My question is whether or not I can fly my drone with the battery charger plugged in? The battery won’t charge, but it seems to connect to the aircraft fine if it’s plugged in.
Thanks
Mike

Wow, that's interesting.  So theoretically, you could use your dead charger with a correct external battery connected to the usb.  

Good luck

That is a weird one.  Mind posting a pic of it in the P3S?

ok, so I posted in another area but I guess it wasn’t the correct one... so here goes again.
I have a P3S, this spring after not flying it all winter I plugged it in to charge the controller. It lights a green led in the off position, and won’t do anything else. No other lights at all, just the large green one. If I unplug it, the light goes out, and if I turn it on, nothing happens. No lights.
  So I plug it in again, green light on, turn the control on, and I get a couple tones, the large led lights yellow, and the four smaller ones light green. In this state, I tried to power up the aircraft, everything works, connects, the drone starts, and will apparently fly. I tried to purchase a replacement battery for the remote, but no one carries them near me, and no one will ship one. So I bought a generic 18650 cell, transferred the little circuit board to the new cell, and tried it... same symptoms exactly. So I’m assuming now the board on it is toast. The controller seems fine, since it’ll power up and connect to the aircraft when it’s plugged into the wall.
  My question is, would I be able to fly the drone with the controller plugged in? I do have some long USB charge cables and a long extension cord, it would be a bit of a pain, but at least I can fly.
Thanks for any inputs.
By the way I’m located in Alberta Canada.
Mike

I saw your other thread, but declined to answer. This is a tricky one. If, with the charger plugged in, everything works OK, then yes, it should work fine. But it is a dodgy way of powering the RC unit, and I would be inclined to send it off to be fixed.

As long as it powers on, go for it.

Yeah I agree it’s nerve wracking, but my location is against me. I’d have to send it to DJI, and no one will air ship it because of the battery. I’d be lucky to get it back by next spring haha.
Has anyone ever flown it with it plugged in?

Maybe I’d have to do a couple of test flights... like take off and hover a few feet off the ground, just to make sure it’s going to stay connected and powered...
Does anyone know if the tones and lights are trouble codes? I can’t find anything corresponding to what I’m getting...

Mike, it is not recommended to fly in such way. If you need further assistance, please kindly send the RC for diagnosis: https://www.dji.com/support

Have you thought about purchasing a used RC, linking it to the AC and fly..then you can send the one you have in for repair.
Just another thought.

Ok  I get that it’s not recommended. That sucks lol. Do you have any suggestions besides sending my transmitter to you? Where do I send it and what kind of turn around could I expect? I’m understanding that DJI doesn’t sell the replacement battery? What’s wrong with it?

Quicksilver372 Posted at 2018-5-28 19:15
Ok  I get that it’s not recommended. That sucks lol. Do you have any suggestions besides sending my transmitter to you? Where do I send it and what kind of turn around could I expect? I’m understanding that DJI doesn’t sell the replacement battery? What’s wrong with it?

People have successfully put in a battery...only DJI have the OEM batteries and they don't sell them for DYI (repair only).
It is unknown if you damaged anything by whatever you have tried in replacing your battery. For one thing the OEM charger will not work with another battery. So if you tried to charge your replacement battery with the charger that came with the P3S then that was a mistake.   

Amateur Droner Posted at 2018-5-28 19:24
People have successfully put in a battery...only DJI have the OEM batteries and they don't sell them for DYI (repair only).
It is unknown if you damaged anything by whatever you have tried in replacing your battery. For one thing the OEM charger will not work with another battery. So if you tried to charge your replacement battery with the charger that came with the P3S then that was a mistake.

No, that is not true. The DJI charger will work with a suitable battery of the same voltage/cell count. And it is more likely the charger circuit in the RC unit is the fault, rather than the battery.

Geebax Posted at 2018-5-28 19:28
No, that is not true. The DJI charger will work with a suitable battery of the same voltage/cell count. And it is more likely the charger circuit in the RC unit is the fault, rather than the battery.

Well maybe I am, I was going on what he stated.. "I tried to purchase a replacement battery for the remote, but no one carries them near me, and no one will ship one. So I bought a generic 18650 cell, transferred the little circuit board to the new cell, and tried it... same symptoms exactly. So I’m assuming now the board on it is toast."
What I was saying is that you can't just replace " little circuit boards" and expect everything to work!

Quicksilver, just look at :https://forum.dji.com/forum.php? ... D404%26typeid%3D404

I still think it would be cheaper (and faster) to buy a used RC and link it!
Just my two cents!

Amateur Droner Posted at 2018-5-28 19:50
Well maybe I am, I was going on what he stated.. "I tried to purchase a replacement battery for the remote, but no one carries them near me, and no one will ship one. So I bought a generic 18650 cell, transferred the little circuit board to the new cell, and tried it... same symptoms exactly. So I’m assuming now the board on it is toast."
What I was saying is that you can't just replace " little circuit boards" and expect everything to work!

The little board is the charger circuit, and as I said, is probably faulty. But I agree, he is better off trying to find a used RC unit and buying it.

Just wondering even this is a P3 series problem if the issues and solution posted here might help you?

Amateur Droner Posted at 2018-5-28 19:50
Well maybe I am, I was going on what he stated.. "I tried to purchase a replacement battery for the remote, but no one carries them near me, and no one will ship one. So I bought a generic 18650 cell, transferred the little circuit board to the new cell, and tried it... same symptoms exactly. So I’m assuming now the board on it is toast."
What I was saying is that you can't just replace " little circuit boards" and expect everything to work!

The cell in the controller is an 18650 , and the one I bought is the same rating. Despite the complexity of the drone control circuits, etc, a battery cell is just a cell. The small board is attached to the cell by... get this... a soldered connection at the positive and again at the... you guessed it... the negative ends. So, yes, it is just a matter of swapping the board over and expect it to work. It’s not difficult.

The symptoms are exactly the same with the new cell, leading me to believe that the cell itself isn’t the issue. The fact that the drone powers up when I’m plugged in, tells me that the rest of the RC is serviceable, leaving the charge control board as the problem.

I’m going to look around for a replacement controller I guess, unless anyone has a source for the battery cell including the board and wire harness as they come from dji?