HOW TO: Monitor battery voltage to watch for signs of failure

[HSK]

I always land by 30 percent. This usually give me just under 20 mins of moderate flying. And a little bit of a buffer in case things go pear shaped.

 

[Pol]

I always land by 30 percent. This usually give me just under 20 mins of moderate flying. And a little bit of a buffer in case things go pear shaped.

+1
Many times even @ 50%
Had a carsh once with my DIY hexacopter. Not nice at all

 

[mpflyermo]

It's important to monitor the battery voltage in each cell of the DJI smart battery. Be aware of the following:

1) Monitor the battery to ensure all cells maintain a similar voltage.
2) Do not allow any of the battery cells to drop below 3.3V.
3) Consider landing your Mavic when (or before) the first battery cell reaches 3.4V.
4) Your battery will shut off mid-flight if the voltage drops below 3.0V.

You can display the voltage of the lowest battery cell on the main screen of the DJI GO application. To do so, enable the "Show Voltage On Main Screen" setting in the "Aircraft Battery" --> "Advanced Settings" section of the DJI GO settings.

View attachment 1007

View attachment 1008


Once enabled, the lowest battery cell voltage will appear at the top, right of the DJI GO application -- like this:

View attachment 1009


In the "Remote Controller Settings" section of the DJI GO settings, you can set either C1 or C2 to "Battery Info" to quickly open/close the battery settings.

View attachment 1010


Below is an example that shows a battery that has a consistent voltage in each battery cell.

View attachment 1011


And, here's an example that shows a damaged battery:

View attachment 1012


It's important to ensure your battery is in good health prior to takeoff. Flying with a battery that has one or more bad cells could cause the battery to discharge very quickly and/or your Mavic to shut off mid-flight and drop from the sky.

This was incredibly informative to a new MP owner. I finally made it through the hurdles of updating my MP, Controller and all the batteries. I now have one battery showing an error on the controller. It appears that the MP won't even fly with this battery inserted. Again I'm a novice to the point I haven't yet even flown the drone, I've been a bit worried after reading all the posts so I'm trying to make sure I have everything set up and checked ahead of my inaugural flight.

Following your write up here I was able to find and check the cell voltage. currently it's showing 11.8 volts at a temp of 29.3c cells are 3.87/4.02/3.89 with the reading i've been doing this seems like the cells are within the margin of error relative to each other, or maybe I'm wrong. Can you or anyone else tell me why my battery is reading error, or how to fix it?

Currently my plan is to let the battery run down till it shuts off and charge it back up to full as that's what the go app is recommending, but any other suggestions are welcome.

Thanks in Advance,
Lee

 

[dewster]

I had one of my home builds drones crash because of a bad cell. I ignored warnings from the lipo charger because I wanted to fly so bad. My craft didn't shut off,but had a severe brown out which essentially was like killing the power. It dropped like rock.

Great info on this thread. Does DJI's smart batteries warn when a cell is bad or out of balance?

 

[Stunnajd112]

It's important to monitor the battery voltage in each cell of the DJI smart battery. Be aware of the following:

1) Monitor the battery to ensure all cells maintain a similar voltage.
2) Do not allow any of the battery cells to drop below 3.3V.
3) Consider landing your Mavic when (or before) the first battery cell reaches 3.4V.
4) Your battery will shut off mid-flight if the voltage drops below 3.0V.

You can display the voltage of the lowest battery cell on the main screen of the DJI GO application. To do so, enable the "Show Voltage On Main Screen" setting in the "Aircraft Battery" --> "Advanced Settings" section of the DJI GO settings.

View attachment 1007

View attachment 1008


Once enabled, the lowest battery cell voltage will appear at the top, right of the DJI GO application -- like this:

View attachment 1009


In the "Remote Controller Settings" section of the DJI GO settings, you can set either C1 or C2 to "Battery Info" to quickly open/close the battery settings.

View attachment 1010


Below is an example that shows a battery that has a consistent voltage in each battery cell.

View attachment 1011


And, here's an example that shows a damaged battery:

View attachment 1012


It's important to ensure your battery is in good health prior to takeoff. Flying with a battery that has one or more bad cells could cause the battery to discharge very quickly and/or your Mavic to shut off mid-flight and drop from the sky.

Thank you. This is the kind of informative info that keeps operators/pilots in the air with flight issues.

 

[msinger]

Does DJI's smart batteries warn when a cell is bad or out of balance?

DJI GO does show a warning when a cell is bad. I don't know what it looks for to determine the cell is bad, so I'm not sure one should always trust that the warning will alert them of a problem.