Zippy Flightmax / Turnigy lipo testing

[Daniel828]

I'm trying to wrap my head around this. So bear with me please.
I would like to use my Mastech power supply, what BMS should I use?
Can I use the BM6 as a BMS? Or is this just a monitoring device?
I want to get my shopping list ready so I can order all the stuff I need at one time
--Dan

[methods]

The BM6 will only monitor cells, not balance them.
Most any other RC balancer will only do from 6 - 12 cells.

You want to buy one of Gary and Fechter's 24channel BMS kits.
Look in the battery section.

-methods

[Ypedal]

Friend of mine got 4 of these Zippy 5ah, 3 cell, " 8H 15-25C "

one of the packs had a 1v cell
2 of the packs were well ballanced... withina few mah
4th was way out of ballance.. 1000mah+ low on the middle cell..

I popped my volt meter probe wires on my charger and held them in place on the ballance plug to top off the low cell.. ( ballancer was taking way too long.. )

incredibly small tho and light... i likey !!

[Ypedal]

Will be used on this ! ( Ironically at 12v 20ah, 30w HID, talk about low C rate! )

Name of the game was small and light weight, was top priority, will be mounted to a Honda CRF450 motocross bike !

Talk about BRIGHT !!!! i want one of these for my ebike !

[Hyena]

I like the 4s1p option because the price seemed to be the best.

The new turnigys are $10 per cell across the board it seems - 4S is $39.95, 5S is $49.95 and 6S is $59.95

[liveforphysics]

Friend of mine got 4 of these Zippy 5ah, 3 cell, " 8H 15-25C "

one of the packs had a 1v cell
2 of the packs were well ballanced... withina few mah
4th was way out of ballance.. 1000mah+ low on the middle cell..

I popped my volt meter probe wires on my charger and held them in place on the ballance plug to top off the low cell.. ( ballancer was taking way too long.. )

incredibly small tho and light... i likey !!

If you get a cell in your pack that arives out of balance, all you need to do is email Hobbycity and tell them. They will send you a new pack. Any LiPo cell that has been to 1v is permanately damaged. Hobbycity provides amazingly good return support for its products.

[Daniel828]

Friend of mine got 4 of these Zippy 5ah, 3 cell, " 8H 15-25C "

one of the packs had a 1v cell
2 of the packs were well ballanced... withina few mah
4th was way out of ballance.. 1000mah+ low on the middle cell..

I popped my volt meter probe wires on my charger and held them in place on the ballance plug to top off the low cell.. ( ballancer was taking way too long.. )

incredibly small tho and light... i likey !!

What does the 8H stand for in "8H 15c-25C"?
Also, what did you use to determine the mAh of the packs?
Thanks
--Dan

[liveforphysics]

The capacity readings on an un-cycled pack are kinda meaningless. After a few cycles, your low capacity cells may turn out to be your highest, or visa-versa. I've seen 30% boosts in LiPo cell capacity after about 10 cycles. I don't understand what causes this, but it happens. After you put 10-20 cycles on the packs, you might be suprized to find cell capacity all end up inside of 5% of eachother.

[Ypedal]

hehe.. would you believe this guy only plans to use the pack 3 or 4 times a year !!!!

[Ypedal]

Also, what did you use to determine the mAh of the packs?
Thanks
--Dan

my Thunder Power 1010C charger shows mah going in on a digital display !

[BenMoore]

Does anyone have test data on the 5Ah Turnigy packs yet to confirm their suggested "20-30C" performance
Can anyone do a quantitative voltage sag comparison with the Zippy 15C (or the 20C) packs using the same discharge current

I was about to pay the extra for the 15C Zippys to get a weight bonus (624g for a 24S 10Ah pack) but if the Turnigys have significantly less sag/internal resistance they may well be the best value all round.

Either way, the future is looking bright for affordable, high performance LiPo's!
Thanks for sharing the good news guys

[Hyena]

How'd you go scaling the fences of customs Methods ? Got your lipos yet ?
I do



Quite speedy shipping actually, they hit the HK post office on the 17th, left on 18th, hit Aussie customs on the 22nd and were on my door step on the 23rd.

[johnrobholmes]

At least one pack has a shoddy connection from the last batch I got. My buddy's system keeps cutting out, and we have narrowed it down to the packs. Probably a bad solder joint.

[CNCAddict]

Yeah, I received some flightmax packs from HC with spotty tab solder joints. Really need to go over these packs closely if you want something very reliable in high vibration applications (what isn't?).

[methods]

How'd you go scaling the fences of customs Methods ? Got your lipos yet ?

Actually... I got mine yesterday
8 6S 5Ah packs and a new charger.

In general I always cut off the main plastic connector that they supply. I have seen several that were a disaster waiting to happen.

As far as the internal connections, I have never had a problem and I have no intention of cutting open any packs.
I think more damage can be done taking them apart and reassembling... I have shorted out too many cells fooling around.

This time around I am going to use Anderson connectors.
They are perfect for building up Series parallel blocks.

Not sure if you guys noticed, but Hobby City is now carrying the 12" 6S extensions. These are perfect for building up large, cell level, parallel packs.
I usually reinforce them with glue and build big Y cables.
I also have a thread somewhere where I show how to take board mount JST-XH 6-pin 90 connectors and use them as sacrificial gender changers.

Running these in parallel at the cell level is critical for managing the balancing. Just keeping 24 cells in balance is hard enough without making it 48, 72, or 96...
I am going to resurrect my 24CH BMS board. Last time I played with it I punched 100V through the 12V circuitry and blew the components right off the board.

-methods

[CNCAddict]

These packs are easy to disassemble. All the cell connections are at one end on a nice G10 PCB. Much easier than the old sytle packs where the tabs were basically just soldered together loose. Just need some aluminum solder flux to fix any tab soldering issues.

[methods]

That zinc solder and flux stink like hell....
Got to have it though!

I took a peak and saw the circuit board in there.
I agree that configuration looks easier to deal with.

-methods

[methods]

My giant pile of knock-off batteries is bigger than your giant pile of knock-off batteries....


-methods

[Ypedal]

Update on the zippy packs i posted about earlier..

Hobbycity says ship pack with 1v cell back to Hong Kong, problem is that shipping from canada by boat is cheap but could take 6 months.. shipping express would cost as much as a new pack.. makes not sense to send it back.. wtf..

So i'm charging the 1v cell via the ballance wires again.. it's taking a 2 amp charge as i type this..

[Hyena]

Nice lipo abs Methods

Ypedal have they offered to pay for return shipping ? Some mobs do, some don't. I was lucky with my first lot of cheap ebay lipos that the seller sent me a new replacement 6S pack based just on my description and a picture of my multimetre reading 0.3v or what ever it was. I pulled it apart and now have a few spare cells, although seperating glued together foil lipo pouches is only for the very brave (and/or stupid )

[Hyena]

Not sure if you guys noticed, but Hobby City is now carrying the 12" 6S extensions. These are perfect for building up large, cell level, parallel packs.

Have you got a link ? I had a look on HC by couldn't see them (only an assortment of servo leads)

For my set up I need 4 seperate lots of 5S parallel charging leads, but I've decided that rather than having a semi-complicated multiple parallel lead harness I'm going to solder all the balance taps to a 26 pin computer IDE socket and then just use a standard computer IDE cable to connect to another 26 pin socket with every corresponding 4 pins wired in parallel to a normal 5S jst-xh connected to the balancer/charger. I figure it'll cut down on mistakes when hooking up all the balance taps and is quicker and easier to connect.
A 24 pin DVI or a 25 pin parallel port plug could also work.

[methods]

Update on the zippy packs i posted about earlier..

Hobbycity says ship pack with 1v cell back to Hong Kong, problem is that shipping from canada by boat is cheap but could take 6 months.. shipping express would cost as much as a new pack.. makes not sense to send it back.. wtf..

So i'm charging the 1v cell via the ballance wires again.. it's taking a 2 amp charge as i type this..

Dude, that sucks. I guess I have been very lucky.
Thinking of you I tested out all of my packs:

6 of the 8 were at 23.2V with a max Delta of exactly 11mV for each pack (voltage between highest cell and lowest cell).
1 of the 8 was within 7mV highest to lowest
1 of the 8 was off by 160mV !!

Each of the cells was off by a random amount with one particular cell down by over 100mV
At first I was concerned, then it occurred to me that they just forgot to balance charge that pack before shipping it out.

I am going to balance it tonight and let it sit for a few days. If the delta between cells does not change then I will forget it.


I wish you luck with your 1V cell.
I have discharged packs down to 2.1V or 2.1V and had them come back fully.
I doubt that you will be able to revive that single cell. Best to make a good flashlight batter out of the other 5 cells

-methods

[Hyena]

I just tested my packs too with the new BM6 I also ordered. All packs had a delta v of less that .01v, most around 0.006-0.008v.
Then I get the pack 6 of 6 and it starts beeping, all cells good except for one reading 1.22v

Shiiiiiit.

Off to email hobby city
This is not looking good for these new turnigy packs, 2/3 of us so far having received a dud pack in our order...

Ypedal let me know how you get on with yours. I doubt the crook cells will come good, and if they do they'll probably fail much earlier than the rest of the pack. As you say return shipping is arguably not worth it. I'm thinking about ordering another 2S pack and cutting it up to repair mine. It'll probably cost about the same as return shipping on the other one.

edit: the more I think about this the more pissed I am.
I did some googling and found a thread on another forum of a guy comparing these turnigys to the zippy h's.
It looks like they're good batteries if they work, but seems it's russian roulette getting good ones
He too had a pack with a dead cell as did someone else who posted in the thread.

http://www.helifreak.com/showthread.php?t=146724

[methods]

We are early adopters of this technology...
Unfortunately it is us who will find the problems, report them, and help improve quality for the nOObs that will follow.

Sorry to hear that both of you guys got bum packs... but I have a solution
Next time everybody has to order 2 more packs than they need!

I am surprised to hear about these bum packs... I wonder if it is bad cells or bad assembly. Could be some kind of sneak current path that is discharging them over time.
Investigation is in order here.

-methods

[ZapPat]

About bad Lipo cells, I've run two down really low (~1V and ~1.5V) by accident once. I charged them *really* slowly, using other larger cells and a very high value resistor to limit the charging current to something very low, like C/50 if it's been to a really low V. I then discharge at a low rate (like C/10) to a conservative LVC (like 3.5V or so). Then charge up again but using a higher rate, like C/20. You could repeat discharge/charge a few times, raising the rates each time. I did this because I read something about a slow charge being used to "form" the electrodes after manufacturing, so I figured it might be worth a try. I might be totaly wrong though since I don't have much experience with Lipos, so be warned! I personnaly would only charge such cells using the temperature sense probe that often comes with the better chargers, and setting the temperature cutoff pretty low in case of a problem with the cell (specially at higher rates).

The cells seems to be doing good and have a large part of their original capacity (maybe 90% but can't remember exactly), but I haven't done high power discharges yet on them, only 5C max so far (they are zippy rhinos from HC). Can't tell you about their Ri change, since I didn't measure it before.

Others have told me these cells are called "the living dead"...