Power for setup, without using precious battery time.

[Soundtekk]

Has anyone seen a power supply for Mavic setup, without using precious battery time?
Just a thought.


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[msinger]

The only available power supply is a Mavic battery. Why not just buy an extra Mavic battery?

 

[Soundtekk]

Then I would feel hard done by as I could be flying with it. Thanks for the reply.


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[Drone Police]

Then I would feel hard done by as I could be flying with it. Thanks for the reply.


Sent from my iPhone using MavicPilots

It doesn't take much time and power to setup the mavic to fly.
You can turn on, lock sats, record home position and take off easily under 45 seconds. No need for auxiliary power.

 

[Soundtekk]

Thanks


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[jzilla80]

I see this post is a bit old but its exactly the same issue as I was researching for awhile now, albeit, still with no luck...

I want to add that the reason I would like a stand alone AC to DC power supply that powers the Mavic 2 via a wall outlet is due to how I prefer to watch/transfer the footage I shoot.

I dont have a PC/Mac (or at least one new enough to be considered usable for this) so Im not too keen on the removing of SD cards so I like to watch/transfer files, via/to Goggles, direct from ac. Often times, the wireless transfer method takes a decent amount of time and I really dont like cycling batteries, for this purpose!

I realize this may not be the most productive way of doing it but Im not a pro & I dont need to do any post production, plus, for now, I only shoot in 1080p, as that is the highest res that the DJI software will allow transfer wirelessly, so, in my current opinion, it really is the most uncomplicated method, but keep in mind, Im a total amatuer, but I still like it that way, for now.

If only I could power the ac for an hour or so, without having to drain, let cool, then recharge my SUPER EXPENSIVE Battery packs!

Any help finding any products available for this purpose? OR even possible ideas on mods that would serve that purpose. Ive thought of hacking a bad battery pack (removing the cells and rewiring the connection terminal to an AC to constant 15v DC power adapter but I dont know where to get a bad battery, as they are usually disposed of via 'proper' methods, not to mention, I havent done any research on batt pack pin-out of the connection...

Id rather just buy one...

Thx to any that might offer some help!

Cheers,
JD

 

[UCMavic]

I see this post is a bit old but its exactly the same issue as I was researching for awhile now, albeit, still with no luck...

I want to add that the reason I would like a stand alone AC to DC power supply that powers the Mavic 2 via a wall outlet is due to how I prefer to watch/transfer the footage I shoot.

I dont have a PC/Mac (or at least one new enough to be considered usable for this) so Im not too keen on the removing of SD cards so I like to watch/transfer files, via/to Goggles, direct from ac. Often times, the wireless transfer method takes a decent amount of time and I really dont like cycling batteries, for this purpose!

I realize this may not be the most productive way of doing it but Im not a pro & I dont need to do any post production, plus, for now, I only shoot in 1080p, as that is the highest res that the DJI software will allow transfer wirelessly, so, in my current opinion, it really is the most uncomplicated method, but keep in mind, Im a total amatuer, but I still like it that way, for now.

If only I could power the ac for an hour or so, without having to drain, let cool, then recharge my SUPER EXPENSIVE Battery packs!

Any help finding any products available for this purpose? OR even possible ideas on mods that would serve that purpose. Ive thought of hacking a bad battery pack (removing the cells and rewiring the connection terminal to an AC to constant 15v DC power adapter but I dont know where to get a bad battery, as they are usually disposed of via 'proper' methods, not to mention, I havent done any research on batt pack pin-out of the connection...

Id rather just buy one...

Thx to any that might offer some help!

Cheers,
JD

Hi.
Did you ever find a solution for this?
I think I have. You buy two of the following cables:
eBay item 123719024246
And a female barrel connector or a female to female extension cable.
This would allow you to plug the battery charger into the battery recepticle on the magic. I have just bought these cables on eBay and waiting to test it out. Before trying it, I need to be sure that the output of a battery matches the output of the charger, to be sure that the charger won't overpower the magic.
Let me know if you found a better solution.
Best.Peter

 

[jzilla80]

Hi.
Did you ever find a solution for this?
I think I have. You buy two of the following cables:
eBay item 123719024246
And a female barrel connector or a female to female extension cable.
This would allow you to plug the battery charger into the battery recepticle on the magic. I have just bought these cables on eBay and waiting to test it out. Before trying it, I need to be sure that the output of a battery matches the output of the charger, to be sure that the charger won't overpower the magic.
Let me know if you found a better solution.
Best.Peter

Oh my bad guys, I actually did come upon pretty much the same method and forgot to post about it. My 'solution' was slightly different than yours but not by much. I used the exact same cable, but instead of finding a female barrel connector to fit this adapter, I just cut the female off and soldered a set of powerpole connectors to it and to the power brick I used.

Your right on about having to make sure that your power brick (AC to DC converter) is the right voltage, etc. Id say this is the MOST IMPORTANT ASPECT to check on first. I used a selectable output power brick and chose 16v, since thats right in the middle of the range and it wouldnt need more since it would never be in actual flight while connected.

(I should mention this now, just in case there are some out there that think you could do this, and also get like a 100ft cable and go fly your M2 around from a wallwort. Its not gonna happen because the M2 and Go4 app dont get any individual cell readings and since it s a 'smart' battery system with its own BMS, no flight is allowed. Also, you'd be fighting against the laws of DC voltage drop related to the length and gauge of wire used. Cool idea but I'm sorry its no bueno. Anyways.)

My results were great, at first... It powered up the M2 perfectly and for months it worked great. I was able to transfer any/all files back and forth without needing to move the SD card from my M2, or my SC or my Goggles RE, so it was nice. I even left it connected and powering my M2 for several hours (by mistake, fell asleep), all without a hitch. Total, no issues, time it worked for I'd say about 7-8 months.

It still works, although I havent tried it in several months. Here's why!

I started having strange battery behavior occur while out in the field trying to actually fly, where completely at random, using any one of my 3 batts, upon powering up, my M2 would power up normally, full self-initialization seq, Id get telemetry and video feed, everything appeared fine EXCEPT my battery (on Go4) would show N/A and the voltage was 0.00 on all cells. It never happened mid-flight. It was usually after landing my 1st flight (of the usual 3 batt days I do), when I went to install fresh batt, even after successfully flying one of the same 3 batts, moments before. The issue was not linked to any specific battery and the issue happened with all of the 3 batts, but in no discernable pattern. Believe me, I tried mapping it out. Once that battery showed N/A, it didnt matter how many times I restarted the M2 with any of my 3 batts, it was the same. Flying was done for that day.

I still have no real fix for this when it happens other than call it quits and go home and hope its gone by my next outing, which it has been.

Anyway, I mention this because I fear that the power brick I used mayve put out too harsh of a sine-wave, which put out a harsh DC voltage and over time, 7-8 mo, it weakened a component or two in my M2s motherboard, which threw off readings and made the software take action? (I liken it to how when you use solar power with your intricate electronics, they tell you to use a 'pure-sinewave' Inverter, although that is the opposite of what were talking about. Thats inverting a DC voltage to a household AC output and were wanting vice-versa, but the jist is there).

The answer for me on powerbrick selection, at first, was the M2 battery charger, but its output V is far too high, since it has to push the batteries to their highest V limits. Not to mention that it probably doesnt offer the cleanest AC output itself.
After thinking about it, I realized it doesnt need to be. I'll explain below.

The M2 itself, nor the battery charger for the M2s batteries, doesnt need to be 'smart' in its monitoring of power because the M2 has been designed for the M2 batteries to hold all the 'smart guts' that monitor for hi/lo V, A, cell balance, etc, so when trying to find an AC to DC converter that outputs a clean wave maybe harder than you may think because the M2 battery, when powering the M2 doesnt output any AC wave, as its a DC circuit, so I had nothing really to compare what I needed, and I couldve gone in depth into finding the perfect solution powerbrick, but I hadnt put much thought into all this until after my $2k setup started acting up.

Now its just not worth it, imo, to find that solution, plus my scope is dead from my last 'project'. I surmise, the above dilemma is why we havent seen a consumer solution to this, as it probably wouldnt sell like hotcakes, so its not worth it to any of the manufacturers to put in the R&D, then put out a product that 'could' affect the M2 core board and cost them. I'm just guessing.


I'm still not 100% that my powerbrick choice is what brought about the battery issues, but what I do know is that my batteries are fine. The actual lithium chemistry cells undernieth the smart tech are in great shape, so my problem was due to the SOFTWARE (as usual with DJI). As a result, I got strange and unreliable battery issues that came at random and killed my flying enjoyment for weeks. I still take responsibility since I did power my M2 from a non-oem source.

Now, my M2 is 99% back to its formally fun flying self, but only after I've done 3 updates, back to back where I rollback to 300, then update to 510, then rollback to 400, and downgrade again to 300, then back to 510, just to make sure it was as clean of an install as possible and any of the old readings were wiped. I didnt choose to go this extreme route the first time around. The first time, I did a simple run of the mill 'refresh' of my FW, but the issue persisted, then I rolled back and re-upgraded... Thats when I went nuts and did the multi -faceted up/downgrade craziness. It sucked and took time, but now the battery issue has only shown its face once and it went away after a few restarts.

So the Moral of this effed up story is: Be careful what you power your electronics with, dont use just any power brick. Do your research.

Up to you, my friend, but I'd say, unless your an electrical engineer with all the insane expensive gear, and you can match the output of the AC side of your AC to DC powerbrick to output a clean DC Voltage that is what the M2 is used to getting from the M2 batteries. Unless you can do that, I'd say its not really worth it?

The worst part of this mess, is I'm still not even sure that one had anything at all to do with the other, and although I'm not an engineer, my humble knowledge tells me it was connected!

Sorry for the MEGA reply. I just wanted to get all this info on here, so at least you know there might be a downside. I truly hope others find that its not connected and they can run there M2 from the wall all day long. It was nice while it lasted!

Good luck

JD

 

[jzilla80]

Not sure if there have been any new cases of this but back when this happened to me in 2019, this was the only post I could find explaining it, but all the screenshots are exactly what I was seeing on mine.

Mavic 2 Pro battery charges, powers drone on, shows dead in app.

I have three batteries that came with my Mavic 2 Pro brand new, day of launch, straight from DJI, China. I have many other tech items I use, including a Mavic Pro and an Osmo Pocket and various action cams, etc, so flying the Mavic 2 a lot hasn't been a priority. These batteries have had very...

forum.dji.com

This guys issue seemed the same however he claimed warranty service before we could tell if the overnight wait wouldve mattered for him, plus it was only on one battery, iirc?

Anyway, It was scary as **** because it didnt matter what battery I tried, the AC was not recognizing it. I even tried 3 totally separate batts that my friend had and like I said, once that N/A showed up, that day was done. Not sure why the overnight rest reset this...

WEIRD is all I can say and i truly dont want anyone lese to have to go thru it!

I feel like I narrowly escaped a full on cascading into catastrophic failure.

 

[UCMavic]

Oh my bad guys, I actually did come upon pretty much the same method and forgot to post about it. My 'solution' was slightly different than yours but not by much. I used the exact same cable, but instead of finding a female barrel connector to fit this adapter, I just cut the female off and soldered a set of powerpole connectors to it and to the power brick I used.

Your right on about having to make sure that your power brick (AC to DC converter) is the right voltage, etc. Id say this is the MOST IMPORTANT ASPECT to check on first. I used a selectable output power brick and chose 16v, since thats right in the middle of the range and it wouldnt need more since it would never be in actual flight while connected.

(I should mention this now, just in case there are some out there that think you could do this, and also get like a 100ft cable and go fly your M2 around from a wallwort. Its not gonna happen because the M2 and Go4 app dont get any individual cell readings and since it s a 'smart' battery system with its own BMS, no flight is allowed. Also, you'd be fighting against the laws of DC voltage drop related to the length and gauge of wire used. Cool idea but I'm sorry its no bueno. Anyways.)

My results were great, at first... It powered up the M2 perfectly and for months it worked great. I was able to transfer any/all files back and forth without needing to move the SD card from my M2, or my SC or my Goggles RE, so it was nice. I even left it connected and powering my M2 for several hours (by mistake, fell asleep), all without a hitch. Total, no issues, time it worked for I'd say about 7-8 months.

It still works, although I havent tried it in several months. Here's why!

I started having strange battery behavior occur while out in the field trying to actually fly, where completely at random, using any one of my 3 batts, upon powering up, my M2 would power up normally, full self-initialization seq, Id get telemetry and video feed, everything appeared fine EXCEPT my battery (on Go4) would show N/A and the voltage was 0.00 on all cells. It never happened mid-flight. It was usually after landing my 1st flight (of the usual 3 batt days I do), when I went to install fresh batt, even after successfully flying one of the same 3 batts, moments before. The issue was not linked to any specific battery and the issue happened with all of the 3 batts, but in no discernable pattern. Believe me, I tried mapping it out. Once that battery showed N/A, it didnt matter how many times I restarted the M2 with any of my 3 batts, it was the same. Flying was done for that day.

I still have no real fix for this when it happens other than call it quits and go home and hope its gone by my next outing, which it has been.

Anyway, I mention this because I fear that the power brick I used mayve put out too harsh of a sine-wave, which put out a harsh DC voltage and over time, 7-8 mo, it weakened a component or two in my M2s motherboard, which threw off readings and made the software take action? (I liken it to how when you use solar power with your intricate electronics, they tell you to use a 'pure-sinewave' Inverter, although that is the opposite of what were talking about. Thats inverting a DC voltage to a household AC output and were wanting vice-versa, but the jist is there).

The answer for me on powerbrick selection, at first, was the M2 battery charger, but its output V is far too high, since it has to push the batteries to their highest V limits. Not to mention that it probably doesnt offer the cleanest AC output itself.
After thinking about it, I realized it doesnt need to be. I'll explain below.

The M2 itself, nor the battery charger for the M2s batteries, doesnt need to be 'smart' in its monitoring of power because the M2 has been designed for the M2 batteries to hold all the 'smart guts' that monitor for hi/lo V, A, cell balance, etc, so when trying to find an AC to DC converter that outputs a clean wave maybe harder than you may think because the M2 battery, when powering the M2 doesnt output any AC wave, as its a DC circuit, so I had nothing really to compare what I needed, and I couldve gone in depth into finding the perfect solution powerbrick, but I hadnt put much thought into all this until after my $2k setup started acting up.

Now its just not worth it, imo, to find that solution, plus my scope is dead from my last 'project'. I surmise, the above dilemma is why we havent seen a consumer solution to this, as it probably wouldnt sell like hotcakes, so its not worth it to any of the manufacturers to put in the R&D, then put out a product that 'could' affect the M2 core board and cost them. I'm just guessing.


I'm still not 100% that my powerbrick choice is what brought about the battery issues, but what I do know is that my batteries are fine. The actual lithium chemistry cells undernieth the smart tech are in great shape, so my problem was due to the SOFTWARE (as usual with DJI). As a result, I got strange and unreliable battery issues that came at random and killed my flying enjoyment for weeks. I still take responsibility since I did power my M2 from a non-oem source.

Now, my M2 is 99% back to its formally fun flying self, but only after I've done 3 updates, back to back where I rollback to 300, then update to 510, then rollback to 400, and downgrade again to 300, then back to 510, just to make sure it was as clean of an install as possible and any of the old readings were wiped. I didnt choose to go this extreme route the first time around. The first time, I did a simple run of the mill 'refresh' of my FW, but the issue persisted, then I rolled back and re-upgraded... Thats when I went nuts and did the multi -faceted up/downgrade craziness. It sucked and took time, but now the battery issue has only shown its face once and it went away after a few restarts.

So the Moral of this effed up story is: Be careful what you power your electronics with, dont use just any power brick. Do your research.

Up to you, my friend, but I'd say, unless your an electrical engineer with all the insane expensive gear, and you can match the output of the AC side of your AC to DC powerbrick to output a clean DC Voltage that is what the M2 is used to getting from the M2 batteries. Unless you can do that, I'd say its not really worth it?

The worst part of this mess, is I'm still not even sure that one had anything at all to do with the other, and although I'm not an engineer, my humble knowledge tells me it was connected!

Sorry for the MEGA reply. I just wanted to get all this info on here, so at least you know there might be a downside. I truly hope others find that its not connected and they can run there M2 from the wall all day long. It was nice while it lasted!

Good luck

JD

Hey JD.
Wow. I think you've gwritten the definitive piece on this. Thank you for all that info. I think you're cautionary advice is well founded. Not having any electronics background, I'm going to stay away from this endeavour for now..I wish DJI had foreseen the usefulness of being able to plug in the M2.
Great to have the opportunity to exchange info.
Thanks again, JD.
Peter

 

[jzilla80]

Hey JD.
Wow. I think you've gwritten the definitive piece on this. Thank you for all that info. I think you're cautionary advice is well founded. Not having any electronics background, I'm going to stay away from this endeavour for now..I wish DJI had foreseen the usefulness of being able to plug in the M2.
Great to have the opportunity to exchange info.
Thanks again, JD.
Peter

Hi Peter,
Yeah sorry, I went a bit crazy with that reply. Ultimately, its just not worth the possibility of M2 failure, esp without any warranty possibilty.

It wouldve been nice for DJI to offer a method to power your drone from home without having to burn up battery juice.

I just don't think theres many folks out there that have put more than just the occasional thought into the prospect of its usefulness, especially when it comes to using all the features in Go4, that REQUIRE your M2 to be powered on. I guess they dont mind burning up battery for this? With these packs being rated for 500 chg cycles, I kinda do, or did!

I still think its possible to do it without running into any issues, it just takes some searching to find that clean output powerbrick with the right voltage output.

I just used a generic one, which I kinda knew better, and the fact that it was a selectable voltage output meant that it has components inside that arent optimized for any specific voltage, so the full range probably had alot of signal noise, which is not good for intricate electronics. Thats just their nature.

Live n learn, I suppose!

I consider myself fortunate to have been able to update my issue away. I'm glad if I can help to keep it happening to you and others, or to at least point out the importance of doing your research before plugging anything into your electronics!

Ill post if I ever decide to go into it again, but its unlikely.

Have a good one and fun flying!

 

[Thomas B]

Oh my bad guys, I actually did come upon pretty much the same method and forgot to post about it. My 'solution' was slightly different than yours but not by much. I used the exact same cable, but instead of finding a female barrel connector to fit this adapter, I just cut the female off and soldered a set of powerpole connectors to it and to the power brick I used.

Your right on about having to make sure that your power brick (AC to DC converter) is the right voltage, etc. Id say this is the MOST IMPORTANT ASPECT to check on first. I used a selectable output power brick and chose 16v, since thats right in the middle of the range and it wouldnt need more since it would never be in actual flight while connected.

(I should mention this now, just in case there are some out there that think you could do this, and also get like a 100ft cable and go fly your M2 around from a wallwort. Its not gonna happen because the M2 and Go4 app dont get any individual cell readings and since it s a 'smart' battery system with its own BMS, no flight is allowed. Also, you'd be fighting against the laws of DC voltage drop related to the length and gauge of wire used. Cool idea but I'm sorry its no bueno. Anyways.)

My results were great, at first... It powered up the M2 perfectly and for months it worked great. I was able to transfer any/all files back and forth without needing to move the SD card from my M2, or my SC or my Goggles RE, so it was nice. I even left it connected and powering my M2 for several hours (by mistake, fell asleep), all without a hitch. Total, no issues, time it worked for I'd say about 7-8 months.

It still works, although I havent tried it in several months. Here's why!

I started having strange battery behavior occur while out in the field trying to actually fly, where completely at random, using any one of my 3 batts, upon powering up, my M2 would power up normally, full self-initialization seq, Id get telemetry and video feed, everything appeared fine EXCEPT my battery (on Go4) would show N/A and the voltage was 0.00 on all cells. It never happened mid-flight. It was usually after landing my 1st flight (of the usual 3 batt days I do), when I went to install fresh batt, even after successfully flying one of the same 3 batts, moments before. The issue was not linked to any specific battery and the issue happened with all of the 3 batts, but in no discernable pattern. Believe me, I tried mapping it out. Once that battery showed N/A, it didnt matter how many times I restarted the M2 with any of my 3 batts, it was the same. Flying was done for that day.

I still have no real fix for this when it happens other than call it quits and go home and hope its gone by my next outing, which it has been.

Anyway, I mention this because I fear that the power brick I used mayve put out too harsh of a sine-wave, which put out a harsh DC voltage and over time, 7-8 mo, it weakened a component or two in my M2s motherboard, which threw off readings and made the software take action? (I liken it to how when you use solar power with your intricate electronics, they tell you to use a 'pure-sinewave' Inverter, although that is the opposite of what were talking about. Thats inverting a DC voltage to a household AC output and were wanting vice-versa, but the jist is there).

The answer for me on powerbrick selection, at first, was the M2 battery charger, but its output V is far too high, since it has to push the batteries to their highest V limits. Not to mention that it probably doesnt offer the cleanest AC output itself.
After thinking about it, I realized it doesnt need to be. I'll explain below.

The M2 itself, nor the battery charger for the M2s batteries, doesnt need to be 'smart' in its monitoring of power because the M2 has been designed for the M2 batteries to hold all the 'smart guts' that monitor for hi/lo V, A, cell balance, etc, so when trying to find an AC to DC converter that outputs a clean wave maybe harder than you may think because the M2 battery, when powering the M2 doesnt output any AC wave, as its a DC circuit, so I had nothing really to compare what I needed, and I couldve gone in depth into finding the perfect solution powerbrick, but I hadnt put much thought into all this until after my $2k setup started acting up.

Now its just not worth it, imo, to find that solution, plus my scope is dead from my last 'project'. I surmise, the above dilemma is why we havent seen a consumer solution to this, as it probably wouldnt sell like hotcakes, so its not worth it to any of the manufacturers to put in the R&D, then put out a product that 'could' affect the M2 core board and cost them. I'm just guessing.


I'm still not 100% that my powerbrick choice is what brought about the battery issues, but what I do know is that my batteries are fine. The actual lithium chemistry cells undernieth the smart tech are in great shape, so my problem was due to the SOFTWARE (as usual with DJI). As a result, I got strange and unreliable battery issues that came at random and killed my flying enjoyment for weeks. I still take responsibility since I did power my M2 from a non-oem source.

Now, my M2 is 99% back to its formally fun flying self, but only after I've done 3 updates, back to back where I rollback to 300, then update to 510, then rollback to 400, and downgrade again to 300, then back to 510, just to make sure it was as clean of an install as possible and any of the old readings were wiped. I didnt choose to go this extreme route the first time around. The first time, I did a simple run of the mill 'refresh' of my FW, but the issue persisted, then I rolled back and re-upgraded... Thats when I went nuts and did the multi -faceted up/downgrade craziness. It sucked and took time, but now the battery issue has only shown its face once and it went away after a few restarts.

So the Moral of this effed up story is: Be careful what you power your electronics with, dont use just any power brick. Do your research.

Up to you, my friend, but I'd say, unless your an electrical engineer with all the insane expensive gear, and you can match the output of the AC side of your AC to DC powerbrick to output a clean DC Voltage that is what the M2 is used to getting from the M2 batteries. Unless you can do that, I'd say its not really worth it?

The worst part of this mess, is I'm still not even sure that one had anything at all to do with the other, and although I'm not an engineer, my humble knowledge tells me it was connected!

Sorry for the MEGA reply. I just wanted to get all this info on here, so at least you know there might be a downside. I truly hope others find that its not connected and they can run there M2 from the wall all day long. It was nice while it lasted!

Good luck

JD

Sorry... didn’t read. Waaaaaaay too long.

 

[kidroc]

Then I would feel hard done by as I could be flying with it. Thanks for the reply.


Sent from my iPhone using MavicPilots

I have two very old batts 3 years old that I keep around just for when i need to do something the takes a bit and I am on the ground. I do not fly with them though.. Maybe I can ship you one of them shipping cost only pm if interested man.