don

 

[Eagle's Eye Video]

Where are you, @dondec ? Altitude above sea level plays into flight time as well. Also, so folks can comment on your experience, are you using the stock charger on these batteries? How many cycles?

 

[dondec]

Pretty close to sea level Eagles Eye... there's a river right down the street.

- Don

 

[Eagle's Eye Video]

That's good info... and BTW, I'm next to a river too... at 5000' ASL.

 

[AeroJ]

That's interesting AeroJ… on getting more time. I usually take it up about 200-300 then push it to around 1/3 mi away or so, take panos from there. I experimented with slower throttle to destination, to see if it gave me more usable air time. No matter what, I got more or less the same air time.

Are you using the stock charger?

- Don

I did the first 40 cycles on the stock charger, but then changed to a typical BD6 balance charger once the adapter cable had arrived.
I agree that is a big discrepancy, but I am not flying that differently to you - I maybe stayer lower longer, and never go quite that far away, but each flight usually includes at least one big climb, so I don't see what the difference is really. The only thing might be that after take-off I usually go back down to nearer turtle speed for the filmic parts of the flight (most of it) which might use less power maybe ?

 

[Ty Pilot]

I got off the stock charger as soon as possible with my Typhoon H 480. I also purchased a single aftermarket battery to go along with the two stock ones and now have over 300 flights on those batteries over a period of about a year and a half. The last time I flew it, I could easily get 14 minutes out of each battery before landing between 14.5 and 14.7 volts. I contribute their longevity and service duration to an aftermarket charger. Like others, I plan on being on the ground before battery warning though I have; on occasions, still been close in and airborne but as a practice I would discourage flying into a battery warning. In the beginning I could just about count on 18 minutes to the battery warning and so over time, they have lost a little capacity, but as I understand it, this is about normal for the cycles and length of service of these types of batteries.

I would add that I am at sea level and in a warm to hot climate year round.

 

[PatR]

How batteries are treated is quite important to their performance and life cycle. Someone that flies them to voltage minimums, stores them fully charged, or charges them immediately after a flight will eventually experience shorter flight times and reduced battery life.

The stock charger is barely adequate for charging the battery and useless for establishing proper voltage. From a manufacturer perspective it works great as it’s nearly impossible to over charge or short out s battery when using it, which almost eliminates product liability. For those that don’t understand battery requirements the stock charger is a great tool for increasing battery sales as those charging their batteries before putting them away for the day are effectively ruining their batteries.

Those that are smarter than their batteries have better experiences than those that aren’t.

 

[h1pst3r88]

Great info. I thought maybe my low battery warning might be broken because I never heard it. However, I followed the consensus advice here to be on the ground by 14.5 and will now err on the safe side landing my H at 14.7v.

With my Venom ProDuo a charged OEM pack registers at 16.7v when the H and ST16 are on and ready to fly. On my first few flights with beautiful windless weather, and rookie caution, I was getting about 14-15 min flights. I thought that was right on target.

I also don't immediately recharge packs, and if a charged pack won't be flown I bring it back down to storage voltage. I learned a lot of this info from a few youtube videos about LiPo care (one by Venom was excellent), BatteryUniversity website, QAs with Venom support -- which is excellent(!) -- and the experts on this forum, namely PatR.

In another thread, PatR said that our batteries are our fuel. I think that's exactly the right way to think about it. It makes the care and maintenance of these amazing LiPo's easier to understand as critical.

If my boys' traxxas cars run out of "fuel" they slow down and stop. If my H runs out of "fuel" it has a very expensive crash!

Good thread, Dondec!

-Chris

 

[PatR]

14.4v is just about the absolute minimum voltage for our batteries to survive for any length of time. Personally, I try to be on the ground by 14.5v and hold 14.4v as a reserve for rare emergencies or to deal with an aborted landing.

As we don’t have “idiot lights” to tell us where the halfway point in flight time is we have to develop a “feel” for flight time and voltage drop under different conditions. It does not take long to gain the ability to estimate battery consumption under various conditions and flight speeds with relatively good accuracy. Looking at the screen voltage monitor periodically is an excellent way of estimating rate of depletion. If we err on the side of caution and return a little early the most we sacrifice is a minute or three of flight time, with the benefit of never crashing because of an empty fuel tank as reward for that caution.

 

[Steve Carr]

the most we sacrifice is a minute or three of flight time, with the benefit of never crashing because of an empty fuel tank as reward for that caution.

Agree with all of that. Squeezing another minute out of the battery is a good way to test the glide path of the H.

 

[h1pst3r88]

Agree with all of that. Squeezing another minute out of the battery is a good way to test the glide path of the H.

Which in my experience is that of a rock

 

[Photo]

Which in my experience is that of a rock [/QUOTEs

Is it in some way possible to change the first warning to 14.7V?

 

[PatR]

It can be done with a 920 Plus, but only by a Yuneec service center. As the H and Plus use the same controller and share the same firmware when a Plus is being flown as an H I suspect such a change might be possible.

 

[FlushVision]

I can't add anything to any of the above. Just to say that I'm always on the ground no lower than 14.5v and usually get between 12 and 14 minutes in the air depending on how I've been flying

 

[PatR]

At risk of boring people to death I’d like to share some thoughts from full scale aviation I believe are appropriate for us.

In full scale, every flight is mandated to plan for fuel reserves adequate to land with between 1/2 hour and 1 hour of fuel remaining in the tanks after landing. More may be required depending on weather conditions that might affect the flight. These reserves are not a suggestion, they are legal requirements.

As the FAA has declared unmanned aircraft operators to be pilots we might want to consider adopting some personal standard for landing with battery reserves instead of trying to extract the maximum possible flight time from a battery. Just like an airplane we can’t pull over to the curb and carry a can to a gas station when we run out of gas. We might also consider that regardless of what class we think we should belong to, as the FAA has declared us pilots we need to start thinking like one. We can start that process early or wait until the FAA forces us to, and they will.

 

[nicholas hickman]

I'm guessing the RealSense module might suck some battery time as well. I'm still a bit miffed that Yuneec didn't employ "smart" batteries that discharge if not used for a day or so (waits for PatR to groan) given that there is little price difference, except DJI because they over price everything. As batteries are a critical component and so easily damaged without realising you'd have thought the extra few $$ would have been a sensible option.

I appreciate people should educate themselves on battery dynamics, however many do not as we live in a world of plug and play, time marches forward as does technology. How many new cars are on the market without ABS and other technologies that assist the modern driver? If we want more safety in the skies wouldn't it be prudent to offer technology to help mitigate UAV's falling from the sky due to duff fuel tanks?