Are you busy flying?

[ajoksch]

I can not believe that nobody has had any questions or ideas about batterys in 2 months. I guess that everyone is enjoying spring and busy flying. Not me, have not flown my Li-Po plane in two months. I just tried to charge up and fly, all 3 11.1V batts I use, have discharged to 6V and do not want to re-charge. Everyone tells me that if a Li-Po dis-charges less that 3 Volts per cell thay are junk. I think that saving a few grams in not worth all the difficulties of using Li-Po batterys. I have been fighting these sence last June. About ready to mount my old reliable Cox .049 on the bird and shoot these blinkn batterys.....

[JakeinColorado]

Ajoksch,
I too gave up on LiPos. Just too tricky to watch all of the parameters, plus that everpresent danger of fires. Just not worth it. Instead, I am using A123 Racing batteries. No danger of fires, and they charge up in as little as 15 minutes. To give you an idea of the power of these batteries, consider this: I am using two 2300ma packs in a 6 pound 110" Condor Magic sailplane, and am running a 60 size AXI motor to get it upstairs. I charge the pack just once for a entire days worth of flying, and at the end of the day I still have 50% of the batteries capacity! I just can't kill the things.

[Mark R]

LiPos have changed the park flyer market if not large scale. They are very safe just here and there a few bad mishaps that hardly ever happen. They are not only lighter but are more powerful with higher discharge rates.

Follow the instructions and you will never have a problem. I highly recommend them. I am using them in my next 40 size extra which hads incredible power. Can you say 2 ft takeoff?

[ajoksch]

:cool: So, I finally was able to recharge my crappy Li-po's. I had to spend most of an afternoon plugging them in waiting a few seconds until the alarm went off, unplug, wait a minute and re try. After several hours of this for each of my three batterys, I was able to charge the darn things up. Now my problem is that the P-51 I built is to heavy for the motor and I must run wide open which drains the batterys in a minute or two. But this is a scratch built
P-51 made from poster board foam. It is 2-D and looks awesome in the air. Now to chuck the old system and get a bigger motor and some powerful batts and I'll be shoot'n at 109's real soon.

[JohnR]

The new breed of Li-poly batteries really are a better products than the battery packs of just a few years ago. One of the ways to prevent the battery pack from going too low is to charge them over the winter break at least once. Keep in mind that the chargers only need one cell to be under and it will have problems charging the whole pack. Using a balancer (like the blinky) will help persevere the integrity of your packs, keep the cells balanced with each other and extend the useful life of the battery.

[aeajr]

I have 8 lipo packs. No problems, but I never let them get below 2.5V resting voltage.

[JohnR]

That is a good policy aeajr, lipos are happier with a charge in them