macscac

iTrader: (4)

bought my son a slash for his birthday.
gave it to him today.
put a 2400 orion lipo in it.. anyhow. charged it full and let him go.
he came inside about 15-20 min later and i tried to charge it and the charger keeps erroring.
called the LHS and they said i ran the battery to low and ruined it.

is this true?
the battery is ruined permanently?
wtf... what a waste of money and an absolutely stupid product for a kid to have.
not to mention the fact that if its true that you can kill the battery by running it to low.. it should be on huge warning labels on the battery box and mentioned plenty of times by the person selling it to you.

im going back to old battery packs. what a waste of money

bradfox2

iTrader: (10)

its why they make low voltage cutoffs in escs..

you can try giving it a small charge to see if the voltage comes back up. if it starts to puff out at all though its toast.

JeromeK99

iTrader: (3)

Yup... if you let the battery go too low.. it is chemically ruined.

I would have a few words with the shop owner... they should have told you that the Slash ESC (electronic speed controller) doesn't have a LiPo cutoff.

Sorry..

Jerome

Jube

iTrader: (43)

To my knowledge at this time there is no compatible low voltage cutoff for the slash. Only an alarm.



Macscac, Lipo's are the best thing since sliced bread if you educate yourself about them like you should with any new product you havent used before. Sorry to say but if I was guessing you probably toasted the pack.

Mr. Thingdoer

iTrader: (6)

Wow, did the clerk forget to mention the other dangers of mishandling Lipos too? Did you know that improper use can cause horrible chemical fires and explosions?

That truly sucks. There are so many advantages to using the new battery technology, but you need a small crash course. They need to be handled and maintained differently than other batteries. They also need to be balance charged periodically.

macscac

iTrader: (4)

well im irritated about the whole thing.
its not that 50 bucks is the end of the world its just that i told him that i didnt want a lipo setup because it was too advanced and all i wanted was to charge and run for my son.
he said it was cake and i didnt need to do anything except charge it and run..

blah blah.
i wont be trusting his advice again

Team Ash

iTrader: (22)

Your lipo is probably dead but might not be. I did the same thing and my charger kept telling me there was an error as well.
I changed the charge setting to nicad and set it to charge at about .1 of an amp just to be safe. It was slow but it accepted this and when it put about 500mA into the battery I finished it off on lipo setting. The battery has had about 20 cycles through it since and it is fine.
Just do it in a safe place where it cant burn anything if it goes wrong.

A mate of mine had the same problem but this solution didn't work so I guess you have to have a bit of luck.

Terry

macscac

iTrader: (4)

good thought!
it was actually about 5 hours ago that my charger kept erroring.
for kicks, i just tried it again and it accepted the battery and is charging it now.
im going to keep checking it every so often to make sure its not bulging or anything.
i can have the shop test it tomorrow i guess to see if its ok.
( im going to a diff hobby shop)
im going to pick up a couple venom 3300ish batteries for my son.
no brainer batteries. perfect for him.

curious... on a diff note.. what do you think is most cost effective way of doing this.......

all our current batteries are standard tamiya connections. (yes i know.. ick)
anyhow, obviously im buying batteries tomorrow w/ traxxas connectors.
the charger however only has a tamiya connector.
are there tamiya to traxxas adapters for charging?
or what should i do?
i really dont want to have to buy a 3rd charger
thanks all!

SWTour

iTrader: (9)

It sounds like someone needs to research things a little on their own too.

LIPOs when used properly will give you great service, but handled improperly can be dangerous

The 2400 Lipo is a very good little battery, but in a heavy slash I'd probably suggest a bigger capacity battery (lipo or not)

a 2 cell LIPO battery should never be run below 6.0 volts (you can run them down generally to 5.4 volts w/o any real damage, but beyond that can have irreversable damage.)

NiMh batteries can be dangerous too, especially depending on the age of the child playing with them and how they treat them. CHILDREN should never be charging any of these R/C batteries unsupervised.

I've seen hobbyshops sell people Gas powered cars that have NO Clue, and have no idea that FUEL can burn and/or can be dangerous... KNOW What your buying, and read ALL of the precautions.

I'm going to assume for a second that because you said it was a 2400 LIPO that it's probably an ORION 2400

On the outside of the BOX a 2400 LIPO comes in (although it's small writing) there is a LARGE List of Precautions with about 10 things that say DO NOT and then it lists the things NOT TO DO w/ a LIPO.

On the INSIDE of the box there should have been a BRITE ORANGE paper with the heading


These precautions shoud be read and taken seriously to prevent serious injury, or damage to personal property from misuse.

macscac

iTrader: (4)

thanks swtour.

i originally didnt want lipo but he talked me into it.
ill use the lipo's in my cars untill im very confident w/ the product then ill introduce it to my son.

when you say that 2400 is a bit low for a slash, what does that mean exactly?
like i need a bigger size for more power? or does is it because theres too much strain on the smaller battery because of the size/weight of the truck?

appreciate your input.
also if someone could answer the traxxas/tamiya question i posed in my last post

thanks!

bradfox2

iTrader: (10)

O man.


2400 milliamp hours (mah) is the energy capacity of the battery. Its how much energy the battery can hold.

He is saying get a bigger battery because the 2400s wont deliver very good run time or amperage to get the slash performing well.


As for the tamiya connectors, Ditch them.


Chop off all of the connectors, and put deans plugs on them, that way you have one standard plug. If you aren't familiar with soldering, then take all your stuff with plugs into a hobby shop and they will probably do it for you for free if you buy all the plugs. P.S. the red wire goes on the cross part of the T connector. Female plugs go on batteries. Male plugs go on everything else.


Also, I really hope your charger is made for lipos because it sounds like you just have experience with NIMH. If your stuff isnt built for lipos then unplug the battery or risk burning down your house.

macscac

iTrader: (4)

are you saying that the 2400 lipo is like running an old 1500 stick battery?
fairly worthless?


**edit... i did buy a lipo thingie yesterday.
dc power converter and lipo charger. it charges up to 3 cells at .5, 1 or 2 amps
so i should be ok.?

bradfox2

iTrader: (10)

Definetely not saying its like an old nicad pack. In fact it is magnitudes better then that. I think he was getting at use the pack while you have it and it works, but next time buy a bigger one.

If its made for lipos you should be fine. Charge at 2 amps and watch it or charge it outside/in garage/on cement for the first few cycles after the low discharge you had.

DavidR

iTrader: (97)

Hey Bro...

Here is a little bit of info on Lipo Batteries.

http://www.maxamps.com/lipo-care.php

That should give you an idea of where to start with Lipo power.

I'll try to stop back in if you have any more questions... Or you can PM me. I'll be glad to help ya out.

-David

roadrashracing2

Get him a few stick packs if he his new. If you don't have a lipo cut off, you better at least have a volt meter and check the batteries often.