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Lipos in the washing machine... anybody done it?


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Puit on my nice clean hoody today... an hour or two later i realised i had something in my pocket with wires. Lo and behold it turned out to be a lipo from my XK A800 electric glider. Whoops...

 

Good job i bought a spare.. I'll just dig that out of the Tranny box where we keep batteries etc... Oh dear.. can't find it. Will pick up the hunt for it later after the school run..

 

Get home, carry on looking.. found it.. in the very same pocket as i found the other one (how on earth i never found it there earlier is beyond me - i'm officially getting old and stupid).

 

So they've both been through the wash - both have their sticky labels completely gone that I put on them (I'm building up a database of batteries, trannys, RC's, aircraft etc - consequently everything is numbered so it can be matched to other equipment).

 

So after all that (congratulations if you've managed to keep reading this far).. whats the likelihood of either lipo still working or recharging with no problems? There's no swelling but i can't find my multimeter to check their voltages..

 

Advice please..

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7 minutes ago, FiddleSticks said:

Puit on my nice clean hoody today... an hour or two later i realised i had something in my pocket with wires. Lo and behold it turned out to be a lipo from my XK A800 electric glider. Whoops...

 

Good job i bought a spare.. I'll just dig that out of the Tranny box where we keep batteries etc... Oh dear.. can't find it. Will pick up the hunt for it later after the school run..

 

Get home, carry on looking.. found it.. in the very same pocket as i found the other one (how on earth i never found it there earlier is beyond me - i'm officially getting old and stupid).

 

So they've both been through the wash - both have their sticky labels completely gone that I put on them (I'm building up a database of batteries, trannys, RC's, aircraft etc - consequently everything is numbered so it can be matched to other equipment).

 

So after all that (congratulations if you've managed to keep reading this far).. whats the likelihood of either lipo still working or recharging with no problems? There's no swelling but i can't find my multimeter to check their voltages..

 

Advice please..

Are they completely dry at this point ( connectors etc) if so I would just  Just plug it into your charger, review the cell voltages and then measure the IR if your charger can do that to see if they have suffered any internal damage  Then if they pass that test I would put them on a very slow 0.5C charge and monitor the cell voltages very carefully during that process for anything untoward Eg  uneven/ unbalanced  definitely charge in the garage on a concrete floor this time around until they have proved themselves ok. 

Edited by MattyB
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28 minutes ago, Robin Colbourne said:

Its often said that one should cycle one's rechargeable batteries, though not usually on the spin cycle.

Not  lithium chemistry you don’t, it doesn’t do anything good other than add cycles you could have used for flying instead

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This episode reminds me of a low inverted Bader of the patch. Crushed rock. Too low, too fast, and it basically wore away, very quickly. The bit that’s welded in the memory, easing down elevator in, and the rudder, vertical stabiliser leaving chips of wood and dust behind, as they wore out. 
Seriously, I can’t see a problem, charge, check, enjoy. 

 

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Sounds like an excellent additional reason to not put lipos in your pocket. Given the frequency with which inadvertent pocket calls are made with "smartphones" the proximity of car keys and lipos would give a tangible risk of a short in the shorts - not a good look.😮

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If you washing cycle was at a green 30c the temperature should not have effected the LiPo any higher it likely would.

Constant immersion in water could have discharged it a bit.

If another hard item in the wash has punctured a cell in any way the soapy water will certainly kill that cell.

As suggested see what the current cell voltages are and make a decision from there.

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Well.. having finally found my meter... both lipos (2s) are holding at 8.3V which unless I'm told otherwise, seems healthy to me.

 

One was already charged before its clean, the other was flat. When i put them on charge last night, one instantly lit up as full, the other took around an hour to charge. I guess the only real way to know how they perform is a test flight??

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On 25/09/2024 at 00:30, Phil Green said:

I would check the connector, a lot of detergents are salt based and in warm water there would be electrolysis and consequently maybe a slight corrosion of the contacts 🙂

 

good shout

 

a liberal dose of contact cleaner is due, perhaps

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14 hours ago, FiddleSticks said:

I guess the only real way to know how they perform is a test flight??

 

or use your charger to do a discharge/charge cycle (fewer airframes involved etc etc)

 

in reality, if they're still showing a decent level of charge, then they're probably just fine

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22 hours ago, FiddleSticks said:

Well.. having finally found my meter... both lipos (2s) are holding at 8.3V which unless I'm told otherwise, seems healthy to me.

 

One was already charged before its clean, the other was flat. When i put them on charge last night, one instantly lit up as full, the other took around an hour to charge. I guess the only real way to know how they perform is a test flight??

No, As per my first post in this thread if you check the i internal resistance with your chargers and then use a  online calculator to calculate the actual real world c rating I’d the pack, that should give you some confidence there has been no major internal damage of it is within 25-30% of the advertised c rating

 

https://www.radiocontrolinfo.com/information/rc-calculators/calculate-the-real-lipo-c-rating/

 

 

 

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