Phantom & Battery Terminals Melting Together - Why??

[coolkidirish]

Does anyone know why this would happen?

I've flown DJI drones for the last 4 years and have never seen anything like this happen until now.

I flew on Thursday and all went well, but when I got home and wanted to charge the battery, I noticed that the battery was stuck inside in the Phantom and tough to get out. I managed to get it out in the end, but noticed that it looked like the pins from inside in the drone and the battery had melted together (see pics).

After a quick Google I can see plenty of threads and images with similar issues, what causes it though? I know a loose connection can sometimes cause issues with plug sockets in a wall, but I personally always make sure the battery is in tight (it's a habit now from my P2V+ days when I had an incident where a battery was slightly loose and the drone warned me it was loosing power while flying), so I wouldn't think that should be the problem.

It's really worrying, if this had happened sooner into the flight, potentially I could have lost the drone or it could have caused a fire or severe accident.

Very worrying.

 

[3rdof5]

The only thing that can cause electrical connections to overheat is excessive current draw (amps, not volts). The phantom (any model), if functioning properly, will not draw more current than is safe for the connections. A poor connection will limit the voltage and thus will cause a higher than normal current draw which appears to have happened here. It could be that the connector on the battery or the AC is becoming worn causing a less than perfect "mating" of the circuits. I would inspect the connection on the AC very closely for damage from the overheating and replace it if needed so as not to damage any other batteries. That particular battery I would no longer use for flight.

 

[sar104]

The only thing that can cause electrical connections to overheat is excessive current draw (amps, not volts). The phantom (any model), if functioning properly, will not draw more current than is safe for the connections. A poor connection will limit the voltage and thus will cause a higher than normal current draw which appears to have happened here. It could be that the connector on the battery or the AC is becoming worn causing a less than perfect "mating" of the circuits. I would inspect the connection on the AC very closely for damage from the overheating and replace it if needed so as not to damage any other batteries. That particular battery I would no longer use for flight.

That's not quite correct. The power dissipated as heat in any series circuit component (including contacts) is given by I ²R, where I is the current and R is the resistance. The current draw from the battery is not determined by the contact resistance (unless it went really high), but if the contact is poor then the resistance goes up and the rate of deposition of heat increases. So it's not that the current is higher - it's the contact resistance going up that causes contacts to overheat and melt during use.

 

[trcsmith]

That's not quite correct. The power dissipated as heat in any series circuit component (including contacts) is given by I ²R, where I is the current and R is the resistance. The current draw from the battery is not determined by the contact resistance (unless it went really high), but if the contact is poor then the resistance goes up and the rate of deposition of heat increases. So it's not that the current is higher - it's the contact resistance going up that causes contacts to overheat and melt during use.

I would have said bad contacts between the battary and drone would create a hot spot. But you beat me to it and said it better.

 

[Deleted member 62848]

All that comes straight to mind is the batt when clipped in its not a snugg fit causing slight movements mayby making that short but don't fly that batt no more,,