LiPol charging

[davidor]

Can you over-charge a LiPol battery? What happens if you leave the satmap connected to the charging cable for extended periods?

A phone will indicate when the battery is full and stop charging, but the Satmap appears to just keep on charging. Particularly irritating as if you want to do a quick topup, you have no idea how near to fully charged you have got (my experience is that the 4 bar indicator is like a car's petrol guage - you use 50% of the battery to get to 3 bars, about another 30% to get to 2 bars, and when it goes from 2 to 1 bar you have about five minu8tes left!).

Does it do any damage to leave it charging overnight say, if it only needs an hour's charge.

[Rogerfrit]

Quote from the Power Pack User Guide.

"The charger will automatically cut out when the battery is full."

HTH
Roger

[Westlothian]

I have had my new LiPol on charge with mains, car then USB for 24 hours and it never seems to indicate fully charged by dropping the lightning strike icon.

It has 4 bars to show a full battery when unplugged and the battery feels cool to touch so there is nothing to worry about. Are other users seeing this charging complete indication for their LiPols?

[nonoftheabove]

the thing is that while the device is being charged the icon shows the lightning icon.
There never comes a point when it indicates full charge during a charging session.
My understanding is that the device shouldnt be harmed by being left on charge; the charger cuts off
Unplug charger and swich unit on should show 4 bars (GREEN)

THATs MY understanding and take of how the device works
ans how my machine operates.
Mind there are the idiosyncratic things to remember
1) to switch 'off 'the device after the charger unit is activated to the mains
2) to go into setup to stop the screen flashing and bleeping every so often while on charge
3) to be sure that the unit is ACTUAllY off after removing the charging unit
from the device- this last has caught me out- i charged the unit up before a short break. I put my boots on swiched the unit on to get lock while i prepared for a walk- Oh blast red bars no charge unit had been in sleep
mode.
So moral is charge unit while taking full english breakfast

[marty-w]

read my recent post (new software release) regarding the Satmap and the battery problemos.

-martin-

[Westlothian]

@ noneoftheabove

To quote the Power Pack User Guide:

"When the battery is fully charged the lightening{spelling?} symbol will disappear"

So you are observing the same behaviour as I am.

The "nine hour" English Breakfast may require a larger plate too!

@marty-w

This post thanks: http://www.pocketgpsworld.com/modules.php?name=Forums&file=viewtopic&t=73262

The charge bands on my Satmap seem to be behaving correctly with version 1.200. I will check with the LiPol - it seems to have a slightly higher voltage and it may have a flatter discharge graph until the "sudden-death" at the end!

The LiPol battery is providing a much better level of sensitivity maintaining lock-on while indoors and generally increasing the SNR when outdoors.

[djhpk]

I am new to the LiPol battery but was fairly sure that the lightning symbol disappeared the first time that I charged it.

However, in view of the comments here I decided to put it to the test by charging for a second time.

So, I put it on charge using the wall charger starting from a point where the charge indicator was hovering between 2 & 3 bars. I left it charging most of yesterday evening and overnight. This morning the lightning symbol HAD disappeared.

During this period, I also found that the A10 did not appear to switch off despite my best efforts to ensure that it did. It is set to blank the screen after 15 secs and the screen alert is set to off. After apparently switching off, I found that pressing any key brought the unit to life with a satellite lock.

[Westlothian]

I confirm that my unit spent :
all day at 4 bars, a few hours at 3,
then a matter of minutes at two,
then switched off due to flat cells.

The recharge, even with power off,
has never cleared the lightning strike
icon when I have looked. Maybe it
doesn't like being watched!

I suspect that the charge monitoring
parameters in the firmware are based
on the single-use AA cells. Fully charged
AA 2500mA rechargables barely achieve
the 4 bars on the Satmap but they will
register at 98% or higher on the Nikon
D300 body when installed in a grip.

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