LIPO Low Voltage Cut Out on SCX-10?
 

Hi guys,

We took the Honcho to the beach for a run today. After 40 mins (at a very rough guess), of fanging it around the sand and crawling over rocks, it stopped. I presumed this to be the ESC cutting out at 3.6V, which I understood the SCX-10 was designed to do???

I got home and finally about 6hrs later checked the battery and found the cells to be at 3.21 and 3.29V. It is a Turnigy nano-tech 5.3 (2 cell 7.4V LIPO 5300mAh hard case).

Have I damaged the battery and is there something else I need to check?

Re: LIPO Low Voltage Cut Out on SCX-10?
 

If you stay above 3.0V per cell it's OK.

Just charge the LiPo with a balancer in a LiPo bag and you'll be fine.

Re: LIPO Low Voltage Cut Out on SCX-10?
 

In the range of 3.2v is normal for the AE2's autolipo setting which is the default setting. As long as your batteries are above 3.0V you are fine.

A balancing charger will bring the cells back to the same voltage.

Re: LIPO Low Voltage Cut Out on SCX-10?
 

Thanks guys, yes I have a LIPO bag and balancing charger (onyx 235) and I charged it back up to 3.8V for storage. So the ESC cuts out at about 3.2V - I thought it was 3.6V (what I was told by the same guy who said that anything lower can damage the battery). So was this advice wrong - is it OK to routinely run the SCX-10 until the ESC cuts out if this happens down around 3.2V or will this be bad for the battery?

Cheers,

Re: LIPO Low Voltage Cut Out on SCX-10?
 

yes as long as it cuts out at 3.2v i have a elcheapo esc in my drift car that sometimes wont cut out till the cell r at 3.0v but they always come back sometimes just by the 30min drive home.

Re: LIPO Low Voltage Cut Out on SCX-10?
 

When I charge the battery, I check the mah reading from the battery to see if is about 80% of the batterie's mah rating. If it isn't I time my runs to be a bit shorter and quit before the LVC kicks in. It takes a few runs to determine the optimal run times to hit the 80% mark. This way you use the Lvc as a failsafe instead of the primary indicator of when to quit your runs.

Example:

With a 3000 mah battery you would want the amount that you charge to be no more than 2400 mah (3000 x .80).

Re: LIPO Low Voltage Cut Out on SCX-10?
 

Cool - thanks guys. I've actually got one of the little pocket sized battery testers that came with the Honcho too. Sounds like I should be using that at 30 mins then every 5 mins or so to check. We took it to the beach again today and found exactly the same observations, but noticed both times that it recharges very quickly from 3.2 to 3.6V, so I'm guessing that similarly, as it discharges it hits the 'optimal' flat voltage then drops off very quickly.