Imagine you have finished your enjoy flight and are ready to charge the battery. So you connect your drone’s battery to the charger and turn on it, but the drone battery not charging. It’s a nightmare. If you are also having that nightmare, don’t worry this article would help with your issue.
Many drone users report battery charging issues often, So it’s better to know about the reasons why the drone battery won’t charge and how to fix it. After researching on forums, articles and conversations we bring all the information to fix this issue. Hope this article would help you to charge your drone back.
Why Drone battery won’t charge?
In most cases, the drone battery not charging because of high or low battery temperature or a faulty charger. Also, outdated firmware, damaged battery cells, and high amperage could cause this issue. If you have stored your battery for a long time and facing this issue, the battery might have gone into hibernation mode.
According to that, there are many reasons and situations that could cause this issue. We would talk about almost every reason and solution for it below. Most of them are so easy to solve like just by performing software operations while some of them are going to cost you money and effort.
Reason 1: Outdated firmware or firmware glitches.
Firmware is the software that is responsible for managing and conditioning the drone’s actions. Usually, firmware updates are released often by manufacturers to unlock new features and fix bugs on recent versions. Most drone users skip updating firmware in a hurry to fly the drone. If you haven’t updated the firmware, you would see an “Inconsistent firmware” notification in the drone’s app.
Even though the battery looks like and hardware brick, the battery also has software to control its actions. The firmware of the drone controls and affects the battery software. So if your current firmware has a bug-related battery, that could cause the issue. So if you haven’t updated firmware to the latest the issue won’t be fixed.
Solution: Many pilots were able to fix this issue by updating the firmware of the drone. So if you also haven’t updated firmware and the “Inconsistent firmware” notification also popping, update the firmware of the drone to the latest. When updating firmware be sure to insert the battery with the issue. because the firmware updating process would solve the bugs in the battery.
Reason 2: Battery has gone into hibernation mode.
If you have stored the battery for the long term and trying to charge it again and it won’t charge, the drone battery might have gone into hibernation mode. Hibernation mode is designed by engineers to keep the drone battery safe and last longer. So if you store the battery for long, it would discharge 50% and go into hibernation mode.
If the drone battery went into hibernation mode, the indication LED of the battery would flash solid red when turning on. Also, it would keep flashing red even after connecting to the charger. So if you are also noticing this behavior from the battery, your battery has gone into hibernation mode and you can fix the issue by kicking out the battery from hibernation mode.
Solution: There are simple steps to kick out the battery from hibernation mode. Turn on the battery and wait until (about five minutes) the solid red light goes out. Then connect the battery to the charger and plug it. Then leave the battery for a few hours and the battery would come out from hibernation mode.
Reason 3: Battery temperature.
Drone batteries are Lithium polymer batteries and they are sensitive to huge temperature differences. Because huge temperature differences affect the reactions of the battery and damage the battery. The temperature range between 5 – 40° C is the optimum range for Lithium polymer battery reactions. If you have left your drone in a warm closed area like inside a car, and facing this issue this would be the reason for that.
Because of the importance of monitoring the temperature of the battery, a lot of sensors are embedded into the battery. So when the battery is too hot, sensors would detect unsafe charging conditions and refuse to charge and turn on. Because charging the battery would cause heat the battery more.
Solution: If your battery is warm, leave it at room temperature for about 30 minutes to 1 hour. Then connect the battery to the charger and plug it. Someone says to put your drone in the freezer if your battery is warm, but I won’t advise it. Because if the drone battery temperature goes below 4° C that also would cause the issue.
Reason 4: Faulty or broken charger.
When talking about this issue, we need to focus on not only the battery but also the charger. Because if your charger is a broken or short circuit, it won’t be able to supply sufficient current and voltage to charge the battery. So the drone battery won’t charge.
You can check whether the charger is supplying sufficient current and voltage by measuring them using a multimeter. You can find the charging current and voltage from the user manual. If you have a DJI battery and its indicator blinks red when you connect to the charger, it also means the charger isn’t providing power to the battery.
Solution: If you have a faulty or broken charger, you would have to replace or send it to repair. If you are buying a new one, be sure to buy the quality and certified charger from the manufacturer.
Reason 5: Bricked battery.
The bricked battery is called a battery which has become almost useless and could use as a brick. If you have stored the battery for the long term, the battery would discharge completely and become a bricked battery. So when you are trying to charge it, you’ll be unable to charge it using the normal method as the cells would have lost their capacity to store a charge.
Solution: If you have a bricked battery, it would be hard to fix. You just need a few types of equipment. Those are the bricked battery, a LiPo balance charger, and NiMH(Nickel Metal Hydride Battery) charger. First, Set the lowest current (0.1 A) as possible in the Nickel Metal Hydride Battery charger and start charging the LiPo bricked battery.
Also, select the output voltage which matches the LiPo battery’s nominal voltage. Once the battery is charged 3.3V per cell, move the battery to the Lithium Polymer balance charger and balance the charge at 0.5C. After balancing the charge, the battery would recover successfully and work normally.
Reason 6: High amperage.
As I mentioned before there are many sensors are embedded in the battery. So if they detect high amperage which could damage the battery, it would refuse to charge. Higher amperage could be a result of a charger or outlet being faulty. Also if you are using a charger from another electronics it also could cause high amperage.
Solution: If you’re noticing high amperage, try a different charger from your fellow. Make sure to try the same type of drone charger. Also try with different outlets.
Reason 7: Damaged metallic contact.
Metalic contact between the battery and the charger responsible for charging the battery. Because of the frequent use of battery, metallic pins become bent and out of the shape. So they won’t line up together and are unable to charge the battery.
Solution: Have a closer look at the metallic contact between the battery and the charger. If they are not shiny, clean off the corrosion with a little bit of isopropyl alcohol and restore the metallic finish to the contacts.
Reason 8: Bad battery cells.
Usually, a drone battery has up to 8 cells. They need to be healthy to charge the battery well. You can check the battery health of battery cells, by opening the drone app and navigating to the battery section.
If your battery is swollen, it’s the nightmare of the battery issues. Stop using swollen batteries as soon as possible. Because swollen batteries are so dangerous and can explode at any time. Especially there is any action with the battery like charging.
To keep the battery healthy, you need to practice good habits with battery maintenance and using it. Here are some habits to practice and keep batteries safe. Those practices would prevent from this kind of issues.
Tips to Keep drone battery cells healthy.
- Keep drone battery clean and dry. Store the battery in a clean dry environment. Avoid contact with moisture and dust. Exposing the drone battery to moisture cause swelling.
- Don’t charge the battery when it’s warm. If you just finished a flight, your battery must be warm. So let the battery cool before charging Once you finish the flight. Instead of charging the battery immediately, give it some minutes to cool off. This will protect the battery from overheating while charging and swelling.
- Store battery at 50% charge. When you store the drone battery, discharge the battery to 50%. Here are some specific advice for storing long term and short term.
- Short-term storage – Batteries should be discharged to between 60-80% if you’re not using them for between one and ten days. It would keep the battery safe without getting damaged.
- Long-term Storage – If storing for the long term (more than ten days), store the battery between 40 and 60%. If you have a DJI drone or drone with an intelligent battery, it would discharge to 50% by itself and ultimately go into hibernation mode. Which responsible for keeping drone battery safe in long term storing.
