Dual Battery Mod

[Rocket_Aus]

Hey there just thought I'd post a little thread about how I did my battery mod.I wont go into finite detail but reading this anyone with basic soldering skills could perform this mod.Now this is how I did the mod first time round, I'm no electronics wiz and am sure that I will refine the mod as I do more of my battery's I've just had many requests for a how to, so here goes.
First things first you need to get the smart battery cover open...I found this video on YouTube although its for a phantom vision2 it's practically identical to the p3's cover. I found that with a sharp hobby knife there is no need to heat it up as he does in the vid.The top cover of the smart battery has four tiny plastic tabs the joins it to the main body of the smart battery's cover but just take your time and using some small flat headed screw drivers etc you'll pry it off in a jiff>

After you have opened it it's time to grab your drill out ...start with a thin bit roughly the size of the lead in a pencil to make a pilot hole for your larger bit.I used rated 20amp wire which is sufficient for the current draw and drilled out holes through the top cover through the pilot hole I made with a bit that suited the size wire I was using>
Next you will want to drill two more pilot holes in the main body of the battery that line up with the holes you made in the top cover to poke the wire through.
Then the fun begins the positive and negative terminals are coated in some sort of epoxy goop now I tried heating it with a hot air gun to no avail so don't waste your time.Anyway just sit the iron on the soldered joints for a few second to get the goo to melt away.Next add some solder to the existing connections enough to hold the new wires on it. Having tinned your wires like this guy does

then solder your wires to the existing positive and negative connections inside the smart battery. Leave enough wire to play with then its time to reassemble. Ok start with one half of the smart battery main body and poke one of your wires through it's a bit fiddly but just take your time and repeat with the other half of the main body. Once you have the two halves together add some little dobs of super glue to the main body to seal it up. Then replace your smart battery's power button and poke your wires through the smart battery top squeeze it back on add a few more dobs of super glue to keep it on and the hard bits over.
Next get some heat shrink and solder and some xt60 connectors which are available at any electronics shop/hobby store and proceed to solder your connector on

Now you will also need a XT60 Y harness to run the batteries in parallel you can get them off hobbykings website ebay etc.XT60 Harness for 2 Packs in Parallel (1pc)
Now since I was not able to find a dual battery holder for the phantom3 anywhere I had to search for something off the self. What I found at my local hardware store was some plastic plasters capping its very strong,light weight,durable easy to work with and cheap.....ticks all the boxes.Peer Industries 20 x 20mm x 2.4m Plasterers Capping Trim I cut a couple of 13.5cm lengths and drill some holes through the tops of the legs carefully as not to drill through your antenna wires, just move them out of the way while drilling. A couple of little bolts washers and nuts later add some velcro for your battery's and your done. The other great bit about the capping that I got is that as you can see in the pics it's not right angled so the battery's actually lean into the bird. The battery's I'm starting with are these Turnigy nano-tech's 1300mAh 4S 25-50C lipos Turnigy nano-tech 1300mAh 4S 25~50C Lipo Pack (AU Warehouse)
Anyhow the whole mod including the batteries was under $50 .........any questions ask away

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1NUuhPPh1BoesdXXTFsT2HXic3qHCCKWehNnHQS0k1Yo/edit

 

[Gizmoh]

Thanks for the Tuto.

How hard was it top open the battery?

Is it easy to spot and solder the positive and negative terminals in the battery? A close up image of the soldered cable to the terminal would have been great..

 

[Rocket_Aus]

Thanks for the Tuto.

How hard was it top open the battery?

Is it easy to spot and solder the positive and negative terminals in the battery? A close up image of the soldered cable to the terminal would have been great..

Yeh was tedious getting the battery open as I didn't wont to break it apart and didn't realize that the top of the cover was secured with 4 little plastic tabs to the main part of the cover.Knowing that now I'd have a battery apart in a few mins.I did take a pic of the soldered wires but cant seem to find where I downloaded it too. Anywho while on the topic don't twist the exposed wire you are going to solder onto the terminal just flatten it with your fingers and solder it vertical so it's already pointing towards the holes you created.

 

[RoyVa]

With the added weight that drops flight time. What did you actually gain .. How many minutes?

 

[shockwave199]

How much total fly time are you getting?

 

[clkilljoy]

Hey there just thought I'd post a little thread about how I did my battery mod.I wont go into finite detail but reading this anyone with basic soldering skills could perform this mod.Now this is how I did the mod first time round, I'm no electronics wiz and am sure that I will refine the mod as I do more of my battery's I've just had many requests for a how to, so here goes.
First things first you need to get the smart battery cover open...I found this video on YouTube although its for a phantom vision2 it's practically identical to the p3's cover. I found that with a sharp hobby knife there is no need to heat it up as he does in the vid.The top cover of the smart battery has four tiny plastic tabs the joins it to the main body of the smart battery's cover but just take your time and using some small flat headed screw drivers etc you'll pry it off in a jiff>

After you have opened it it's time to grab your drill out ...start with a thin bit roughly the size of the lead in a pencil to make a pilot hole for your larger bit.I used rated 20amp wire which is sufficient for the current draw and drilled out holes through the top cover through the pilot hole I made with a bit that suited the size wire I was using>
Next you will want to drill two more pilot holes in the main body of the battery that line up with the holes you made in the top cover to poke the wire through.
Then the fun begins the positive and negative terminals are coated in some sort of epoxy goop now I tried heating it with a hot air gun to no avail so don't waste your time.Anyway just sit the iron on the soldered joints for a few second to get the goo to melt away.Next add some solder to the existing connections enough to hold the new wires on it. Having tinned your wires like this guy does

then solder your wires to the existing positive and negative connections inside the smart battery. Leave enough wire to play with then its time to reassemble. Ok start with one half of the smart battery main body and poke one of your wires through it's a bit fiddly but just take your time and repeat with the other half of the main body. Once you have the two halves together add some little dobs of super glue to the main body to seal it up. Then replace your smart battery's power button and poke your wires through the smart battery top squeeze it back on add a few more dobs of super glue to keep it on and the hard bits over.
Next get some heat shrink and solder and some xt60 connectors which are available at any electronics shop/hobby store and proceed to solder your connector on

Now you will also need a XT60 Y harness to run the batteries in parallel you can get them off hobbykings website ebay etc.XT60 Harness for 2 Packs in Parallel (1pc)
Now since I was not able to find a dual battery holder for the phantom3 anywhere I had to search for something off the self. What I found at my local hardware store was some plastic plasters capping its very strong,light weight,durable easy to work with and cheap.....ticks all the boxes.Peer Industries 20 x 20mm x 2.4m Plasterers Capping Trim I cut a couple of 13.5cm lengths and drill some holes through the tops of the legs carefully as not to drill through your antenna wires, just move them out of the way while drilling. A couple of little bolts washers and nuts later add some velcro for your battery's and your done. The other great bit about the capping that I got is that as you can see in the pics it's not right angled so the battery's actually lean into the bird. The battery's I'm starting with are these Turnigy nano-tech's 1300mAh 4S 25-50C lipos Turnigy nano-tech 1300mAh 4S 25~50C Lipo Pack (AU Warehouse)
Anyhow the whole mod including the batteries was under $50 .........any questions ask away

NOW THAT's WHAT I'VE BEEN TALKING ABOUT!

Great post. This is the kind of thing that makes having a UAV fun. I love moding these things.

 

[PilotHarry]

Nice!

 

[tbnilen]

Nice job, but how to charge, did you use the P3 charger?

 

[joebar.rc]

The phantom uses high voltage lipos, so 4.35V per cell compared to the 4.2V that you are using as external batteries.
I wonder what the effect would be to have external lihv batteries like these Drone Matters - AtasSphere BLITZ 3S 11.4V 1450mah 70C LiHV Pack - High Voltage Flight Batteries - Batt

Should do better in theory because now you're more of less charging the external batts a while. It tends to level off sure after some time.

@tbnilen
That would be very unwise, you need a dedicated lipo charger for that with balancer connections.

 

[Rocket_Aus]

The phantom uses high voltage lipos, so 4.35V per cell compared to the 4.2V that you are using as external batteries.
I wonder what the effect would be to have external lihv batteries like these Drone Matters - AtasSphere BLITZ 3S 11.4V 1450mah 70C LiHV Pack - High Voltage Flight Batteries - Batt

Should do better in theory because now you're more of less charging the external batts a while. It tends to level off sure after some time.

@tbnilen
That would be very unwise, you need a dedicated lipo charger for that with balancer connections.

Now that's the next step in batteries Drone Matters - AtasSphere BLITZ 3S 11.4V 1450mah 70C LiHV Pack - High Voltage Flight Batteries - Batt

With the added weight that drops flight time. What did you actually gain .. How many minutes?

I'll being doing some tests and will post results stock standard Im getting around 15mins my goal eventually with the right battery's/weight is to double my flight time.

 

[phantomlova]

great post !! Thank you!!!

 

[ebross67]

Why go to the trouble to open the DJI battery? Use your nano tech batteries and connect them directly to the positive and negative of the Phantom control board using XT60 connectors.

 

[FredzMaxxUAV]

The phantom uses high voltage lipos, so 4.35V per cell compared to the 4.2V that you are using as external batteries.
I wonder what the effect would be to have external lihv batteries like these Drone Matters - AtasSphere BLITZ 3S 11.4V 1450mah 70C LiHV Pack - High Voltage Flight Batteries - Batt
Should do better in theory because now you're more of less charging the external batts a while. It tends to level off sure after some time.

Have a look at Hyperion G6 LiHV packs. They have a lot more sizes and are more easily available around the world. AtasSphere seem only available from a Singapore web site. Haven't tested any of them, but will do soon.

 

[Rocket_Aus]

Why go to the trouble to open the DJI battery? Use your nano tech batteries and connect them directly to the positive and negative of the Phantom control board using XT60 connectors.

So you don't void your birds warranty which you would if you open the shell.

 

[SteveMann]

Warning - it is relatively safe to wire two batteries of the same capacity. Do NOT try putting a 5s battery in parallel with a 4s battery. The 5s will try to charge the 4s and you could wind up with an in-flight fire.

 

[JP.]

Phantom 3 battery is 4s?

 

[Rocket_Aus]

Well just came back from my first test flights and have some results to report on the performance of the Turnigy nano-tech's 1300mAh 4S 25-50C lipo's.
Standard smart battery :Take off 97% Landing 11% Flight Time 16.06 mins, Battery Efficiency 18.71
Turnigy Duel Batts : Take off 95% Landing 10% Flight Time 21.45 mins,Battery Efficiency 25.57mins

Even tho these are just preliminary reports Im pumped with the results from these little 1300's.
Edit: Just set my pb with the batt mod 6.4km Take off battery 98% landed 34% total km 13.252 Flight time 18.13mins Battery Efficiency 28.45mins Looks like there's plenty left in the tank with these 1300's time to break my new pb.

 

[dirtybum]

Warning - it is relatively safe to wire two batteries of the same capacity. Do NOT try putting a 5s battery in parallel with a 4s battery. The 5s will try to charge the 4s and you could wind up with an in-flight fire.

So i asked in another post.... I wouldnt want to use my 1300 4s from p3 mod to do same mod on p2?? I would need to purchase 1300 3s is that correct

 

[TG3S]

Doesn't look too difficult.. Thanks for posting..

 

[Rocket_Aus]

So i asked in another post.... I wouldnt want to use my 1300 4s from p3 mod to do same mod on p2?? I would need to purchase 1300 3s is that correct

That s correct 3s for the p2 as the p2's battery is 11.1v
Set a new pb today 8.066km/5miles lost signal on the DBS after I turned to head home reached about the limit of the DBS antenna/mod but boosters are on the way.Still landed with plenty of juice left in the 1300's.
I wonder if any one else that has a battery mod has noticed there smart battery running 20c cooler