Swelling batteries

[Jet skier]

That's cool that they covered it out of warranty.

Mine are about 2 years old too but so far, no swelling, knock on wood.

How many cycles are on them?

 

[wco81]

How many cycles are on them?

Maybe a couple dozen?

 

[Jet skier]

Maybe a couple dozen?

That’s the reason they’ve lasted so long

 

[wco81]

So how many cycles before they swell?

This thread goes back to April 2019 so that's about 6-8 months after the M2P came out?

 

[Jet skier]

So how many cycles before they swell?

This thread goes back to April 2019 so that's about 6-8 months after the M2P came out?

Regardless of when my batteries were bought they are getting around 60 to 70 cycles no more but they have been replacing them for free regardless of what year they were made because I think they’re supposed to get around 200These are Mavic two pro

 

[wco81]

Thanks, good to know.

Is there an official written policy or you just call them and they will just swap it out for you?

 

[Jet skier]

Thanks, good to know.

Is there an official written policy or you just call them and they will just swap it out for you?

It does take a lot of back-and-forth and they’ll want to see the receipts of the batteries and you’ll have to send the batteries in if they’re not too swollen not sure but I think that warranty is actually 200 cycles that they are supposed to getBut I would have to look it up again

 

[GadgetGuy]

Sept 2018. Out of warranty. They started swelling up maybe May or so but I didn't [ay much attention until they started popping out of the lock mechanism. If you read back in this thread you will one member says DJI has a swollen battery division, so it is obviously not a one-off thing.

That was me. Swollen M2 batteries, even out of warranty, are given special consideration. When mine needed to be replaced out of warranty, once I told them they were swollen, they escalated it for me to the "swollen battery" section.

 

[Patrickgood]

DJI did start to concede last year in replacing swollen batteries, particularly those manufactured July/August 2018, but we're now talking about 2 year old batteries so they may be more resistant to replace batteries that old.

That's true but DJI is not so easy. I bought everything in May/June 2019
I bought my drone with 1 extra battery in Europe, the drone by itself in included 1 battery.
Because I stay in Thailand, I order 1 battery in China, so I have in total 3 battery's.
All 3 where swollen, so I send a complaint to DJI, the one I bought seperated in Europe, they send to an address in Europe but the one I order in China, they are not willing to send to Thailand.
The 3th battery, included the drone, it was not possible to claime anymore because it was not possible to show the serialnumber anymore, it was disassembled by myself.
At the end I have 1 new battery in Europe but because I can't leave Thailand (Corona) I must order somewhere a new one.

 

[TheRock]

My charges were 51, 55, 59... so all were low.

 

[GadgetGuy]

My charges were 51, 55, 59... so all were low.

Number of charge cycles appears to be unrelated to the M2 swelling issues. Age of the batteries is directly correlated. However, none appear to swell within the first 12 months after the date of manufacture, regardless of the date of manufacture.

 

[treben]

It's nice to know that they are taking care of batteries even out of warranty. Mine only have a few dozen charge cycles and aren't that old but nice to know nonetheless.

 

[CactusJackSlade]

In the thousands of batteries I have seen come through here, I have never seen 3 batteries all puffed due to factory defects. It has always been due to owner negligence. Owner negligence includes a battery that has puffed due to being in a crash, or a battery that has been subjected to extreme temperatures, such as above 120°f/49c or below 0. Also, no Lipo likes to be left stored at 100% for more than a few hours time. So, Im not sure if you left them fully charged at high ambient temps for long periods of time. That is a death sentence for DJI batteries.

Beyond a doubt, the most durable, high quality component that DJI makes is its batteries. The battery quality is on par with batteries such as Maxamps and Thunderpower. DJI batteries almost never fail on their own, and will protect themselves from owners negligence by self discharging.

While I would agree with most of what you said, the Phantom 2 batteries were horrible, even with very conscientious battery care 5 out of 6 of my batteries puffed with less than 25 uses.

I now have had two out of four MP2 batteries puff, even with the best care and precautions.

 

[TheRock]

Well, mine got royal treatment and were always in climate-controlled situations if not up in the air. Anyway, to follow up, after a bit of back-and-forth DJI did replace this week my 3 batteries that were part of a Fly More M2P kit bought in Sept 2018. So obviously, it admits its error in the manufacture of the mid-2018 M2P batts. My hat is off to DJI for an honorable resolution.

 

[jaswalt]

I've never lost any drone batteries, but have lost a handful of LiPo batteries from other tech. In every case, as I was finally informed, storing the battery at or near 100% charged for extended lengths of time is what caused it. I also lost a LiPo battery because I left the USB charger to cellular hot spot plugged in, which kept the battery at full charge. In either event, when I corrected those behaviors of mine, I have stopped losing batteries. I don't know the discharge rate of Mavic 2 batteries, but it seems really slow to me. It's best not to charge your batteries until absolutely necessary. The Phantom 3 batteries had a feature that discharged them within 3 or 4 days of charging them if you didn't use them. It would discharge them to below 25% so I'm not thinking that batteries care if they keep a low charge below 60%, or DJI wouldn't make them discharge lower. The Mavic 2 batteries do discharge, but I haven't figured out a what rate. If anyone knows, I'd welcome that info.

 

[GadgetGuy]

I've never lost any drone batteries, but have lost a handful of LiPo batteries from other tech. In every case, as I was finally informed, storing the battery at or near 100% charged for extended lengths of time is what caused it. I also lost a LiPo battery because I left the USB charger to cellular hot spot plugged in, which kept the battery at full charge. In either event, when I corrected those behaviors of mine, I have stopped losing batteries. I don't know the discharge rate of Mavic 2 batteries, but it seems really slow to me. It's best not to charge your batteries until absolutely necessary. The Phantom 3 batteries had a feature that discharged them within 3 or 4 days of charging them if you didn't use them. It would discharge them to below 25% so I'm not thinking that batteries care if they keep a low charge below 60%, or DJI wouldn't make them discharge lower. The Mavic 2 batteries do discharge, but I haven't figured out a what rate. If anyone knows, I'd welcome that info.

New M2 batteries now have the same battery algorithm as newer drone batteries like the MA2 and Mini 2. From 100% charge, they immediately discharge to 96% within 24 hours and to 70% within 5 days. The 96% discharge also prevents topping off to 100%, unless you manually first discharge to 95%. Really sucks when heading off the grid for more than 5 days! Original M2 batteries charged to 100% could be set to stay charged for 10 days, which was far more flexible, even if a few batteries eventually swelled.

 

[TheRock]

The swelling batteries were a design problem for the early M2P models. DJI has a whole unit handling it. But only for a certain period when the model first came out. After some exchange of e-mails and photos and videos, they agreed to replace mine. It could be other problems with the later models. Since I got the new ones I have had no problems and I live in Guam where it is always warm.

 

[GadgetGuy]

The swelling batteries were a design problem for the early M2P models. DJI has a whole unit handling it. But only for a certain period when the model first came out. After some exchange of e-mails and photos and videos, they agreed to replace mine. It could be other problems with the later models. Since I got the new ones I have had no problems and I live in Guam where it is always warm.

The compromise is you now have no user control over the M2 battery discharge algorithm! Some of us liked having full user control over the settings. Losing 4% of your battery capacity within 24 hours, and not being able to recover it without first manually discharging it to 95% is a huge loss of invaluable flight time and a major inconvenience. Be careful what you ask for and complain about. The cure is often worse than the disease!

 

[TheRock]

The compromise is you now have no user control over the M2 battery discharge algorithm! Some of us liked having full user control over the settings. Losing 4% of your battery capacity within 24 hours, and not being able to recover it without first manually discharging it to 95% is a huge loss of invaluable flight time and a major inconvenience. Be careful what you ask for and complain about. The cure is often worse than the disease!

Yes, agreed. I travel a lot and to some fairly remote spots where it would really be helpful to have the batteries hold a full charge for a few days. But I did like the fact that DJI owned up to its mistake and replaced the ones that swelled up. I haven't had the problem since with any other DJI battery or the replacement ones DJI sent. But a longer time before discharge would be nice.

 

[GadgetGuy]

Yes, agreed. I travel a lot and to some fairly remote spots where it would really be helpful to have the batteries hold a full charge for a few days. But I did like the fact that DJI owned up to its mistake and replaced the ones that swelled up. I haven't had the problem since with any other DJI battery or the replacement ones DJI sent. But a longer time before discharge would be nice.

Same here. I also commend DJI for replacing my swollen M2 batteries, but was very disappointed to find out that the replacements all came with the new battery FW as described above, which defensively loses 4% battery within 24 hours.

Anyone know how to roll back the M2 battery FW to the original version that didn't discharge to 96% within 24 hours, and defaulted to 10 day auto discharge?