the RC (radio control) and electric rideables thread

[Gibson99]

Are you disposing of the entire pack ? Cos its not the dead cell thats the worry , but rather the ones still retaining energy .

Yes. Tossing whole thing. All 3 cells are puffed on one pack so it's done. On the one with 2 supposedly good cells and no puffing, I couldn't separate the cells from each other without tearing each cell's outer foil wrap. Plus as I tried to split them, I could hear air squishing through some openings, and discovered some damage to the foil on one of the "good" cells, so decided it wasn't worth the effort. I don't NEED another 2s pack - I already have 4 others with jst plugs and 4 with deans. Plus my 3s packs, which are xt60.

I had originally bought these to use in my TX but I've just gone back to the 8xAA holder that came with it. It lasts plenty long, and doesn't puff up or need a low battery alarm beyond the one built into the TX.

 

[abarth]

i don't see the need to switch the balance plug unless your device uses the balance plug as its power source (i have seen this in some little 2s rc cars - wltoys 1:24 scale). otherwise, plugging it into a charger or balance board ought to be transparent to the charger/board.

I guess I never tried to balance charge with the 5S plug when I took out the puffed cell. I did not know whether or not that was going to be a problem for my charger.

 

[old4570]

Most chargers have balance plug ports , not sure how you would go charging 4s in a 5s port ?
Balance leads are cheap enough , not something I would park around with .

 

[Gibson99]

Most chargers have balance plug ports , not sure how you would go charging 4s in a 5s port ?
Balance leads are cheap enough , not something I would park around with .

i figure the simplest way to wire up a bunch of balance ports in a charger is essentially in parallel. so that on every balance port, all grounds are tied together, all cell 1 pins are tied together, etc... so that if you plugged something into the 6s port that only had 2 cells that were connected to the first 2 pins, the charger wouldn't know any different and would just say "oh, this is a 2s pack". i'd have to confirm w/ a multimeter, but i wouldn't be surprised if that's how they're hooked up. pretty sure that IS how they're set up on balance boards, so why would a charger be different? seems it'd just make it more complex in terms of wiring/design.

 

[kamkar]

My friend ran the Maxamps "lego" batteries, use to charge a bunch of them as 1 S with 20 A
you can build what ever battery you want to, just have to charge as 1 cell every time, but you can still do a bunch of cells then.
No balancer lead as its 1 cell you charge.

https://www.maxamps.com/mv5450-multi-voltage-lipo-battery-pack

 

[Gibson99]

Did you know that if you plug a light bulb into a bucket of sand, it will light up?

It only works if your sand has an appropriate plug, in this case, a jst plug.



After the bulb goes dark, which sometimes takes a while, you can pull the wires out of the sand and find this big puffy thing (right, obv) attached to the ends of the wire.


Sure is tempting to pop those bubbles... But this bubble wrap probably packs quite a punch, so I'm avoiding that temptation.

 

[Gibson99]

My friend ran the Maxamps "lego" batteries, use to charge a bunch of them as 1 S with 20 A
you can build what ever battery you want to, just have to charge as 1 cell every time, but you can still do a bunch of cells then.
No balancer lead as its 1 cell you charge.

https://www.maxamps.com/mv5450-multi-voltage-lipo-battery-pack

Dunno that I would trust such a system unless it had some kind of auto balancing system in each cell to prevent overcharge and to keep them evenly charged/balanced. And since I can't imagine that would be cheap....

 

[kamkar]

It worked just fine, but my friend care not for proper lipo battery care and maintenance, so he dont store charge batteries like i do, so his batteries might lie "empty" after lipo cut off in this car, or fully charged for a while.

So he go thru batteries fast, for instance 3 years ago he got a phantom quadcopter, and at once got 10 batteries for it ( the old phantom dont fly long on a charge )
But he dident use it much and now every single of those batteries are puffed up to some degree, and seem to hold a charge bad if he try to use them.

My train batteries that's just as old and have been used just as little are still solid like a rock, i just charge them and then store charge them once every year.

Granted some of my old batteries have also puffed up a little, but i still got 3 years or so of good use on them and god know how many cycles, my friends quadcopter batteries cant have seen more than 10 - 15 cycles each.

http://ns.umich.edu/new/multimedia/...-into-battery-life-for-next-gen-lithium-cells

 

[Gibson99]

i'm not the best about remembering to use my charger to put them at storage voltage, but usually when my battery alarm goes off, and then i drive/fly back home and take out the battery, it's right around 3.7v/cell anyway. rarely is it exactly 3.70, but it's close enough.

i think this one puffed because it sat in my TX with a partial charge (around 4v/cell) for a long time. not like the tx really runs it down, so it never got a full discharge; just an occasional topping off. and that's why i just went back to regular alkalines in the tx - i don't use them up fast enough to need rechargeables.

i'd love to mod my neato robot vacuum (neato is the brand name, but it is pretty neat imho ) to use lipo batteries - it currently uses ni-mh. better than nicad, but not much. but the charging circuit in there is rather convoluted, so it's not worth re-engineering the whole bot... not to mention that the bot runs on 12v, not 14. so even if i went to li-Fe batteries, i'd still have to deal w/ the weird charging circuits...

 

[abarth]

Sure is tempting to pop those bubbles... But this bubble wrap probably packs quite a punch, so I'm avoiding that temptation.

do you have something that will allow you to pop the energy bubbles at a distance? perhaps a BB gun?

 

[Gibson99]

do you have something that will allow you to pop the energy bubbles at a distance? perhaps a BB gun?

i have a cheap little "Red Ryder" BB gun - spring action only, no pump/air. bought it as a gag gift for my wife since she loves the Christmas Story movie so much (Ralphie, "you'll shoot your eye out")

it's strong enough to go through 2 layers of cardboard and still put a small dent in the sheetrock (being stupid, shot it in the garage, didn't expect it to go thru the box), but dunno if it would puncture the battery. if i do decide to shoot it, i'll be sure to set up my gitup cameras to capture anything that happens beyond simple venting.

 

[kamkar]

We actually tried to shoot a range of lipo cells with a .22 PCP airgun, poked holes in them just fine, but not a single emission of flames or smoke, just a little bit of heat generation.
That was a let down for sure

 

[Gibson99]

I have a Walther P22 that would definitely put holes in them, but since I live in a suburban neighborhood, I can't shoot that in my back yard

 

[old4570]

Go for a drive !

 

[kamkar]

We did also go for a drive that day, but we also shoot the same air guns in my friends garden, but we also have silencers both of us ( was illegal back then ) so the most noise are when the pellet "land"

We cant go shooting at a range / club, cuz of the intensely weird way things are set up here so aside for private land ( which we do not have access to ) then the law force us to break the law, all for the simple and clean fun of shooting a little air rifle.

 

[old4570]

11.11 = Did anyone buy anything ?

 

[kamkar]

No, my budget have taken a most unfortunate dive to the wrong side, so i have to be very careful with that i do between now and my car service and inspection of it next year.

Dont get it though, its just like some times my economy just take a free fall, and really i cant tell why it do that.

 

[old4570]

No, my budget have taken a most unfortunate dive to the wrong side, so i have to be very careful with that i do between now and my car service and inspection of it next year.

Dont get it though, its just like some times my economy just take a free fall, and really i cant tell why it do that.

Yeah , I know how that is ..
My finances are not great , but I actually budgeted for 11:11 and this is pretty much my Xmas shopping done for myself ..
Hopefully everything will get here safe n sound ( ordered some pocket knives ) . Hopefully 90% of the Xmas shopping has been taken care off .

 

[jokiin]

Yeah , I know how that is ..
My finances are not great , but I actually budgeted for 11:11 and this is pretty much my Xmas shopping done for myself ..
Hopefully everything will get here safe n sound ( ordered some pocket knives ) . Hopefully 90% of the Xmas shopping has been taken care off .

knives and drones, are you building some type of weapons system

 

[kamkar]

Us singles,,, well i am anyway, got to be good to ourself cuz no one else are.