Just a tip: Go to your local gardening store and buy a ceramic pot. Charge your batteries in that. If it goes off it will contain the fire and prevent it from spreading.
Hello, RCMR. I just want to take this moment and thank you for the lipo bat recovery. I have a battery that I completely discharged by mistake. I left it plugged in my googles all night and it was down pretty low to where it would not charge at all. By doing what you recommended I was able to recharge it back to normal YOU SAVED ME MONEY Thank you so much, we all appreciate you!!
I had a stack of lipos here, and was going to cut the leads off for spares. Of the 6 bats I had setting at low voltage on a single cell, all but 1 are now balance charging properly. I owe you way more than a pint for this one Bruce. ;)
Same here. The one I didnt bother with was puffed on one cell but the rest maybe only had like 15 good cycles and I just left em discharged for too long. But I'm about to charge em up this weekend and see if they can give me some flight time.
Not sure how careful I was in following the instructions within this video but I have to say, IT WORKED!! I have to say thanks Bruce, being new to quadcopters, I have watched your videos and have not stopped learning yet. Thanks for ALL of your help, not just this amazing video
1 Year later. I found this excelent video. I been able to bring to life a 3s lipo with an under voltage of 2.8 en every cell. Now is perfect and balanced. Thanks again.
Got my quad caught in a tree. Had to leave it there overnight. Retrieved it with 40 feet of PVC. Battery Would not not begin to charge. Watched this and adjusted voltage for my LIPo 7.4v. It works! Thank you for concise video.
Darryl Douglas haha my dad did the same with a biplane of mine. Those PVC snakes are hard to wrangle!! We used a second man on a fishing pole to guide the end of it.... absolutely hysterical!
Saved two 11.1V LiPo batteries for Airsoft which had discharged because I didn't realize how fast my new Bluetooth-enabled Jefftron Leviathan mosfet runs down batteries. I ran one down, bought a new one at the field, and left it until the next day in the gun due to forgetfulness. Two brand new batteries that hadn't even gotten through one cycle - dead. Both were down around 6.7 - 7 V and would not balance charge - "low voltage warning". The method in this video saved both and all have nicely balanced cells. I guess I got lucky, but I wouldn't have even tried without this video. Thank you!
Thanks for sharing. I needed to charge my only 2s for calibrating throttle end points. The charger threw a battery disconnect at me. So I used your technique and worked like a charm.
All I can say is thank you. You've just helped me save one of my best batteries a Yuneec q500 4k drone batterythats sits at a 3s 5400mah. This battery meant slot to me for flight time, and thanks to you, I can rest tonight knowing that my Lipo was saved.
I used this mod on a completely drained Lipo Parrot Bebob 4000mAh battery. My charger gave a complete error and normally I would throw the battery away. (€50,-) With this method I was able to revive the battery completely. No loss of cells, no loss of power. Great mod and I will recommend this to everyone. Thanks.
I've seen this method before, but I have been so cautious after a few blown up lipo batteries lol (different type of situation). But hey, I thought I'd try just as you demonstrated but only 1-2 minutes at a time..before even 10 minutes of charging, my batteries were in the 3V range per cell!! I have 3 batteries saved so far that are now safely and fully charged again. You just saved me well over $100 on batteries I thought I had thrown out since I deemed them totaled; good thing I kept those batteries and I cannot thank you enough! Anyone reading this by chance, if you try this, I would be extra cautious and only charge for a minute or two minutes at a time, unplug it, and then reconnect to check voltages--but that could just be me over worrying lol. Thanks again man, I really appreciate this
Bro.big thanks. Warranty ended on my $1k battery pack and it wasn't charging. Popped it open and bought a balance charger. Followed your instructions and boom! It's back operational. Much thanks 👍
I've done this with a few of mine over the last few years and it works beautifully. You are right Bruce in that you need to respect these batteries and their volatile habits if not treated properly, I think too many people are probably a bit blazé with lipos and don't take many or any precautions with them.
DUDE!!! YOU TOTALLY JUST MADE MY YEAR!!! I've had these 3 lipo batteries (11v 5200) in storage for about 3 years and never got to use them. They were brand new and I just tried charging them but got the low voltage error message. They were about to be disposed of until I saw this vid. IT TOTALLY WORKED 100%!!!! Thank you soooooo much!! My Slash vxl, Arrma fury, and my Slash 4x4 vxl greatly appreciate you!!!
I'm not complaining of the flying videos, but I do enjoy a lot more this bench or workshop videos. Thanks again for all the knowledge Bruce, you are awesome, mate.
You Sir are a gentleman and a scholar I had 4 lipos showing low currents after 3 years of no use and your trick fixes them in about 4 minutes each liked for ya and many thanks
Brilliant advice thanks literally watched this got mine out of bin had 2.2 volts per cell 2s 4000mah followed these instructions now fully working again and didn't even get warm charging it
Thank you soooo much. I just recovered a fairly new 4S battery that measured only 6.4V on the multimeter. Charged it to 12V in Ni mode, switched it back to Lipo. YES!!!!!!
I've done this many times. Although I'll put a cell checker on the balance port while I charge on the NiCad setting so I can monitor each cell individually to make sure I don't over discharge an individual cell. Also keep a bucket of sand, water source, and/or a hard flame proof surface handy. Setting up the charger in the middle of a concrete floor or driveway outside is best.
Man you just saved my 2 Turnigy 3S 11.1v 5000mAh LiPo batteries with your advices! They were so low, about 4.5v each pack. I charged them until 9v with Nicd mode at 0.1A. Then put them in LiPo Balance charge with 2A. Perfect work! Moreover this 2 packs only had 2 charges so I was really disappointed at first!
Thanks for this ! Saw this video about 10 months ago but didn’t need it at the time ( I never run my batteries too low ).Today I left a 2300 2S plugged into my FPV goggles ( first time I ever forgot to unplug it ! ) all day and this evening the battery was completely dead. Charged it to 6.4v as described and it then took a 2S balance charge back to almost 4.2v per cell. I was about to throw it away when I remembered seeing this video back in the day and your method worked fine for me. Thank you for saving me a good few quid ! Cheers !
It's a good idea to plug in a voltage monitor to the balance connector to CONTINUOUSLY monitor the individual cell voltages while charging in NiCd mode. I don't walk away from my charger when I do this, I just stand there for 10 minutes monitoring. Also a lipo bag would be good. Also you say you're on a concrete floor, which is good, but there were other batteries nearby, which I think is less good. So still room to improve safety here!
Used a standard car charger for a 4S Upair2 battery that had only 2volts left in it. Disconnected the plug that goes to the PC board and basically touched the connectors to the Battery side for no more then 10 seconds and then had 7.9 volts which was enough to get the charger going. Top job!
So I purchased three batteries back in 2015. 5 years ago.... Never charged them..and I just came upon them. I was afraid to even try to charge them...bit now I will. 👍🏼
You rescued me man, due to some short circuit my battery was completely discharged and it wasn't charging at all. But your trick came to me as a gift from God mann. Thanks a lot dudeee
So I paid extra for one of these spectrum smart batteries 22.2v 6s,a while back thinking I would get a charger once the financial well fills back up so to speak. In the mean time I got the battery to low playing around with it and by the time I bought the charger it said the battery wasnt any good. So I seen on youtube a couple 12 year olds using this tech. to get the battery back but I don't want to risk a fire on someone that doesnt shave yet if you know what I mean. So I ran into your video and thought if your willing to try it it must be mostly safe if the current is kept low ext. so I did it for about 10 minutes and it just worked perfectly,it was like the charger which is a spectrum s1200 (the $64 one with a toolkit 19vdc 200W power supply) started wakeing up this started working then another funtion started working and now all is good. So thank you very much I am a huge fan and now I'm you #1 fan.....Your friend Bob from Kentucky...
Cheers Bruce. I was testing out my new quanum goggles last night with one of my lipos and it got way flatter than it should have. I used this trick of yours and the battery was sorted and back at storage capacity in under an hour. You saved battery. Thanks
Watched this, as I do all your publications, when it first appeared! Today, I realized I had Bu,,,ed up and lost two brand new LiFe batts. through total negligence on my part! Memory still OK and course Bruce was there with the solution! Batt's. now retrieved and recharged. Your channel has a solution to almost everyone's RC problems! Thanks!
Cheers my friend, you have just saved my 2s lipo! I got the battery to 7v then tried it and it worked 1st time. I was shocked when I 1st checked the voltage as one cell was showing as 2.5v and the other at over 3.5,quite a big difference but thanks to your vid its now fully working and charging without any swelling on the pack..... Topman!!
Thanks for the Video. I was really worried for my 12S 5800mAh LiPo Pack, which I somehow managed to discharge by only doing benchtests. I realized they must be flat only after I went for a test ride, they were at 30V (2.5V/Cell), bad but not as bad as your pack! Now I'm charging them carefully. I couldn't rely on the Discharge Protector in my ESC, so I will from now on always have my Voltmeter attached and soon my BMS too.
I had a 15 Wh LiPo cell inside a tablet that I just resurrected. I had a "setup" ready for it. A few years ago I had resurrected a Li-ion battery for a drill. So here is how I do it. I take a wimpy, low current wall wart power supply. In this case, I used a 5 VDC, 500 mA power supply. 1. I stripped the leads on the power supply to reveal a red and black wire. 2. I grabbed by digital multimeter with the alligator clips and checked the voltage output of the 5 V PS for polarity. 3. I found two long pins that you might see a seamstress use. 4. I stuck those pins into the red and black (+/-) terminals of my LiPo connector. 5. I unplugged the PS from the wall and checked LiPo voltage to be 0.024 VDC (virtually 0). 6. With a fire extinguisher nearby, I plugged in the PS and watched carefully at the voltage display. 7. I unplugged periodically to see if the LiPo battery was responding and taking a charge. 8. In roughly 5 minutes, the battery had risen from around 3.2 V to 3.6 V. 9. I now removed all of my charging apparatus and re-connected the LiPo to my tablet. 10. The tablet showed a -4% charge initially. I wish I was kidding, but I think that's what I saw. 11. In a few hours, the battery was 100% using the tablet's charger. For the drill, the modified procedure including connecting 2 PS's in series. I made a 17 VDC circuit with a 5 and a 12.
Excellent video. I did not let my battery run flat. I blame the tree that held my lost plane hostage for a week for this travisty. I used the Tx charge port on my old Robbe power peak infinity nicad charger. (1 - 8 cells, 250 mA)
Thanks so much brother! You just saved me 200 bucks. I left my 3s lipos go way under and my charger would not charge and gave me an error, I thought I was screwed. Saw your video and tried it. They are back up and running like champs!
Thank You so much, I thought I lost my 2 3s 11.1v I used my passport ultra charger " And ran a 1.0 amp rate for 5 min just enough to get detected again... worked great... really appreciate your help
Simple - it worked. I left a 3200 3-cell connected to ESC for about 3 days. Would not recharge. Followed what was done on this video - miracle recovery.
What a lot of people dont understand with LiPo batteries is that when they are assembled they have no charge what so ever. They need to be activated and what you just showed in your video Bruce is what they do in the factory to kick them into life. As you rightly say keep them under observation all the time and do it slowly.
+Don Judge Close friend was a principal owner of a very large LiPo brand. He told me when they manufacture the LiPo packs they are in fact inert. ( I think thats the word) To get to the stage that they will start to take a charge they give them a very solid DC boost just like Bruce did but likely a significant amount more violent. Once the cell takes the initial voltage the charger takes over and there you have your Lithium pack ready to run. It was he who told me if you ever over discharge a pack just hit it with a suitable voltage to get you to 3 volts per cell and 99% percent of the time you will recover it. In his words. "Thats the way we kick start them in the factory"....
+Allan Main Fantastic, thanks Allan. Makes a great change to get something from a manufacturer rather than someone blindly repeating a 'fact' they read on the Internet somewhere.
Mate you're a legend you saved my life battery life that is I just bought a battery 2 days ago took it out for a flight and hello forgot to unplug it it went flat done what you did bang started working good work mate keep up the awesome work 10 out of 10 for you
Additionally, you can “jump” a battery with another battery or just about anything that puts out power, however, it can be very dangerous. This process shouldn’t take much time before the battery is in range to charge again but I can’t stress enough how dangerous this method can be. I once accidentally charged a lipo on NiMH settings. The lipo didn’t seem damaged afterwards, however, it was warm after charging which isn’t supposed to happen with lipos. I tested that battery in an RC and it worked fine, so, I thought everything was ok, however, later on when I charged it up again with the correct “lipo” setting, it caught on fire 🔥. I’d be very careful attempting to charge a low voltage lipo with more than one cell. Whenever, I was “jumping” lipos, it wasn’t for RC’s. I had an old cellphone that wouldn’t charge without “jumping” the battery if the voltage got too low. Nowadays, I try to avoid lipos as much as possible. I prefer NiMH batteries because they aren’t as fussy and don’t catch fire as easily. After that lipo fire, I started using different connectors for different batteries. Tamiya connectors for NiMH and Deans or Traxxas for lipo. That way, I don’t get confused and charge on the wrong settings. Be careful, always use a lipo charging case, and NEVER CHARGE BATTERIES UNATTENDED.
Another thing I discovered by accident was sometimes you have a situation where say one cell is showing 1.5v and the other two are at 5 or 6 v. It's very hard to repair that problem but I managed it. I accidently left a low voltage alarm connected for a couple of weeks, the type with no audible alarm. When I found it again all cells were completely flat. I used the method you showed and managed to bring all cells back to a balanced state. With all cells at zero they are balanced and all came back together. Probably would not work every time but it did this time and I use it for LED lights on my ground station for a bit of light in dark car parks.....
Thank you soooooo much!!! It worked like a charm. You honestly have the best all around RC Fixes Infotmation etc youtube channel than any other channel around. Much apprecited.
NICE VIDEO! Bruce, this is potentially one of those videos that brings a lot of views. you should add a few other keywords into the title. Dead Lipo, discharged, damaged, dead lipo hack, quick tip, etc. We don't use the word "flat" in the U.S. ... unless it's a tire.
Kudos!!! I need to follow you I learned more in a few short minutes with you than I have with others,reason being you get right to the point and you don't get side tracked and that's so awesome it's the way videos should be in my opinion thank you gonna try and save my battery and 2 other batteries that friends said are dead and won't charge and are barely a year old!!! Thank you again!!!
Seems to be saving my 1500mah floureon 4s sooooo awesome, I'm new to lipos and quadcopters, bt I had only ruined one 1300 mah 4s if I only would've looked this up before, thank you so much.
Excellent briefing, no wasted time, lots of helpful data and respect for safety:- Great Video ( can you do one on how to store / general battery care so we don't get in this position? Maybe you already have..save us time and send a link?) Again thanks for the help
Just revived a dead/ unrecognised lipo cell using your method plus after about 3 mins charge in nicd mode, changed to lipo storage mode (much safer I think)!
The old black Eflite charger which uses the balance connector to charge is good for recovering 2S or 3S batteries since it has a simple analogue current control knob to set a low current for trickle charging.
This has worked for me a few times. But when this method didn't revive a lipo, I did something more drastic. I set it to Nicad. But i turned it to 5.0amps charge. Let it charge without balance plug connected for 8 to 10 seconds. Turn off. Plug in balance plug and charge normally on Lipo Balance charge! I revived several 1s and 2s batteries this way.
Thank you so much I just got off my ebike and my LiPO batteries died I know I didn't draw too much so little damage was done so this definitely helped 😊
I was actually able to recover a loop that I found in the woods and the shrink wrap was all whitened from the sun and the red power lead was completely white because it sat in the sun for so long. Picked it up and measured the voltage, 0.02 volts for the entire pack. I did the same process as done here and it worked!! The pack is pretty puffed but it does work!
+shaneman27 You found a LiPo in the woods? How do you explain that? Someone's UAV fell apart in flight? You might have found a camera or other bits had you looked around. Crashed in a tree and the battery was the only piece with enough mass to escape the Velcro straps?
Thankyou! this was my problem, new smart charger, My batteries sat for 4 months, i didn't know where to start. turns out the battery was at 2.3 volts on a 1300mah 7.4v LiPo battery.
This is very topical today. I picked up a battery earlier this evening I thought was fully charged, and took it flying. It didn't last long before I got LVC. I was horrified to find it under 10v when I got home. (I don't normally let them go under 3.7-3.8v). Luckily this battery had enough juice in it that I didn't have to resort to the above. Still freaked me out, so this video is very topical! Thanks for the video Bruce. Hope I never need it! :)
+Max StewieGriffin. Thanks, but risk to what? Life? Limb? Surely going down that far isn't good for the battery. I put 546mAh into a 500mAh battery today :O Given I live in NZ where postage for Lipos is very expensive, or takes a LONG time, I prefer to take better care of my Lipos than what I just did to this one.
+Dave Mountford going down to 3.3 is where the damage starts, so setting the lvc to 3.5 should be ok, but its fair enough if you want them to last longer.
Thanksss👍👍👍 just revived my 4s lipo that had gone below 7v in total when I was fiddling with betaflight settings. Gotta give extra attention to this one pack though..
G'day, Yay Team ! Shit, there's a lot of Traps for Beginners with these Lithium Batteries...! A mate of mine had a $70,000 plug-in Car called a "Me-V" and after a year it was back at the Manufacturer for Servicing, they left it in an uninsulated Shed overnight in winter in Armidale NSW, and the Temperature hit Minus 12 Deg. Centigrade...; not only did the Freezing kill the $40,000 Battery, but when they attempted to recharge it, all the Magic Smoke escaped from the $13,000 Onboard Battery Charge-Controller... I get the impression that LiPo's are much better suited for carefully cosseted applications where they"ll be overseen functional Obsessive-Compulsives who enjoy paying attention to small Details ; than the rough-and-tumble of everyday useage by "Normal" people who can't be bothered paying attention to "pesky shit" like Critical Operational Parameters...(?) ! Have a good one, Ciao !
Thank you ! my lipo went just under 9.5V and my charger wouldn't recognize it anymore. plugged in my handy cell checker on the battery balance wires and switched my charger to nimh, in about 10 seconds my voltage went up back over 10.0V and i could switch back to liPo charging mode ! nice tip sir
Just a tip: Go to your local gardening store and buy a ceramic pot. Charge your batteries in that. If it goes off it will contain the fire and prevent it from spreading.
Badblueshy h
I do all mine in a sealed ammo container. Built the charger into the box
@@discoversunshine if its sealed it can blow up
I bought one of the fire bags
Yea me to a cool case lipo bag the big one
Just week ago I found thought to be dead battery because it stayed too long in storage.. And now you saved me few bucks! Thank you Bruce.
Hello, RCMR. I just want to take this moment and thank you for the lipo bat recovery. I have a battery that I completely discharged by mistake. I left it plugged in my googles all night and it was down pretty low to where it would not charge at all. By doing what you recommended I was able to recharge it back to normal YOU SAVED ME MONEY Thank you so much, we all appreciate you!!
I had a stack of lipos here, and was going to cut the leads off for spares. Of the 6 bats I had setting at low voltage on a single cell, all but 1 are now balance charging properly.
I owe you way more than a pint for this one Bruce. ;)
Same here. The one I didnt bother with was puffed on one cell but the rest maybe only had like 15 good cycles and I just left em discharged for too long. But I'm about to charge em up this weekend and see if they can give me some flight time.
🍺
Not sure how careful I was in following the instructions within this video but I have to say, IT WORKED!! I have to say thanks Bruce, being new to quadcopters, I have watched your videos and have not stopped learning yet. Thanks for ALL of your help, not just this amazing video
1 Year later. I found this excelent video. I been able to bring to life a 3s lipo with an under voltage of 2.8 en every cell. Now is perfect and balanced.
Thanks again.
Got my quad caught in a tree. Had to leave it there overnight. Retrieved it with 40 feet of PVC. Battery Would not not begin to charge. Watched this and adjusted voltage for my LIPo 7.4v. It works! Thank you for concise video.
Darryl Douglas haha my dad did the same with a biplane of mine. Those PVC snakes are hard to wrangle!! We used a second man on a fishing pole to guide the end of it.... absolutely hysterical!
your trick worked! only needed about 30 seconds to boost the dead cell and all is good👍Thanks so much
This just saved my 11.1, thank you! Shockingly all three cells read the exact same when I switched over to balance, so no terrible damage!
6 years late to the video but it still saved my battery! Thanks man!
Saved two 11.1V LiPo batteries for Airsoft which had discharged because I didn't realize how fast my new Bluetooth-enabled Jefftron Leviathan mosfet runs down batteries. I ran one down, bought a new one at the field, and left it until the next day in the gun due to forgetfulness. Two brand new batteries that hadn't even gotten through one cycle - dead.
Both were down around 6.7 - 7 V and would not balance charge - "low voltage warning". The method in this video saved both and all have nicely balanced cells. I guess I got lucky, but I wouldn't have even tried without this video. Thank you!
Followed all your steps and it worked. I charged inside fireproof bag and took all fire/ explode precautions. Thank you.
Thanks for sharing. I needed to charge my only 2s for calibrating throttle end points. The charger threw a battery disconnect at me. So I used your technique and worked like a charm.
All I can say is thank you. You've just helped me save one of my best batteries a Yuneec q500 4k drone batterythats sits at a 3s 5400mah. This battery meant slot to me for flight time, and thanks to you, I can rest tonight knowing that my Lipo was saved.
Great tip. I have recovered quite a few lipo's using this method. Worked every time but WARNING.. Do NOT leave it unattended while doing this!
Brilliant, I was about to give up and throw my Lipo to the recycling but it just took me an hour to gently put my battery back to life. Thank you.
My 4 lipos were on low voltage. I tried this on all of them IT WORKED. Thanks Bruce for your help ☺️
I love your delivery. So many American attempts at this sort of thing are excruciatingly long winded and disorganised. Full marks Brucie :-)
I used this mod on a completely drained Lipo Parrot Bebob 4000mAh battery. My charger gave a complete error and normally I would throw the battery away. (€50,-)
With this method I was able to revive the battery completely. No loss of cells, no loss of power. Great mod and I will recommend this to everyone. Thanks.
8 years later and still works. Thank you very much.
I've seen this method before, but I have been so cautious after a few blown up lipo batteries lol (different type of situation). But hey, I thought I'd try just as you demonstrated but only 1-2 minutes at a time..before even 10 minutes of charging, my batteries were in the 3V range per cell!! I have 3 batteries saved so far that are now safely and fully charged again. You just saved me well over $100 on batteries I thought I had thrown out since I deemed them totaled; good thing I kept those batteries and I cannot thank you enough!
Anyone reading this by chance, if you try this, I would be extra cautious and only charge for a minute or two minutes at a time, unplug it, and then reconnect to check voltages--but that could just be me over worrying lol.
Thanks again man, I really appreciate this
Very nifty little trick that Bruce, although best to not run them flat if it can be avoided as you mentioned.
Bro.big thanks. Warranty ended on my $1k battery pack and it wasn't charging. Popped it open and bought a balance charger. Followed your instructions and boom! It's back operational. Much thanks 👍
Thank you from 2020 for your 2016 video! It worked Ni Cad .1 charge rate on a 7.4 2S lipo
I've done this with a few of mine over the last few years and it works beautifully. You are right Bruce in that you need to respect these batteries and their volatile habits if not treated properly, I think too many people are probably a bit blazé with lipos and don't take many or any precautions with them.
DUDE!!! YOU TOTALLY JUST MADE MY YEAR!!! I've had these 3 lipo batteries (11v 5200) in storage for about 3 years and never got to use them. They were brand new and I just tried charging them but got the low voltage error message. They were about to be disposed of until I saw this vid. IT TOTALLY WORKED 100%!!!! Thank you soooooo much!! My Slash vxl, Arrma fury, and my Slash 4x4 vxl greatly appreciate you!!!
Thanks, I have chucked at least 200 bucks of batteries over the years. Thanks to this video I'm now charging one of three dead lipos.
This actually worked I was already in a bad mood that I had to go out and spend 200$ to enjoy my arrma .
Life saver !!!!
I'm not complaining of the flying videos, but I do enjoy a lot more this bench or workshop videos. Thanks again for all the knowledge Bruce, you are awesome, mate.
You Sir are a gentleman and a scholar I had 4 lipos showing low currents after 3 years of no use and your trick fixes them in about 4 minutes each liked for ya and many thanks
Brilliant advice thanks literally watched this got mine out of bin had 2.2 volts per cell 2s 4000mah followed these instructions now fully working again and didn't even get warm charging it
Thank you soooo much. I just recovered a fairly new 4S battery that measured only 6.4V on the multimeter. Charged it to 12V in Ni mode, switched it back to Lipo. YES!!!!!!
Thank you for your video, Bruce. NiCd CPR helped my 2 batteries come back to life.
Thanks Bruce, I have been away from the hobby for a while and had several batteries that wouldn't charged. They are all taking a charge now.
It's good to know that low charge is not necessarily the end of the road. I'll save the video for future reference. Thanks Bruce.
I've done this many times. Although I'll put a cell checker on the balance port while I charge on the NiCad setting so I can monitor each cell individually to make sure I don't over discharge an individual cell.
Also keep a bucket of sand, water source, and/or a hard flame proof surface handy. Setting up the charger in the middle of a concrete floor or driveway outside is best.
I know this is late but DON'T EVER USE WATER ON A LIPO BATTERY!!!!! The lithium reacts badly with water.
OMG THIS GUY SAVE BATTERIES.
You deserve a reward for it !
LIKE LIKE LIKE..
you sir are an asset to RC community. I tried this with my Imax B6.. it WORKS.
Thank you so much
Man you just saved my 2 Turnigy 3S 11.1v 5000mAh LiPo batteries with your advices!
They were so low, about 4.5v each pack. I charged them until 9v with Nicd mode at 0.1A.
Then put them in LiPo Balance charge with 2A. Perfect work!
Moreover this 2 packs only had 2 charges so I was really disappointed at first!
Thanks for this ! Saw this video about 10 months ago but didn’t need it at the time ( I never run my batteries too low ).Today I left a 2300 2S plugged into my FPV goggles ( first time I ever forgot to unplug it ! ) all day and this evening the battery was completely dead. Charged it to 6.4v as described and it then took a 2S balance charge back to almost 4.2v per cell. I was about to throw it away when I remembered seeing this video back in the day and your method worked fine for me. Thank you for saving me a good few quid ! Cheers !
It's a good idea to plug in a voltage monitor to the balance connector to CONTINUOUSLY monitor the individual cell voltages while charging in NiCd mode. I don't walk away from my charger when I do this, I just stand there for 10 minutes monitoring.
Also a lipo bag would be good.
Also you say you're on a concrete floor, which is good, but there were other batteries nearby, which I think is less good. So still room to improve safety here!
Used a standard car charger for a 4S Upair2 battery that had only 2volts left in it. Disconnected the plug that goes to the PC board and basically touched the connectors to the Battery side for no more then 10 seconds and then had 7.9 volts which was enough to get the charger going.
Top job!
So I purchased three batteries back in 2015. 5 years ago.... Never charged them..and I just came upon them. I was afraid to even try to charge them...bit now I will. 👍🏼
You rescued me man, due to some short circuit my battery was completely discharged and it wasn't charging at all. But your trick came to me as a gift from God mann. Thanks a lot dudeee
Thank you been over 6 months since iplayed with my equipment. Left so e plugged in and batts died. Thanks a mil my guy!
So I paid extra for one of these spectrum smart batteries 22.2v 6s,a while back thinking I would get a charger once the financial well fills back up so to speak. In the mean time I got the battery to low playing around with it and by the time I bought the charger it said the battery wasnt any good. So I seen on youtube a couple 12 year olds using this tech. to get the battery back but I don't want to risk a fire on someone that doesnt shave yet if you know what I mean. So I ran into your video and thought if your willing to try it it must be mostly safe if the current is kept low ext. so I did it for about 10 minutes and it just worked perfectly,it was like the charger which is a spectrum s1200 (the $64 one with a toolkit 19vdc 200W power supply) started wakeing up this started working then another funtion started working and now all is good. So thank you very much I am a huge fan and now I'm you #1 fan.....Your friend Bob from Kentucky...
Cheers Bruce. I was testing out my new quanum goggles last night with one of my lipos and it got way flatter than it should have. I used this trick of yours and the battery was sorted and back at storage capacity in under an hour. You saved battery. Thanks
Watched this, as I do all your publications, when it first appeared! Today, I realized I had Bu,,,ed up and lost two brand new LiFe batts. through total negligence on my part! Memory still OK and course Bruce was there with the solution! Batt's. now retrieved and recharged. Your channel has a solution to almost everyone's RC problems! Thanks!
Cheers my friend, you have just saved my 2s lipo! I got the battery to 7v then tried it and it worked 1st time. I was shocked when I 1st checked the voltage as one cell was showing as 2.5v and the other at over 3.5,quite a big difference but thanks to your vid its now fully working and charging without any swelling on the pack..... Topman!!
Thanks for the Video. I was really worried for my 12S 5800mAh LiPo Pack, which I somehow managed to discharge by only doing benchtests. I realized they must be flat only after I went for a test ride, they were at 30V (2.5V/Cell), bad but not as bad as your pack! Now I'm charging them carefully.
I couldn't rely on the Discharge Protector in my ESC, so I will from now on always have my Voltmeter attached and soon my BMS too.
Hi Bruce,
I have tried this myself quite a few times for some of the members of our club--it worked well for all of them! Thanks for the video.
Ron
This vid helped me bring my li-po battery back to life. Thank you!
Thank you for the video, you saved me a $50 2s graphine lipo battery that had less than 10 cycles on it from being scrapped.
Thanks! Managed to get my lipo up and running because of this video!
Thanks Bruce, very useful! Just tried it on a Turnigy Nanotech and it worked flawless!
good idea to use a balance lead extension cable to get the lipo further away from the charger in case it does burn.
Great information Bruce ! Well done. I was just about to throw out a newer 3S that I left connected overnight and it went flat.
6 years later still one of the best vids
I had a 15 Wh LiPo cell inside a tablet that I just resurrected. I had a "setup" ready for it. A few years ago I had resurrected a Li-ion battery for a drill. So here is how I do it. I take a wimpy, low current wall wart power supply. In this case, I used a 5 VDC, 500 mA power supply.
1. I stripped the leads on the power supply to reveal a red and black wire.
2. I grabbed by digital multimeter with the alligator clips and checked the voltage output of the 5 V PS for polarity.
3. I found two long pins that you might see a seamstress use.
4. I stuck those pins into the red and black (+/-) terminals of my LiPo connector.
5. I unplugged the PS from the wall and checked LiPo voltage to be 0.024 VDC (virtually 0).
6. With a fire extinguisher nearby, I plugged in the PS and watched carefully at the voltage display.
7. I unplugged periodically to see if the LiPo battery was responding and taking a charge.
8. In roughly 5 minutes, the battery had risen from around 3.2 V to 3.6 V.
9. I now removed all of my charging apparatus and re-connected the LiPo to my tablet.
10. The tablet showed a -4% charge initially. I wish I was kidding, but I think that's what I saw.
11. In a few hours, the battery was 100% using the tablet's charger.
For the drill, the modified procedure including connecting 2 PS's in series. I made a 17 VDC circuit with a 5 and a 12.
Excellent video. I did not let my battery run flat. I blame the tree that held my lost plane hostage for a week for this travisty.
I used the Tx charge port on my old Robbe power peak infinity nicad charger. (1 - 8 cells, 250 mA)
Thanks so much brother! You just saved me 200 bucks. I left my 3s lipos go way under and my charger would not charge and gave me an error, I thought I was screwed. Saw your video and tried it. They are back up and running like champs!
amazing trick worked for me perfectly and saved a practically new battery for me. The best trick ever
Thank You so much, I thought I lost my 2 3s 11.1v
I used my passport ultra charger "
And ran a 1.0 amp rate for 5 min just enough to get detected again... worked great... really appreciate your help
Simple - it worked. I left a 3200 3-cell connected to ESC for about 3 days. Would not recharge. Followed what was done on this video - miracle recovery.
What a lot of people dont understand with LiPo batteries is that when they are assembled they have no charge what so ever. They need to be activated and what you just showed in your video Bruce is what they do in the factory to kick them into life. As you rightly say keep them under observation all the time and do it slowly.
+Allan Main Really? Do you have any manufacturer's evidence for this? Just asking.....
+Don Judge Close friend was a principal owner of a very large LiPo brand. He told me when they manufacture the LiPo packs they are in fact inert. ( I think thats the word) To get to the stage that they will start to take a charge they give them a very solid DC boost just like Bruce did but likely a significant amount more violent. Once the cell takes the initial voltage the charger takes over and there you have your Lithium pack ready to run. It was he who told me if you ever over discharge a pack just hit it with a suitable voltage to get you to 3 volts per cell and 99% percent of the time you will recover it. In his words. "Thats the way we kick start them in the factory"....
+Allan Main Fantastic, thanks Allan. Makes a great change to get something from a manufacturer rather than someone blindly repeating a 'fact' they read on the Internet somewhere.
Mate you're a legend you saved my life battery life that is I just bought a battery 2 days ago took it out for a flight and hello forgot to unplug it it went flat done what you did bang started working good work mate keep up the awesome work 10 out of 10 for you
Thanks!! That only took a couple minutes and it did the trick. The battery didn't even get warm.
Thanks for video. How much does an external power source/ battery charge cost?
Thank you very much, sir. I followed your instructions and could save a fully flat LiPo.
Thank you, you saved me a trip to my nearest hobby store 48 minutes away and maybe even money for a new lipo battery
Additionally, you can “jump” a battery with another battery or just about anything that puts out power, however, it can be very dangerous. This process shouldn’t take much time before the battery is in range to charge again but I can’t stress enough how dangerous this method can be. I once accidentally charged a lipo on NiMH settings. The lipo didn’t seem damaged afterwards, however, it was warm after charging which isn’t supposed to happen with lipos. I tested that battery in an RC and it worked fine, so, I thought everything was ok, however, later on when I charged it up again with the correct “lipo” setting, it caught on fire 🔥. I’d be very careful attempting to charge a low voltage lipo with more than one cell. Whenever, I was “jumping” lipos, it wasn’t for RC’s. I had an old cellphone that wouldn’t charge without “jumping” the battery if the voltage got too low. Nowadays, I try to avoid lipos as much as possible. I prefer NiMH batteries because they aren’t as fussy and don’t catch fire as easily. After that lipo fire, I started using different connectors for different batteries. Tamiya connectors for NiMH and Deans or Traxxas for lipo. That way, I don’t get confused and charge on the wrong settings. Be careful, always use a lipo charging case, and NEVER CHARGE BATTERIES UNATTENDED.
Ace Report yeah that’s what I do. Just jump it for for a couple of seconds a couple of times. Never had a problem. Always recovered my batteries 👌
Thank you from across the pond. God bless.
Another thing I discovered by accident was sometimes you have a situation where say one cell is showing 1.5v and the other two are at 5 or 6 v. It's very hard to repair that problem but I managed it. I accidently left a low voltage alarm connected for a couple of weeks, the type with no audible alarm. When I found it again all cells were completely flat. I used the method you showed and managed to bring all cells back to a balanced state. With all cells at zero they are balanced and all came back together. Probably would not work every time but it did this time and I use it for LED lights on my ground station for a bit of light in dark car parks.....
I did the exact same thing. Like exactly, my voltage was down near 7.4, almost exactly like urs.
Thank you soooooo much!!! It worked like a charm. You honestly have the best all around RC Fixes Infotmation etc youtube channel than any other channel around.
Much apprecited.
NICE VIDEO! Bruce, this is potentially one of those videos that brings a lot of views. you should add a few other keywords into the title. Dead Lipo, discharged, damaged, dead lipo hack, quick tip, etc. We don't use the word "flat" in the U.S. ... unless it's a tire.
Thank You this is a very helpful video I used to charge my batteries!
I use LiPo safe bags when charging my LiPos
Thanks for the great video👍
Kudos!!! I need to follow you I learned more in a few short minutes with you than I have with others,reason being you get right to the point and you don't get side tracked and that's so awesome it's the way videos should be in my opinion thank you gonna try and save my battery and 2 other batteries that friends said are dead and won't charge and are barely a year old!!! Thank you again!!!
Seems to be saving my 1500mah floureon 4s sooooo awesome, I'm new to lipos and quadcopters, bt I had only ruined one 1300 mah 4s if I only would've looked this up before, thank you so much.
You just rescued a Turnigy graphene 4s 1300 65c! Thank you sir!
Wow! I tried this and it saved my batteries. I'm down to my last 2 , both had one bad cell now they are working well. Thanks!
You just saved me $26 bucks! Thanks for the video!!
Excellent briefing, no wasted time, lots of helpful data and respect for safety:- Great Video ( can you do one on how to store / general battery care so we don't get in this position? Maybe you already have..save us time and send a link?) Again thanks for the help
Internal resistance does go up when overdischarged significantly, though. Some may not have same punch as they did before.
Thank God for you! I only have one battery! You saved my budget!
Just revived a dead/ unrecognised lipo cell using your method plus after about 3 mins charge in nicd mode, changed to lipo storage mode (much safer I think)!
This just saved me £50 thanks mr xjet all the way from the uk 🇬🇧 top man 👍🏻👍🏻
The old black Eflite charger which uses the balance connector to charge is good for recovering 2S or 3S batteries since it has a simple analogue current control knob to set a low current for trickle charging.
This has worked for me a few times. But when this method didn't revive a lipo, I did something more drastic. I set it to Nicad. But i turned it to 5.0amps charge. Let it charge without balance plug connected for 8 to 10 seconds. Turn off. Plug in balance plug and charge normally on Lipo Balance charge!
I revived several 1s and 2s batteries this way.
Thank you so much I just got off my ebike and my LiPO batteries died I know I didn't draw too much so little damage was done so this definitely helped 😊
I was actually able to recover a loop that I found in the woods and the shrink wrap was all whitened from the sun and the red power lead was completely white because it sat in the sun for so long. Picked it up and measured the voltage, 0.02 volts for the entire pack. I did the same process as done here and it worked!! The pack is pretty puffed but it does work!
+shaneman27 You found a LiPo in the woods? How do you explain that? Someone's UAV fell apart in flight? You might have found a camera or other bits had you looked around. Crashed in a tree and the battery was the only piece with enough mass to escape the Velcro straps?
+jsl151850b Nono I got the whole plane. Trashed. Got the motor and ESC though.
Thanks bruce. You are a gift to the hobby been with your channels for 6 or 7 years now and you saved me again 👍🏼🥳
Thankyou! this was my problem, new smart charger, My batteries sat for 4 months, i didn't know where to start. turns out the battery was at 2.3 volts on a 1300mah 7.4v LiPo battery.
This is very topical today. I picked up a battery earlier this evening I thought was fully charged, and took it flying. It didn't last long before I got LVC. I was horrified to find it under 10v when I got home. (I don't normally let them go under 3.7-3.8v). Luckily this battery had enough juice in it that I didn't have to resort to the above. Still freaked me out, so this video is very topical! Thanks for the video Bruce. Hope I never need it! :)
+Dave Mountford you can go down to 3.5 without risk
+Max StewieGriffin. Thanks, but risk to what? Life? Limb? Surely going down that far isn't good for the battery. I put 546mAh into a 500mAh battery today :O Given I live in NZ where postage for Lipos is very expensive, or takes a LONG time, I prefer to take better care of my Lipos than what I just did to this one.
+Dave Mountford going down to 3.3 is where the damage starts, so setting the lvc to 3.5 should be ok, but its fair enough if you want them to last longer.
I land at 3.5V. 3.7 or 3.8 doesn't give much flight time on a mini quad! The packs are lasting lots of cycles.
Great video, saves a load of time messing with then trying to trickle charge with a 9V battery!!!
Thanksss👍👍👍 just revived my 4s lipo that had gone below 7v in total when I was fiddling with betaflight settings. Gotta give extra attention to this one pack though..
Thank you so much for your technique, I can save my 4S 5000 mAh, and save my money around 130 $, thanks thanks
Just did it and fixed mine...very cool. Thank you.
Thank you so much you saved me spot of money and frustration
G'day,
Yay Team !
Shit, there's a lot of Traps for Beginners with these Lithium Batteries...!
A mate of mine had a $70,000 plug-in Car called a "Me-V" and after a year it was back at the Manufacturer for Servicing, they left it in an uninsulated Shed overnight in winter in Armidale NSW, and the Temperature hit Minus 12 Deg. Centigrade...; not only did the Freezing kill the $40,000 Battery, but when they attempted to recharge it, all the Magic Smoke escaped from the $13,000 Onboard Battery Charge-Controller...
I get the impression that LiPo's are much better suited for carefully cosseted applications where they"ll be overseen functional Obsessive-Compulsives who enjoy paying attention to small Details ; than the rough-and-tumble of everyday useage by "Normal" people who can't be bothered paying attention to "pesky shit" like Critical Operational Parameters...(?) !
Have a good one,
Ciao !
Thank you ! my lipo went just under 9.5V and my charger wouldn't recognize it anymore. plugged in my handy cell checker on the battery balance wires and switched my charger to nimh, in about 10 seconds my voltage went up back over 10.0V and i could switch back to liPo charging mode ! nice tip sir