Maximus-Racing

LIFEPOWER4 Battery Information

So you are interested in LIFEPOWER4's but don't know a lot about them.
We have complied a list of information that may help you make your decision to switch to LIFEPOWER4's.

LIFEPOWER4's have a 30C nominal discharge and 60C burst.
What does that mean? That means that a 2300 mAh pack can deliver a constant 69Amps or 138Amps burst! These are not mis-types, these are actual facts.

LIFEPOWER4's (2300 mAh packs) can be charged at up to 5Amps safely (10A still on test), with no negative effects on the battery.
What does that mean to you and I? It means that charging at 4Amps, your battery will be charged in just over 30 minutes. At 8Amps, it will be charged in about 15 minutes.
These numbers are from completely dead to fully charged!

They offer a 10 year shelf life and 1000+ cycles, compared to ~200 cycles with Lipo's.

They have a flat discharge curve, and have a nominal voltage of 3.3 volts per cell.
What does that mean to you and I? A 2 cell pack will have a nominal voltage of 6.6 volts, and the voltage will pretty much stay at 6.6 volts until the energy in the pack is extinguished.
Lipos go from 8.4v at their peak, all the way down to 6.5v (or whatever your personal cut-off is). Whereas a Lipo can have about a 2 volt swing, an LIFEPOWER4 battery has about a .5 volt swing. The 6.6 nominal voltage allows users to run the batteries without regulators, if they so choose.

The voltage of an LIFEPOWER4 2S pack is about the same as a freshly charged 5 cell Nimh pack.

Balance or don't balance, the choice is yours.
While Lipo's almost demand to be balanced, LIFEPOWER4's do a good job of staying in balance by themselves. While you may get a slight voltage variation from cell to cell, it is not as critical on an LIFEPOWER4. Meanwhile, we recommand to balance at each charge during the first 10 cyles, then you can balance only each 10 cycles.

NO EXPLOSIONS! LIFEPOWER4 is an inherently safer chemistry and does not explode if droped, or even a nail driven through it.
While no battery should be intentionally mis-handled, tests by LIFEPOWER4 Systems show that an LIFEPOWER4 cell will not spontaniously ignite from over-charging or dropping (or driving a nail through the case). I personally would not recomend trying any of these yourself.

They hold a charge for a very long time. No more having to "top" the batteries off right before flying. The batteries will maintain ~95% of their charge over a 1 month period of time.

Lighter than comparitively sized Nicads or Nimh. They are slightly heavier than their Lipo comparison. A 2 cell pack with 14ga. wire leads weighs in at about 5.8oz.

How do you charge them?
The chemistry is still relatively new, so charger manufacturers are fighting to get LIFEPOWER4 capable chargers to market.
Right now, the two most popular solutions are the TBD, for balance charging, and the "Dapter" which converts any Nicad capable charger into an LIFEPOWER4 capable charger.
There are other chargers that are LIFEPOWER4 capable, like the ThunderPower and Orbit Pocketloader, but I do not have much experience with either. Both of them require a software update to be LIFEPOWER4 capable.

The battery's only downside is that you can not tell how much energy is left in the pack by reading the voltage. Because the discharge curve of the pack is so flat, the voltage will be almost the same throught its cycle, and then "cliff dive" at the end of its cycle.
Because of this, it is important to become familiar with how much energy your vehicle uses during each use.
For planes, I advise people to fully charge their batteries and then fly 2-3 flights.
Then, fully charge the packs again and see how much energy (mAh) you put back in to the packs. Then simply divide the amount of energy by the number of flights and come up with your average mAh per flight.
This will allow you to set your safe cut-off. It is advisable to only use 1800-2000 of the pack's 2300 mAh's.
You can make the same for smaller or bigger cells.

Visit our Batteries page to purchase LIFEPOWER4 packs in various configurations.