Lipo charging - which leads ?

[Norman Seal]

Hi,

I’m new to this site and have recently returned to flying after about 20 years !

I have a Hyperion EOS-0403i Charger and I’m slightly confused as to the correct charging procedure, despite reading the charger instructions several times !

The charger has a balance board and the requisite main charging leads. The battery is a 3S Tattu 1800ma one and I know I need to charge it at 1C ( 1800ma ) but do I connect both the balance leads on the battery and charger AND the main +/- leads to the XT plug ?,or do I just use the balance board connection ?
Thanks in advance

Norm

[Jonathan M]

Both. Plug the heavy-duty +/- charging leads into the battery, and also connect the balancing plug on the battery to the port on the charger via the adaptor-board which has a number of ports to suit 2s, 3s, 4s etc LiPos.

Note that some chargers automatically work out how many cells the LiPo has, others you have to specify it on the menu.

[Norman Seal]

Thanks for that Jonathan, whilst I was waiting for my first ever post to be approved I found an online manual for the charger which was a bit clearer !

im sure I read somewhere that it was possible to slow charge a Lipo via the balance board only but that may be me interpreting the info wrongly !

Norm

[MattyB]

I’ve had tiny 1S and 2S packs from “toy” indoor models that can be charged by the balance leads, but it’s completely impractical for anything larger. Always connect the main connector before the balance lead, as if you start to do parallel charging that allows any small difference in voltage between the packs to equalise via that route rather than the thin balance wires.

[Ben B]

It's not completely impractical. When I'm traveling I do most of my packs (up to 2200 3s) through the balance leads using cheap 2/3s Turnigy balance chargers. I've got two on a Y lead attached to a single 12v power brick so they're slow but I can still charge 15 batteries (mix of 2s 450s and 3s 850s) in 24hrs.

[Norman Seal]

Posted by Ben B on 03/09/2020 22:52:14:

It's not completely impractical. When I'm traveling I do most of my packs (up to 2200 3s) through the balance leads using cheap 2/3s Turnigy balance chargers. I've got two on a Y lead attached to a single 12v power brick so they're slow but I can still charge 15 batteries (mix of 2s 450s and 3s 850s) in 24hrs.

I know with Nicads/ NiMh batteries it’s better for them to be slow charged, does it improve the life of Lipos to do it this way as well ?

[Norman Seal]

Thinking about it, I have a Parrot AR2 drone with two 1500ma Lipo batteries which plug directly into a wall charger. The only charging connections are 4 recessed gold pins in the ends of the plastic battery cases, so these must charge via a balance system.

They’re 5yrs old and still perform very well. I bought one of the little circuit board basic cell testers from Robotbirds and I tried it on the Parrot batts and the cells are very well balanced, within 0.01v of each other ( they’re 3S’s )

[Richard Wills 2]

Posted by Norman Seal on 03/09/2020 23:01:26:

I know with Nicads/ NiMh batteries it’s better for them to be slow charged, does it improve the life of Lipos to do it this way as well ?

I don't think charge rate has much impact on life as long as you don't go crazy, much more important to not over discharge them and not to leave them fully charged for long periods.