Battery shows 0.0V on screen, indicator LEDs show full. Communication problem, solution?

[scubaddictions]

I know I've seen other people mention these same symptoms but they've all been new(ish) batteries under warranty, so DJI swaps them out for a new battery. I have one battery that performed completely normal during a flight. Re-charged normally, LED indicators show full. Put in drone and boot up, instantly get warning messages on screen that it "cannot take off" and voltage is only sufficient to land, etc. Voltage displayed on screen shows 0.0v. If I pop into the battery tab under settings in DJI Go 4 it shows no information at all, no charge history, no cell voltage, etc. Unfortunately, this battery is more than 6 months old, so technically out of warranty.

It seems obvious to me that it's a communication issue, cells are charged, just not communicating with the drone. Battery is physically pristine, no swelling, no faults with terminals. Carefully cleaned and detailed each contact on both drone and battery, no change. All other batteries work fine. Can charge/discharge the battery on the battery charger. No other oddities such as blink error codes on battery's LED indicators.

Thoughts?

 

[MavicAir2Marc]

Are all of your batteries on the same firmware? Sometimes batteries need to be updated as well in some of the updates.

 

[scubaddictions]

A

Are all of your batteries on the same firmware? Sometimes batteries need to be updated as well in some of the updates.

Almost certainly, but impossible to tell at the moment as the problem battery doesn't display any data. I've seen no new firmware updates pushed to the batteries in a few months. Certainly no firmware updates on anything for weeks before the failure, it worked perfect one day and failed the next.

 

[SkyeHigh]

I would take it up with DJI. The batteries should last upto 200 charge cycles depending on usage.

Does the battery auto-discharge at all?

It does sound like the battery management system is at fault. There is a microcontroller in each battery that provides the ‘intelligence’ for charge/discharge monitoring as well as cell voltages. The microcontroller uses serial communication to communicate with the Core board (flight controller). If this link fails, as it appears in this case, it will show 0V. The BMS is still able to display battery level on the LED’s as it uses different microcontroller ports to control the LEDs.

Has the battery been dropped at any time or involved in a crash?

It could be as simple as an internal connection fault but the batteries are sealed so no simple access.

 

[scubaddictions]

I would take it up with DJI. The batteries should last upto 200 charge cycles depending on usage.

Does the battery auto-discharge at all?

It does sound like the battery management system is at fault. There is a microcontroller in each battery that provides the ‘intelligence’ for charge/discharge monitoring as well as cell voltages. The microcontroller uses serial communication to communicate with the Core board (flight controller). If this link fails, as it appears in this case, it will show 0V. The BMS is still able to display battery level on the LED’s as it uses different microcontroller ports to control the LEDs.

Has the battery been dropped at any time or involved in a crash?

It could be as simple as an internal connection fault but the batteries are sealed so no simple access.

No, no drops or crashes with this battery. The failure is a mystery.

 

[SkyeHigh]

No, no drops or crashes with this battery. The failure is a mystery.

Just a thought, using DJI Assistant 2 and connected to the aircraft, does the firmware version of the battery display?

 

[ToddCarey]

I have experienced exactly the same thing with one of my M2P batteries. According to my flight records it has 39 flights, but one time when I went to take off, I got exactly the same 0.0 volts and message.

I have tried to charge and discharge it, and it will charge and discharge. I have given up as it appears it's communication link is dead.....

 

[Tiger64]

Several things to try.
Can you clean the pins?
Are any of them bent?
Does a different battery work ok?( i gave had batteries die, that show volts but have no power under load)

 

[scubaddictions]

Just a thought, using DJI Assistant 2 and connected to the aircraft, does the firmware version of the battery display?

As far as I can tell (at least with my version of DJI Assistant 2) I can't display firmware versions for the battery, only the aircraft.

 

[scubaddictions]

Several things to try.
Can you clean the pins?
Are any of them bent?
Does a different battery work ok?( i gave had batteries die, that show volts but have no power under load)

I did clean all the pins, on both the aircraft and the battery. Nothing bent, no physical damage at all. All other batteries work fine.

 

[Tiger64]

I had a battery for my fpv goggles do a similar thing this week. Worked fine, recharged, no go when plugged in. Led lights showed full charge. Multi meter on balance lead showed full charge. No power at main lead. A friend who is an electronics engineer had a look at it for me. He just let me know it had a built-in fuse that failed.

 

[Capt KO]

Chances are that DJI will replace out of warranty. Won’t cost anything to try. Worked for others but usually from swelling. GL

 

[SkyeHigh]

Several things to try.
Can you clean the pins?
Are any of them bent?
Does a different battery work ok?( i gave had batteries die, that show volts but have no power under load)

OP has already answered these questions in the originating post.

 

[scubaddictions]

Chances are that DJI will replace out of warranty. Won’t cost anything to try. Worked for others but usually from swelling. GL

Yeah, that's what I figured as well. Should be delivered to DJI in Texas on Wednesday. Don't have super high hopes personally. It is somewhere around 14 months since purchase.

 

[sharkface]

I know I've seen other people mention these same symptoms but they've all been new(ish) batteries under warranty, so DJI swaps them out for a new battery. I have one battery that performed completely normal during a flight. Re-charged normally, LED indicators show full. Put in drone and boot up, instantly get warning messages on screen that it "cannot take off" and voltage is only sufficient to land, etc. Voltage displayed on screen shows 0.0v. If I pop into the battery tab under settings in DJI Go 4 it shows no information at all, no charge history, no cell voltage, etc. Unfortunately, this battery is more than 6 months old, so technically out of warranty.

It seems obvious to me that it's a communication issue, cells are charged, just not communicating with the drone. Battery is physically pristine, no swelling, no faults with terminals. Carefully cleaned and detailed each contact on both drone and battery, no change. All other batteries work fine. Can charge/discharge the battery on the battery charger. No other oddities such as blink error codes on battery's LED indicators.

Thoughts?

I had something close. my controller said the correct battery (40%) life, but the Pad said 75%?? I removed it and firmly pressed it in again. could it be the contacts? everything seem to work ok after that.