Spektrum S2200 charger storage charging issues

[RedOctobyr]

Cool, I hope the new battery works properly, and improves your Spektrum experience. My experiences with Horizon's warranty (a long time ago) were positive, thankfully.

It's still a weird concept to me that this sort of difficulty can only be addressed by the charger. And if the charger refuses to help, you're kinda stuck.

With a traditional charger, you have more options available, different chargers can provide different amounts of balance bleed current, and you can also read the balance lead voltages directly. Plus you can try a different charger.

Whereas with these, the balance electronics are buried in the pack, and either work properly, or they don't. Hopefully they keep working correctly! A friend just got Spektrum smart packs (G1 and G2), and the S2100 charger. He likes all all of them so far.

 

[brapsquatch]

Cool, I hope the new battery works properly, and improves your Spektrum experience. My experiences with Horizon's warranty (a long time ago) were positive, thankfully.

It's still a weird concept to me that this sort of difficulty can only be addressed by the charger. And if the charger refuses to help, you're kinda stuck.

With a traditional charger, you have more options available, different chargers can provide different amounts of balance bleed current, and you can also read the balance lead voltages directly. Plus you can try a different charger.

Whereas with these, the balance electronics are buried in the pack, and either work properly, or they don't. Hopefully they keep working correctly! A friend just got Spektrum smart packs (G1 and G2), and the S2100 charger. He likes all all of them so far.

Yeah agreed. I simultaneously understand how not being locked into the spectrum ecosystem is a great thing! And also that having smart spectrum stuff is kind of nice for a lot of reasons, like being new to lipos. Having programmable batteries…etc but it has to be executed properly. One small thing wrong with a smart battery that, for all intents and purposes, otherwise functions properly kind of kills the deal. Like I paid for all of the functionality, I want all the functionality.

 

[RedOctobyr]

I'm glad the Spektrum chargers can charge traditional batteries. Though it's a bit of a bummer that G2 Smart batteries can only be charged by Spektrum chargers. My friend with the S2100 could charge my 6S batteries. But sadly, I can't charge his. So I can't add more charging capacity, if he was already using his charger for his daughter's batteries while we were all playing together.

He likes the auto-discharge-to-storage feature, that will be nice if either he or his daughter sometime forgets to bring down a pack that stays fully charged. And, being new to all of this, he understandably likes the simplicity of the charger, and the fact that it helps avoid you accidentally doing something bad (setting a 2000mAh battery to a 20A charge current, etc).

 

[brapsquatch]

I'm glad the Spektrum chargers can charge traditional batteries. Though it's a bit of a bummer that G2 Smart batteries can only be charged by Spektrum chargers. My friend with the S2100 could charge my 6S batteries. But sadly, I can't charge his. So I can't add more charging capacity, if he was already using his charger for his daughter's batteries while we were all playing together.

He likes the auto-discharge-to-storage feature, that will be nice if either he or his daughter sometime forgets to bring down a pack that stays fully charged. And, being new to all of this, he understandably likes the simplicity of the charger, and the fact that it helps avoid you accidentally doing something bad (setting a 2000mAh battery to a 20A charge current, etc).

Spot on. Couldn’t agree more.

 

[DiffLock]

It does the same thing. Just basically nothing. The Amps drop to 0 and the estimated time remaining goes to infinity. Yeah the support has been pretty good to me so far. It was pretty painless. Send a couple pics, send the receipt and that was it.

Got the exact same problem.
Spektrum S2200 G2 charger, latest firmware, with 5000mAh 100C 6S G2 lipo. Won't complete storage charge but instead basically stops doing anything and displays random times to completion ranging from "--" to like 12h. What's even worse, this is the second pack having this issue.

Contacted HH after the first pack had those problems occuring when I was storage charging after its first run last weekend. Told me it might be a bad balancing board and I should contact my dealer. Well, did that, the dealer also checked the pack (with the Spectrum SMART checker). To him, data looked good, but as he knew the story (forwarded him my messaging with HH) and provided me with a replacement (although being in doubt whether he might actually get that battery replaced).
Now, the replacement has the exact same issues. Initially, I wondered whether G2 packs simply can't be storage charged anymore as their auto-storage-discharge eliminates the necessity and you simply charge them up to full and let them be. But now it seems more likely that G2 packs are simply prone to errors. My G1 packs with balancing leads work perfectly fine.

Might contact HH again - this really sucks. I'm fine with paying a premium for premium products, but then I also expect them to be as premium as promised. Right now, it does look more like paying a premium for a half-assed effort without proper implementation.

 

[brapsquatch]

Got the exact same problem.
Spektrum S2200 G2 charger, latest firmware, with 5000mAh 100C 6S G2 lipo. Won't complete storage charge but instead basically stops doing anything and displays random times to completion ranging from "--" to like 12h. What's even worse, this is the second pack having this issue.

Contacted HH after the first pack had those problems occuring when I was storage charging after its first run last weekend. Told me it might be a bad balancing board and I should contact my dealer. Well, did that, the dealer also checked the pack (with the Spectrum SMART checker). To him, data looked good, but as he knew the story (forwarded him my messaging with HH) and provided me with a replacement (although being in doubt whether he might actually get that battery replaced).
Now, the replacement has the exact same issues. Initially, I wondered whether G2 packs simply can't be storage charged anymore as their auto-storage-discharge eliminates the necessity and you simply charge them up to full and let them be. But now it seems more likely that G2 packs are simply prone to errors. My G1 packs with balancing leads work perfectly fine.

Might contact HH again - this really sucks. I'm fine with paying a premium for premium products, but then I also expect them to be as premium as promised. Right now, it does look more like paying a premium for a half-assed effort without proper implementation.

My replacement also had a problem. I think there’s a bad run of the batteries. I’ve had them replace 3 batteries and they always tell me to keep the old ones. I’m getting a big pile of batteries building up. It’s kind of frustrating. Honestly I’ve spent less half the price of the amount of batteries I have due to them refunding and replacing while telling me to keep them.

It’s wild. You’d think someone in product or something is looking at numbers and know that a lot of their G2 batteries aren’t storage charging.

 

[RedOctobyr]

Wow, that sucks. Perhaps it's the sort of problem that doesn't appear right away, so these bad batteries got out into the field before they realized?

 

[brapsquatch]

Wow, that sucks. Perhaps it's the sort of problem that doesn't appear right away, so these bad batteries got out into the field before they realized?

I mean they have a little QC sticker on them meaning they’d been checked. What exactly was checked I don’t know. But yeah these brand new batteries, 0 cycles failing to 100% complete a storage charge.

 

[DiffLock]

I mean they have a little QC sticker on them meaning they’d been checked. What exactly was checked I don’t know. But yeah these brand new batteries, 0 cycles failing to 100% complete a storage charge.

Don't know if you're still struggling with the issue, but I've got some updates...

After the second pack failed to storage charge as well, I contacted Horizonhobby again. This time, the advice was to send everything in - S2200, both packs. 2-3 weeks later, I received a message from my dealer telling me that everything was back and working perfectly. Having one run in on each pack now (have them back only since last Friday, and the weekend was busy, unfortunately), I can confirm that both packs now work as specified.

What Horizonhobby did:
They updated the firmware of the LiPos.
What's interesting, though: I also updated the firmware of both packs via the S2200 (which ran the latest firmware, ofc), but it couldn't fix the error. What Horizonhobby did, and what they also explicitly mentioned in their report: They updated both packs with the XBC100 LiPo checker, NOT with a charger. Although Horizonhobby confirmed upon request that G2 batteries can be firmware-updated by charger or checker (and it wouldn't matter), to me it seems LiPo updates via charger, no matter how SMART it might be, are bugged.

Purchased that XBC100 checker just to be on the safe side next time. Oh, and I also kind of force-purchased that second 6S G2 pack that my dealer gave me as a replacement. Why, you ask? Well, Horizonhobby Europe didn't bother to offer real replacement, they just did the firmware update. Leaving my dealer with an opened and once-used pack that couldn't be sold regularly anymore. Thankfully, my dealer gave me a 40% discount on the pack, but nonetheless the whole thing turned from a free guarantee service into costing me roughly 170 bucks, and Horizonhobby Europe doesn't see any need to accomodate. Which sucks big time.


Anyway:
Given you are in the lucky situation to having received multiple replacement packs, I suggest you try updating their firmware. Perhaps try updating via your S2200 first, if that doesn't work see if you can get hold of an XBC100 somewhere. If it's also buggy firmware in your case, you might end up with quite a stock of G2 6S packs for really cheap...

 

[brapsquatch]

Don't know if you're still struggling with the issue, but I've got some updates...

After the second pack failed to storage charge as well, I contacted Horizonhobby again. This time, the advice was to send everything in - S2200, both packs. 2-3 weeks later, I received a message from my dealer telling me that everything was back and working perfectly. Having one run in on each pack now (have them back only since last Friday, and the weekend was busy, unfortunately), I can confirm that both packs now work as specified.

What Horizonhobby did:
They updated the firmware of the LiPos.
What's interesting, though: I also updated the firmware of both packs via the S2200 (which ran the latest firmware, ofc), but it couldn't fix the error. What Horizonhobby did, and what they also explicitly mentioned in their report: They updated both packs with the XBC100 LiPo checker, NOT with a charger. Although Horizonhobby confirmed upon request that G2 batteries can be firmware-updated by charger or checker (and it wouldn't matter), to me it seems LiPo updates via charger, no matter how SMART it might be, are bugged.

Purchased that XBC100 checker just to be on the safe side next time. Oh, and I also kind of force-purchased that second 6S G2 pack that my dealer gave me as a replacement. Why, you ask? Well, Horizonhobby Europe didn't bother to offer real replacement, they just did the firmware update. Leaving my dealer with an opened and once-used pack that couldn't be sold regularly anymore. Thankfully, my dealer gave me a 40% discount on the pack, but nonetheless the whole thing turned from a free guarantee service into costing me roughly 170 bucks, and Horizonhobby Europe doesn't see any need to accomodate. Which sucks big time.


Anyway:
Given you are in the lucky situation to having received multiple replacement packs, I suggest you try updating their firmware. Perhaps try updating via your S2200 first, if that doesn't work see if you can get hold of an XBC100 somewhere. If it's also buggy firmware in your case, you might end up with quite a stock of G2 6S packs for really cheap...

Hey appreciate the response. That's too bad they won't send you replacements but I did try to update firmware for all batteries via the charger. The updates seem to be ok but what I think is a bad UX design or straight bug is that you can update as many times as you like. So if you update the battery firmware, there is no communication between the charger and battery letting you know that the batter has the latest. Like you can loop infinitely updating the battery firmware.

 

[RedOctobyr]

For curiosity, is there a display of the firmware version? And can you look up somewhere online what the latest firmware should be? Just as a way to confirm that your battery is up-to-date. Which still seems like a strange sentence.

 

[DiffLock]

@RedOctobyr @brapsquatch
Finally got my hands on an adapter cable IC5 to IC3 and, thanks to that, was finally able to put that XBC100 battery checker to use. And yes, the XBC100 does display battery firmware version. For my G2 packs, its V1.09. My S2200 - which just happens to be Spektrums Top-of-the-line charger, but nevermind - is not capable of that feat.

Lastly, just as a reminder so you don't end up like me: If you buy an XBC100, make sure to buy that adapter cable. The engineering marvel that is the XBC100 accepts IC3 only for batteries.

 

[RedOctobyr]

Thank you for the update! This is good info to know. Hopefully the issue with the charger not being able to update the battery's FW is an issue with the *charger's* firmware. Which perhaps they could fix with (sigh), a charger firmware update. To then properly do BATTERY firmware updates