P4 battery life span (cycles) and motor

CyberPilot10 · Aug 23, 2017

Hello all, I'm new to the drone world. I've been flying RC aircraft for over 25 years (glow power) this is my first experience with electric propulsion on RC aircraft.
Question: is there a life span (or cycle life) on these batteries and if so how many cycles before I need to start thinking about new batteries.
The life of the electric motors is also a concern to me. Any info would be appreciated.
I have had my P4 for 32 days
120 flights, 14hr 49min flight time, distance flown 571,786 feet
And countless bugs KIA!!!! I think I clean more bug guts off this drone, than I do the leading edge of the wings on the Cessna 172 I fly!!!! I'm not trying to fly myself into a P4P upgrade anytime soon!
Thanks
Rich!

Stevo0596 · Aug 24, 2017

From what I have been able to determine these batteries are good for approx. 100 recharge cycles. I assume they will still be able to be recharged and used after this however the battery will probably not be working at optimum efficiency leading to reduced flight time. Due to this and other reasons it is not recommended to store the batteries fully charged as you will waste recharge cycles. In fact, based on the battery management settings, the battery will auto discharge after the set period of time (1-10 days).

tevek · Aug 24, 2017

There are a number of threads relating to battery care and what would be a reasonable life if managed correctly. I run mine down to approx 30% each flight and fully charge them on the day. If I need to store them for a bit I'll either run them down to approx 50% or adjust my auto discharge down to 2 days and let the battery smart electronics do the rest. I have over 100 charges on my batteries and the go app and Airdata have me at around 98% for each of them. I'd be happy with 150+ charges before I need to purchase spares.

Erised · Aug 24, 2017

tevek said:
There are a number of threads relating to battery care and what would be a reasonable life if managed correctly. I run mine down to approx 30% each flight and fully charge them on the day. If I need to store them for a bit I'll either run them down to approx 50% or adjust my auto discharge down to 2 days and let the battery smart electronics do the rest. I have over 100 charges on my batteries and the go app and Airdata have me at around 98% for each of them. I'd be happy with 150+ charges before I need to purchase spares.

I do about the same as tevek and I fly them down to 20%,store them at 50% and full charge on fly day. I have about the same charges he has and the same battery life left. I never fly full power for extended periodes of time. I still have the same flight times as I did 16 months ago. For the best distance to power usage go 50 kph (30 mph) 13M/sec. thats about 75% trottle in s mode. The motors are brushless, they should outlast your batteries and then some.

tevek · Aug 24, 2017

Erised said:
I do about the same as tevek and I fly them down to 20%,store them at 50% and full charge on fly day. I have about the same charges he has and the same battery life left. I never fly full power for extended periodes of time. I still have the same flight times as I did 16 months ago. For the best distance to power usage go 50 kph (30 mph) 13M/sec. thats about 75% trottle in s mode. The motors are brushless, they should outlast your batteries and then some.

Looking over my shoulder to see if you are watching me type...lol. Same same except I fly in P mode at 50 kph, I did a test some time ago to compare speed vs distance vs battery life in almost identical conditions over a 2 Klm loop. P mode was more consistent in each of the tests given the wasted power trying to keep the drone in a straight line in S mode and as a consequence achieved better battery life throughout the flight in P mode.