Should I balance charge Parrot batteries ?

[Clive_fox]

I understand that Bebop batteries have a circuit inside that balances the cells when using the stock Parrot charger. If this is the case would charging / balancing a Parrot battery using a good quality charger do any damage to the battery or should I just use the supplied charger ?

I intend to balance charge 3rd party batteries as they apparently do not have a circuit built in like the Parrot batteries.

[AR.Tommy]

Hello,

the Bebop batteries don't have the cell balancer logic built inside, if this is what you are trying to say. This is done by the Parrot charger.

Using a quality charger is possible if you solder your own charging cable. (breaking the stock charger) I did this a while ago and it would look like this:

[Clive_fox]

Thanks but maybe I misunderstood after watching a video by ANTHONYVLOG
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2WlKkxA ... nw&index=3
where he compares a Bebop battery to a GiFi battery. The Bebop battery clearly has circuitry on a PCB which I assume, perhaps wrongly, that it balances the cells.
If what you say is correct then the Bebop battery could be balance charged without damage but then what is that PCB for?

[AR.Tommy]

I didn't watch the whole video (please provide timecode) and I don't know the gifi battery, but if a battery would have a built in balancer it would not expose the single cell connectors. It would connect to + / - only.

[Clive_fox]

It is only a short video just over 5 minutes but the timecode is from 2.30 on....................

[AR.Tommy]

I have to admit that looking on a PCB to tell what it does is an incredible skill. To me this could do anything from low voltage cut off, to cell checking, to overload protection and what not. Personally I have no idea why he thinks this is for balancing the battery.

If you look at the charger it has the same connectors (obviously) as the battery. I mentioned it above: 4 connectors for a 3 cell battery are exposed because the charger is the balancer. It would not make sense to have 4 connectors if the battery has the balancer logic build inside.

[Clive_fox]

"..It would not make sense to have 4 connectors if the battery has the balancer logic build inside."

That makes sense but there appears to be a lack of definitive info regarding this. However I would still like to know whether or not using a 3rd party charger / balancer would damage a Parrot battery. From the video it would obviously help with 3rd party batteries.

[AR.Tommy]

I'm using a 3rd party charger all the time, you need to solder the charger cable above. With a build in balancer this would not be possible. I can provide a how to if needed.

[Clive_fox]

So I understand correctly you are using a 3rd party charger with Parrot batteries ? If so have you noticed any significant performance change that is better / worse than the stock charger.

[AR.Tommy]

So I understand correctly you are using a 3rd party charger with Parrot batteries?

Yes.

If so have you noticed any significant performance change that is better / worse than the stock charger.

Not at all, besides that good chargers will charge faster and more precise (less cell drift) than the stock charger.

[sergey]

I'm not sure why people complain so much about parrot charger. I've got standard 5-pin charger (not HD) and it works with parrot batteries very well - end voltage is always 4.2 while initial voltage could be way off due to cell degradation. It balance very well.

[thesoundsmith]

I have been using a balance charge with a cable I bought from http://www.mrkent.com/cables/ Same cable as shown above, basically, well made and i did not have to dig out my wire strippers.

[waterlanding]

Thanks but maybe I misunderstood after watching a video by ANTHONYVLOG
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2WlKkxA ... nw&index=3
where he compares a Bebop battery to a GiFi battery. The Bebop battery clearly has circuitry on a PCB which I assume, perhaps wrongly, that it balances the cells.
If what you say is correct then the Bebop battery could be balance charged without damage but then what is that PCB for?

YouTube should really remove that video for propagating mis-information. This isn't the first time it's caused confusion. The narrator is guessing the PCB is a charging circuit, and he's just plain wrong.

I'm a retired engineer. When this first came up a couple of years ago I pulled that board and put it through it's paces. It is NOT a charging circuit. I'd describe it as the predecessor of the Anafi "smart" battery - which makes a lot of sense, since they're both Parrot products.

Normally, a LIPO should be stored at 1/2 charge. Parrot has always recommended you store their batteries fully charged - and that's because of the little PC board. It controls the cell discharge/leakage during storage. If one cell drops low it'll bleed a low current from the other cells to "balance" it. The theory was to keep all cells balanced at full charge so the batteries were ready-to-go.

On a good battery, this concept works great. The slight variations in the cells are adjusted. A battery stored for 6 months will have almost the same flight time as a freshly charged battery. But throw in a bad or failing cell - or even a battery that wasn't properly balanced and this circuit works against you - discharging all cells to try to recover one bad cell. The circuit is innovative, but not "smart" enough. It'll keep a good battery good, but make a bad battery worse over time.

Years later, Parrot added a timer to the circuit and called it the Anafi "smart" battery. It will retain the balance for about 2 weeks, then it goes into a balanced discharge mode to reduce the battery level to 1/2 for long-term storage.

Ok, back to the original post. Yes, you need to use a balancing charger for the Bebop 2 battery. The quality of the charger Parrot provides varies, but it IS a balancing charger and works fine for most folks. A lot of us choose to use 3rd battery chargers because (in most cases) they're faster and more reliable. There's a bunch on Amazon that don't require making your own cable. https://www.amazon.com/s?k=bebop+2+char ... _sb_noss_1