What is the correct procedure to calibrate the smart battery for my P3P?

Hello rv, do you mean cycling or updating the firmware? We have lots of discussion about them here.

Run it down until it turns off from lack of power, then fully charge it.

The method I use: fly it until it gets to normal (not critical) low power and requires landing. Then at home, power it up again outside of the craft, and let it drain until it turns off normally. Then charge it fully.

You should only need to do this after about 10 normal uses / flights.

Chris

Correct, the above post should help you.
You can fly fly it to under 10% land, and then let it be until it shuts itself off. Let it cool down then fully charge.

Thanks guys, will give it a try. Waiting for the day to cool off, more for me than the machine.

rvoutdoorsman Posted at 2016-6-18 01:55
Thanks guys, will give it a try. Waiting for the day to cool off, more for me than the machine.

Just do the calibration every 10 charges and you'll be good.
Have fun

I thought the original inststructive plan, was to deep cycle our intelligent flight battery packs, every twenty full charges?
Is this method of every ten charges only for intelligent battery packs with a glitche? Trouble free kit here, in every way.
Before ten full charges. we softly broke in these four battery packs, by never flying them beyond 50 % discharge.
Eh, I am just trying to stay on top of the heap, by following your lead. Ha


RedHotPoker

RedHotPoker Posted at 2016-6-18 06:15
I thought the original inststructive plan, was to deep cycle our intelligent flight battery packs, e ...

For P3s and TB47/48s, they would be cycled every 10. Phantom 2 batteries and older would be 20.

That's rather odd, as we were always told twenty full charges, suggested over the last full year, & again only a few couple of short months ago...
When did it recently change to ten full charges for deep cycle?  Ten charges was always the soft breakin period. ;-)
So, is there an actual official documentation, about this best battery practice from @DJI, on this subject.
Ok, then please post the actual battery needs here, for us. Let's please stop this guessing game and pondering over $150 packs!!

RedHotPoker

RedHotPoker Posted at 2016-6-18 07:22
That's rather odd, as we were always told twenty full charges, suggested over the last full year, &  ...

ikr, very odd

If you check the Phantom 3 Intelligent Flight Battery Safety Guidelines V1.0 from 2015.4 it clearly says:

Battery Charging
1) Charge and discharge the battery completely once every 20 charge/discharge cycles. Discharge battery until there is 8% remaining power or until it can no longer be turned on, then recharge it to the maximum capacity. This power cycling procedure will optimize battery life.

But if you check this one from 2015.11 that part was actually removed.

Yeah, so not, that we are all "battery wise", what the heck's going on, around here? ;-)  
We followed these previous guidelines for a couple of months or longer actually, with my four intelligent flight battery packs!
It smells like, More of that ol' three steps forward, & two steps backwards, the BS dance. WTF?!?!

Time for a comprehensive battery guide, from the boys and girls over there...
The more games played, the farther newcomers will flee...
Sorry, but this is all actually very dissapointing, and annoying, now I wonder if my batteries were compromised
or life shortened, by my flying them twenty times before a deep cycle was performed?

Why was it twenty charges, but now it's ten?

RedHotPoker

DJI-Ken Posted at 2016-6-18 02:57
Just do the calibration every 10 charges and you'll be good.
Have fun

Hi Ken. Could you please clarify why it changed from 20 to 10 charges? Does that mean that people who have been doing the calibration after 20 charges (as previously instructed to do so) will have a reduced battery life?

Thanks.

dbortolli Posted at 2016-6-24 05:09
Hi Ken. Could you please clarify why it changed from 20 to 10 charges? Does that mean that people  ...

It's not described in the later version. I've inquired about it.
The Inspire is 10 cycles so just use 10 cycles for the P3 as well.

Batteries are batteries. There are different chemistries but i suspect these ones will be lipos not LiFePo4 or anything exotic. Perhaps someone with a dead one can take it apart and get some part numbers so the chemistry can be identified.

Using batteries kills them, it does not matter what you do. Fully discharging any liPo battery to 0 volts will destroy the chemistry. The range of normal use per cell is 4.2 down to 3.2 volts with 3.7 volts nominal.  
Keeping them fully charged destroys the chemistry also, so storage volts is somewhere around 3.7v which is actually less than 50% capacity because amps delivered per unit time (mAh)  falls with voltage.

The purpose of running them down to low voltage cutoff is to let the battery management system measure how much energy goes in on a full charge and therefore allow your software to estimate runtimes accurately. Doing this full cycle is more harmful to the battery than a partial discharge but is necessary if you want your capacity remaining meter in DJI Go to be in any way accurate as the chemistry in your battery dies during normal use.
I would go with 1 deep cycle per 20 normal use cycles because its less harmful but will still allow the time remaining meter to be semi accurate.

New dry chemistry designs may get round this in the future but at the moment the only way to keep your batteries good is not to use them and keeping each cell at about 3.7 volts indefinitely.
They will also self discharge over time if you don't use them, so they need charged a bit every now and then even when initially stored at 3.7v per cell.  

Its all a bit depressing really when you consider the cost of these batteries and the fact they are basically disposable items.

I really despair of some advice seen .... and the below is my view on LiPo use / charging / discharging from many years of using them, from information passed to me by a friend who is a Senior Tech for Mallory Industries - world leading battery manufacturer.

The batterys used in DJI P3 are High Voltage LiPo ... that is they charge to a max voltage of 4.35V instead of the normal LiPo that charges to 4.20V per cell.

LiPo's do not like being deep discharged - it causes irreparable damage. DJI have set a 12v parameter into the charge control board on front end of battery pack .. so 0% relates to 3.00V per cell IF BALANCED ! The discharge of a DJI pack terminates at 12v ... or as described above - switches off.

So the DJI pack does not actually go lower than 12V overall - that's about the absolute lowest battery manufacturers recc'd for any 4S LiPo. But it is NOT recc'd to keep repeating it ... as it actually accumulates harm in form of Increased Internal Resistance of cell or cells. Manufacturers of LiPo do not recc'd repeated discharge to lower than 3.30V (rested no-load voltage).
Sadly one aspect of the DJI battery system is its lack of fully balancing cells. Charge and discharge cycles are terminated not on cell results but overall voltage of pack. Unlike a proper LiPo charger which monitors individual cells and controls flow to / from each cell to balance. Balance via a LiPo charger can actually take nearly as long as the bulk charge time !!  The DJI system cuts off at total voltage leaving cells potentially unbalanced.

The calibration people talk about is basically a 'counter' - it does not reset the cells ... it resets the 'counter' based on mA in / mA out. It is an 'apparent' solution to battery capacity - it does not increase or change what the battery has physically. FW / GO / Litchi reacts to the 'counter' ... if 'counter' is showing less than battery actually has - it will act based on 'counter' ... this is also why flying on partially discharged batterys is bad news !

I know there are a number of people on this forum that like to argue / contradict me - that's their choice - but battery manufacturers cannot be dismissed.

So what am I saying ? My personal view based on industry information and many years use of LiPo batterys tells me DEEP discharge is bad news unless controlled properly cell by cell. DJI do not allow you that luxury. DJI have produced an 'idiots battery pack' to avoid many of the common errors made by owners who are not so educated on LiPo care. But that system also limits the real care that can be taken with LiPo.

Now I'll let the floor to those who like to argue with anything I post regardless of whether right or not ...

Nigel

i agree