Phantom 4 pro rookie battery question.

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Hello everyone

I just recently got myself a Phantom 4 Pro and I absolutely love it. I had some questions hopefully you can help me with. I have read horror stories on flying without 100% battery life and this got me thinking. I usually fly my drone about 4-5 times a week after work. I have read that you should setup a discharge rate so it won't hurt the batteries is this necessary if i'm using them this much I will definitely be setting it up for 10 days when we have winter. Also I have two batteries what if I fly one down to 20% and don't touch the other battery that is fully charged will it be ok to fly with the fully charged one 3 days later or should I top that one off. It's got me a little scared to hear the people flying their drone with less then 100% and it just falling out of the air. I hope this all makes sense.
 
If you’re not gonna fly for a while, set your discharge for three days. If you’re flying often, like you say you are, set it for 10 days. Your battery will remain at full charge without topping off. Never leave it with a low charge for any length of time.
 
Its always good to give a top-up if you can - even if you charged night before.

If you switch on a DJI battery and then plug in charger .... you will see what I mean !!
 
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Its always good to give a top-up if you can - even if you charged night before.

If you switch on a DJI battery and then plug in charger .... you will see what I mean !!
I understand. Since that’s not the normal charging method, I wonder if there’s long-term implications for the battery. But it does supercharge it.
 
I understand. Since that’s not the normal charging method, I wonder if there’s long-term implications for the battery. But it does supercharge it.

It does not supercharge it in any way ... the board still shuts off at 100%

The reason for the switch on ... is that batterys naturally self discharge ... plus any battery that comes of a charger is often NOT at 100% because of temperature effects. Its very close though ... 99% or more. The switch on over-rides the default board setting of stopping charger if battery is more than about 93% charged when you try to top up a charged battery. It allows you to put that last 7% or whatever in ...

It has no long term implications doing this. But the benefit for you - is you have a 100% battery plugged in to go flying.
 
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It does not supercharge it in any way ... the board still shuts off at 100%

The reason for the switch on ... is that batterys naturally self discharge ... plus any battery that comes of a charger is often NOT at 100% because of temperature effects. Its very close though ... 99% or more. The switch on over-rides the default board setting of stopping charger if battery is more than about 93% charged when you try to top up a charged battery. It allows you to put that last 7% or whatever in ...

It has no long term implications doing this. But the benefit for you - is you have a 100% battery plugged in to go flying.
Thanks for the correction. ?
 
Thanks for the correction. ?

No worries ...

Usually because batterys are stored at below 90% ... just plugging in charger is good enough. The charger is slow enough to not cause too much heat increase in the cells. The board auto-shuts off the charge at near 100%. But if the battery is ~90% ..... the board defaults to not allow charge top-up. The LED's are not a good indicator in fact as they are in increments of 25% ... 12.5% when flashing. That means in effect - your battery could be ~7% below full and LED's will still light up 4 solid.

I know I am 'paranoid' about having full battery for any flight - for any of my 60 odd models.... has led me to switching on DJI batterys for ALL charging I do. Even when battery is at 30% or so. I have noticed a general improvement in initial voltage / % readings when plugged in to my P3. I assume the same would occur with a P4.
Before - I often saw 98 - 99% initial reported battery level on power up. Now with my switch on routine - I never see less than 99% ... in fact rarely do I see anything other than 100%.
I get good flight time still even though none of them are anywhere near new !!

That applies to my original DJI and 3rd party batterys same.
 
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Hello everyone

I just recently got myself a Phantom 4 Pro and I absolutely love it. I had some questions hopefully you can help me with. I have read horror stories on flying without 100% battery life and this got me thinking. I usually fly my drone about 4-5 times a week after work. I have read that you should setup a discharge rate so it won't hurt the batteries is this necessary if i'm using them this much I will definitely be setting it up for 10 days when we have winter. Also I have two batteries what if I fly one down to 20% and don't touch the other battery that is fully charged will it be ok to fly with the fully charged one 3 days later or should I top that one off. It's got me a little scared to hear the people flying their drone with less then 100% and it just falling out of the air. I hope this all makes sense.


I have the same drone and have used it alot for two years with no battery issues. I always check them before a job and charge all to 100% or when they stop charging completely. I have mine set to discharge after ten days of storage and this seems to work fine. I would caution you not to fly below that 20% as sometimes that last 20% goes down very quickly, you don't want an unexpected power loss on the way down. HAPPY FLYING!
 
Helpful thread and link - thanks guys.
 

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