Hey, today I just hovered around with my Blade CP Pro, and suddenly my heli seems to be a little slower and it fell down. Now, I run in full throttle and the heli doesn't have enough power to lift off. So I thougt the lipo is empty and I connected it to my charger.
The Error in charging LED got on.. So I looked at the battery, and I saw that one of the cell is oversize. so my lipo is probably dead.. but this is not the issue. The issue is why my lipo is dead ?! any idea ? maybe heat?

Thanks, Gil.

Give us some info. Is your setup stock? What charger? How many cycles has this battery run? How long do you run the batteries? Do you time your flights? Do you check voltage after a flight?

Give us some info. Is your setup stock? What charger? How many cycles has this battery run? How long do you run the batteries? Do you time your flights? Do you check voltage after a flight?

My setup is stock, except Super-Skids. I use a wall charger and balancer by eflite.. something like 10 cycles. My flight time is about 15 minutes and I don't check the voltage after a flight.

If I had to make a guess I would say you are draining too much from your lipos. I had a Thunder Power 2100 do the same thing to me. I was pulling too much from the packs. It only lasted about 20 cycles before it started puffing and would not hold max voltage anymore. Do you time your flights or just fly until it doesn't have enough power to stay in the air?

Its probably either a bad battery or bad charging/discharging practice. I have had good luck so far with the e-flite 800s from the Pro. I have 2 of them with over 80 cycles and still going strong. They still hold the same charge they did when they were brand new. I have 3 dead lipos (2 TP2100s and an Align 2100) and all of them were due to over discharging.... well... and 1 crash... but that lipo was having the same problem as my other over-discharged lipos

I'm just flying until I see it have no power. Good to know that it's wrong..I want to make an order of another battery - SonixPower 1300mah 15C from helidirect: 20$.. Is it worth something?

I'm the wrong guy to ask about those batteries... I hate the heavy batteries in the Blade. It takes away a LOT of its performance in my opinion. I recently bought 2 1100s to try out and I still think they are too heavy. They sit in my flight box most of the time and I run my 800s. Its just personal preference though. Tons of people on these forums are running 1350s and other big batteries and are very happy with them... they just don't feel right to me. My blade is already over-weight without the big batteries. I would rather run a smaller battery and change it more often. Even with a brushless setup I still get 8-9 mins from the stock 800mah batteries and they are within the 80% discharge rule.

It's not so heavy.. 78gr.. and it's much more powerful.. no?

78 grams is not bad, I would say go for it. The stock 800 is 64 so that is not far off at all. Even my 1100s are around 90 grams if I remember correctly. The last 1350 battery I looked at was over 100 grams so I didn't look twice.

Does anyone have any experience with these? Sounds like a great price/weight/c rating.

I asked some people about it and they said that this battery is great. I would never buy something more than 80-85 grams..
78 grams 1300mah 15C in 20$ - It's very good I think..

The only 1300s I ever considered were the Thunder Power Prolite 1320s. They are only 85 grams, but at 50 bucks each they didn't seem worth it. Most of the other 1300+ batteries for less money have too much weight (anything around/over 100 grams is far too much weight and signifigantly decreases the Blade's performance IMO). These Sonix batteries are less weight and less than half the price. I think Ill order a few of them to try out.

I use the ThunderPower 1320 ProLites on my Blade and HoneyBee. I have well over 200 charge/discharge cycles on these packs. I use a good charger and the ThunderPower balancer. Both packs peak at 12.56 VDC and I've NEVER run either pack below 11.0 VDC. The packs have always been charged at 1.0 ampere. By the way, you want to measure your pack voltages under a light load, as a no-load voltage will be deceptively higher than a loaded voltage reading.

Being very conservative in your charge/discharge practices with your LiPo packs will greatly extend their life and reliability.

Gerry Cullan,
Gaui 200, 255; T-Rex 250, 450 SE & SA, Mini-Titan, Blade 450

The problem with just hovering is that you can overdischarge a pack and the heli still hovers. On a regular flight you can sense the drop in power with weak climbouts and the tail beginning to lose it.

You can get an led or buzzer voltage warning device or time your flights and quit sooner than your regular flights.

You must also have a balancer charger or a dedicated balancer.

Gino CP ,good comment on how easy it is to overdischarge the Lipo's while hovering. Another trick, and one that I use, is to use the timer function on a digital watch. I set mine for 8 minutes. Some of the various radio systems also have timer functions available, Regardless, a key to long LiPo life is to not overcharge them, or charge them too quickly as well as not to dischage them too deeply.

Gerry Cullan,
Gaui 200, 255; T-Rex 250, 450 SE & SA, Mini-Titan, Blade 450

send that pic to horizon and i bet they will hook you up

How to make a lipo battery last long

First of all charge it at least 1amph, but the best thing to do is charge it below one amph somewhere between 0.6 or 0.8 apmh..by charging it slow the lipo battery will charge longer but it will be charge balance in the three cells. A blance charger can be use but will cost you more money. Now your lipo is charge balanced and full with power, now it depends on what MILIAMPHERS you have, I have a 910 miliamph and it last for about 15 minutes and it starts to slightly loose power then that's the time you stop and charge it again...as what Gino said overdischarging your battery will cause a memory power porblem(which means your battery was discharge too low and when you charge it again it will porduce lower power than normally it porduce) its mysterious but true..
Grock..I think you only have two possible reasons why your lipo is dead...it could have been discharge too low or it was over charge(if your charger has automatic power cut off when your battery is full then it is not overchrage) It could have been charge in higher current which could charge the cells unbalanced and produce a low current...

This one pooched overnight, after being run moderately.

Can I use the balancer that I got with the blade cp pro on the sonixpower 11.1V 15C 1300mah LiPo ?

how to make a lipo last longer???

use it properly! never fly it to 100 percent of it's capacity...75 percent max. If it's a 1000 mah cell, use 750 to 800 mah max.

this produces less heat which damages cells and the pack never gets a chance to have one or more cells below their limit.

also using too small a pack results in taxing it too much and lots of heat. heat and over discharging kills lipos!!

use a timer!

never, never, never fly it until the heli motor starts to slow down!

at the end of the flight a good voltage to look for is IMHO in the area of 11.3 for a three cell pack.

charge at 1C maximum.

Use a cell balancer so that all cells start out on the charge at the same voltage...that way they end the charge at the same voltage hopefully.

there is NO memory effect in lipos or even nicads for that matter....

If you start charging a lipo with one or more cells at a lower voltage than the other, you risk overcharging the higher voltage cell/cells as the chargers trigger using voltage.

also the lower voltage cell may never reach full charge so then it doesn't have the capacity to run full time and you see a pack die before it should...and that cell will be overdischarged.

Can I use the balancer that I got with the blade cp pro on the sonixpower 11.1V 15C 1300mah LiPo ?

Anyone ?

As far as I know the E-Flite balancing charger is not a balancing charger. It charges through the balancing connector until ANY ONE CELL reaches 4.2V (or something like that). I believe their reasoning is that it is safer..ie: the pack wont catch on fire... but it leaves the pack horribly out of balance over time... and during discharge the low cells discharge too low, destroying the pack.

helicopter pilots beat the air into submission