As adam savage says, the only difference between playing around and doing science is writing down the results.

You need to do another round of testing to see if LiPo's are like plants and do better when you talk to them and give them positive reinforcement. :)

Joshua, I applaud your research effort's and your impressive knowledge in this hobby. I am a retired Air Force medical researcher, and I have learned a lot from you, many thanks. If you don't mind some advice from an old medical researcher, you need to eliminate as many variables as possible to attain greatest accuracy of your results. The biggest variable was clearly the discharge method, that has to be much more highly controlled or standardized. Obviously, you need more batteries to get more accurate results. What are your standard deviation calculations on your results? I'll bet these results fall within 1 to 2 standard deviation's which would be well within a margin of error. Thanks for all you do for this hobby Josh.

break-in seems to be waste of cycles considering that these packs have a finite amount of total cycles that they last. I think the flight temperature of batteries are more important because it effects the chemistry.

I was hoping for more obvious differences, but fair enough. I wouldn't read much into the small differences. Ideally, for such a small effect, you need a bigger sample (5-10 batteries), and a statistical test (t-test, rank-sum). I hope it's possible in the future.

You are definitely the quad scientist! (Kind of a mad quad scientist!) I love your understanding and application of the scientific method. You always try to be aware of your biases and are the first to point out weakness in your studies. Love your content! Keep killing it!

Huge thanks for all the work on these battery testing videos Joshua. You did a great job of helping new folks avoid making terrible decisions about batteries. First and only pack I bought so far being the Tattu 1300 and I don't suppose the weight difference of the Infinity 1500's will be noticeable for a noob like me.

Good video. Thanks for the hard work and taking the time to do this.

Looked like everything was within margin of error, so i'm not so quick to say it matters.

excellent work. keep testing them batteries and see how they wear down after each 30 cycles.

I'm happy with the data resulting from your battery tests. Yes happy, or satisfied that is, with the study design and methods employed being absolutely appropriate in their context of teasing out elements of meaningful data. ( To be candid with you, I started to say that I'm happy the results are absent a level of contrast sufficient to compel my buy in to the "break in"

Always learning something new! Thanks for this video!

Thanks Joshua and Banggood. Always good to check your assumptions.

I've been running the 1500 lightning batteries for about 8 months now and they still perform quiet well. I definitely agree that are a great product at the price they run. I also just run them to fly freestyle, i don't normally do top speed or racing kinda things. I did not do any break ins so its good to see the difference is minimal. as for feeling a difference or sag in the batteries, out of 14 i haven't had any problems yet. Great video, always super informational. Thanks Josh!

great job! i love your channel!

Keep at it Josh, you've helped me along with many of your videos!!

woo!! great timing!! Thanks for the hard work and thorough review

I'm grateful for you RC guys. I use lipos for vaping, not driving/flying, but the same knowledge is very useful to me

Good test and even better reflections over the result. Thumbs up!

I learnt something today.. and subbed. Hello Joshua. : )

Great video : This vid certainly grabbed & kept my attention . Not only that but I'll even check those packs out if there in a reasonable price range I might even grab a few . Never can have to many lipos. Thanks again. another evening watching educational videos . Looking forward to the next one already.

Nice job. I wonder if breaking would apply more with crappy batteries. That's what I seemed to notice from years ago. Nowadays the batteries we use seem to be less venerable to breaking in. I don't break in any more with a cycle charger, but I do fly a little softer on first couple flights.

Nice vid as always! ^^, keep it up! Btw on the Lenovo plug he little middle pin is signal it's telling the computer that a charger has been plugged in :) if you remove it will power the computer but it won't charge it's going to say "non original charger" something along the lines ^^,

First, excellent test again Joshua! I think we all appreciate you taking the time. After your initial battery tests that determined the Infinity 1500 did so well and was only $25 I decided to buy a couple. After flying with them I immediately ordered 4 more. I've been meaning to give you some feedback but you fly them so you know. I think these batteries are the absolute best bang for the buck. There is so much power and it just keeps dishing out the amps till the battery is finally done. Thanks for saving me time and money!!

great video.. now I have to go figure out what a means to break in a battery. Thanks! I learned something today.. i'm gonna go learn some more now! lol.

I'd like to see a C (your definition of C) discharge curve comparison between the two groups. Does the voltage sag? This would have much more important implications.

I think to get a truely conclusive result would need to increase your sample size and then I would do a paired t-test (you can do this in excel) to determine if the differences in your results are statistically significant.

You have no idea how much you help the R/C hobby in it's whole not only drones!

Good Stuff Joshua, Very interesting episode!

What would be interesting to see is how they hold up over 100+ uses. A lot of us use our batteries till they die and I have packs that are still flying over 2 years of use. I could see the slight advantage shining in the long run. I hope you keep using these in the long run and continue to test them say every 30 cycles. I think things will get interesting around 120 cycles.

Very big of you, Bardwell. Cheers -

You keep producing and I'll keep watching!

Brilliant, I’d also like to see battery performance till end of life with broken in vs non broken in, great vid, thanks

did you shake em though is the real ?

btw josh i have 3 of the 4s 1500 infinity and i found similar results as you did and love those packs .

Did you shake them during break-in?

Joshua, thanks for your videos!

Does it effect the longevity of the battery ? If your going through all this, why not take it 1 step more ?

personally I only use Monster Cables for my wiring on my quads, gives them more amps and keeps the 1's and 0's in DShot more clearly defined. I'd use Audioquest but I reckon thats just snake oil.

I'd be interested to see how they performed after 200-300 cycles.

Wow, this May 2022 and I'm looking at a young JB, excellent advice partaked then as now 😀

Do the not broken in batteries have same amount of cycles as broken in. Like used on quad a few times?

I've been watching this and also comparing Stinger's battery test. Both of these seem to suggest the SMALL benefit of break in's. Right now you are at 30 cycles, what happens when it hits more cycles, does this small difference actually get bigger or does it stay the same, meaning. if it is a small difference at 30 cycles, IF the batteries make it to 60 cycles will that small difference double?

Fantastic tests. Self explanatory.

I am curious about the overall useable life of the battery. Will a broken in battery last longer? I don't believe you will get more power out of a given battery without making physical changes. Is long term battery condition improved? Saving money on replacement batteries.

Because LiHV have different internal chemistry can we get another test to see if the margins are still very close. Also to see if breaking in LiHVs will have an affect on longevity or number of cycles for broken in vs out the box charge then go windows to the walls LiHVYOLO

what is the break in process for a lipo battery??

What you think on the 4S 1300mAh 70C Graphene Infinity and the Infinity 1300mah 90C 4S batteries, for $25 ? or at this price is better to buy the Thunder Power 1300mAh 4s Adrenaline . At the and I need battery that will give me lots of cycles . thanks

is there a benefit of breaking in lipos after a few normal use cycles?

I think another factor that was left out which I think is very important is weight . A few grams of material can give an increase in mah . One more small factor as well would be room temperature . I'm thinking that may also influence the final test . Just my thoughts . . .

Good Job! Thank you! Cheers!

Weird to hear about the undersold mah batteries because about 30 mins ago I was salvaging a cell from an old 3000mah Floureon pack, and it had "3200MAH" clearly written on each cell. It makes the battery feel like it is lasting for a long time, until it puffs on the 15th cycle. I wonder if any thought went into just how long it takes for a costumer to buy another one vs when they are engineered to fail. Those slick marketers

dispelling FPV myths like a boss :) thanks, great job

Did you label for break in then heat shrink em as to make it at least blind for the discharge? Thank you for the knowledge.

How long cycling time lipo battery? 100x use?

Thanks for the testing... valuable info anyway you did it. I break in all my LIPO batteries but do it by not going below 3.8v new or above 4.10v the first few cycles (it's said some/most have a storage chemistry that needs to change) and would not call deep cycling them down to 3.5v when new beneficial at all based on a few mistakes I made that deep discharged a few but were still above 3.0v that lost capacity before the other batteries from the same batch kept above 3.6v and were broken in above 3.8v but who knows... it may be the Pauli effect as I have great luck with batteries;-) I think the main thing with LIPOs is you want to store them cold and dry to stop storage time loss, and stay in the middle around 3.8v as much as possible and keep the batteries cool by using a high enough C rating. Doing so is shown to at least double or triple the life of most lipos based on what I've studied but of course run time matters especially on quads that have short run times so have dropped low often and had great luck with the higher C Nanotechs taking a beating. Stopping the charge at 4.10v is where I'd stop if on a desert Island with limited supplies, but I charge my quad LIPO cells to 4.2v normally and aim for 3.7v without OSD as the min LVC knowing under load the voltage went lower. And on larger more expensive batteries 3.75v or above and just use a larger battery in planes to add airtime. Keeping the charge rate as low as possible by using multiple batteries instead so not in a hurry and the charge/discharge rate super low breaking them in seems to really work well and can say the batteries definitely balance better. If I screw up on one going too low I can remember which one just by watching it charge. Cells are seldom equal new but you can make them behave as if they are using a good charger with a low C slow balance charge and discharge cycle the first 5 charges where the first 3 seem the most important to get the cells ready for use.

Hello Joshua. Thanks for sharing your experiment. Well, I have a question, maybe one that has been asked and answered a lot of times before, but I don't know the answer. Well, would it be a waste of money to buy 4 X 30A esc for a quadcopter? Bear in mind that it is intended to be used in a 200mm quad, with 2205 motors and 5" props... And I intend to use a 1500mA 4S battery, like a Turnigy Graphene or Infinity... If this kind of battery isn't able to offer 60A consistently, even worse 120 (what would justify 4 X 30A esc). Would 4 X 20A esc be enough? Thanks in advance.

Curious to know what kind of battery to battery difference you saw as opposed to group averages.

Hey I am new to the hobby What is the best charger you recommend

hi mate. ask the for more batts and do controlled bursts on the bench.

Iwonder if this brake in process is also ok with graphene LiHv Batteries

Keep up the good work Josh.

So, in regards to Yuneec batteries 10/10 break in procedure..Is it charge/fly 10 minutes/10 times, or charge /fly 10 mins/ re-charge/and fly 10 mins till the end cycle. OR Chg/ fly 10 mins/ discharge /then charge and fly the remaining..and also what is the interval time between the 10/10 break-in rule?...Ive also done testing, but with only 4 batteries, 2 10/10 and 2 use up to the advertised flight time (25 min advertised ) ( actual 18 to 21).. The term for batteries on almost all drone always use "UP TO", what exactly does the term "UP TO" mean???

Cheers for your efforts on this JB. IMO that's such a small difference that it's not worth it. As of late I just charge to 4.2, discharge at low C to 3.5 and charge again, then I go spank them.

Would you mind sharing the raw data? I wouldn't mind crunching some of the stats.

I'm a little concerned with the Infinity with the production consistency... what i mean is that different batches will have quite different batteries... unlike ones from Tattu, Thunder Power, SMC, etc...

Good work Mr Bardwell. How many cycles are you getting from batteries? For me more than 50 cycles is a bonus. Hopefully my Turnigy Graphenes will last hundreds of cycles (only up to about 30 so far).

I would like to see you revisit this test with the new battery test machine.

good test are you going to see what happens after another 30 cycles or till there done to see how many cycles can you get out of them?

Josh, I just bought a fc40 phantom just to play with and I bought 2 new Ovonic lipo batteries same spec as stock and they only last 30 seconds - 2 mins tops. My stock battery is very old and puffy but it last at least 3 mins. I'm guessing Ovonic is overrated bad or just junk. What is a good cheap battery brand to get for this old girl? I heard this big phantom is supposed to get at least 10 mins. I hope nothing else is wrong with the phantom. It seems good. Motors are in great shape. I just oiled and cleaned them. Is my battery just junk?

The best reason to do cycle charge discharge on a new battery is you can see if there is a problem before the warranty runs out. Lot of us buy batteries let them lay around waiting to get a project done maybe test a motor, or setup servo's then by the time you fly it's 3-6 months down the road then you discover a bad cell in a battery warranties are long gone. As soon as I receive a new battery I solder the connector on, and cycle the battery 6-10 times on my charger while monitoring the cells set to storage charge and check it after a few weeks and each month.

Joshua Bardwell I have a question about lipo charging and leaving them charged. everytime that i come home from flying i set my batteries in storage at 15.23volts. i find it very annoying to charge them only if im sure im going to fly. sometimes i just want to fly right away but i have to wait 2 hours before i have all my batteries charged. how do you do that? do you charge all your batteries and leave them so you can fly when you want to or do you do it like me and charge them only when you are sure that you are going to fly? is it a bad (dangerous) thing to leave them fully charged or am i doing it right and should i keep bringing them to storage voltage when im done? thanks for reading this i hope you have an answer to this. your video's are awesome and i learned a lot from you. thank you.

2:18 WHY???? whats the reason for never discharging them below 3.8 volts?

Sounds like calibration which is done for a protection circuit to recognize full capacity. It's not needed for performance most likely. More important is to get higher capacity, higher C rating at the lowest weight and volume. Didn't mean "C" rating since overdriving batteries can be potently dangerous due to overheating. Heard about cycle life charging/discharging - basically using Li-ion batteries at 20% to 80% of charge and charge it slowly for chemistry not to break down so quickly. It's most beneficial for power walls.

could you outline the brake in protocol- how do you get the amp, burst etc values while flying seems like a stupid question

I have some infinity batteries as well and I love them

Thanks Joshua, the age old question. I have my taranis alerting me when my Battery is low and again when critical. My question is what is the best value to safely set these two parameter so I don't damage the batteries. Thanks again.

How do the 1300 70c and 1300 90c compare? Can you notice the difference?

Just bought some batteries and they charged up to 4.05 per cell. They should be 4.20. Is this common in first charge and they'll break in?... or should I return them?

What is a safe voltage to set an alarm at for a 14.8V Lipo battery.?

I ordered a twin pack of lipo 1500mah 7.4v 2s battery’s and charger off eBay. I would test them and let you know how I got on but they never turned up 🤷🏻‍♂️

I'm trying to give this a go on some new 1300mah 4s with my old trusty accucel 6. I've never used the discharge function. When I use the discharge function for 4s it states the end voltage will be 12.0V (3.0 per cell) Storage discharge states the end voltage will be 15.2V (3.8 per cell). I can't for the life of me work out how to discharge to 3.5V per cell? I can't seem to change the end voltage, only the discharge voltage... Can anyone point me in the right direction please? Apologies in advance if I'm being a turd!

Do you think graphene batteries are worth buying over regular lipos?

Thanks for the long term testing. I think your results are probably within your margin of error like you so correctly point out. I think what makes the biggest difference that no one talks about is charge rate. I charge all of my race packs at 1/2C, and I see a lot of guys charging at 2C-3C which I think is wrong. Might be a follow up test you could run on the same packs from Banggood. I certainly would like to see the results of that testing.

With results that close, beware the Placebo effect. I don't see enough of a difference to justify the effort.

one interesting thing to note is that the 1500 mAh batteries pretty much had the same stats at 0 cycles and at 30 cycles however the 1300 mAh batteries seem to be more degraded (especially in the # and longest burst metrics). Looks like the higher 90 C rating of the 1300 mAh battery only lasts 30 cycles or less then they more or less become the same as the 70 C rated batteries (if you compare burst time). I would be very interested to see what the stats look like after 60 and 90 cycles! :)

Mine never get old... they mostly get damaged young

Sorry to ask this on this video but if we have a Bugs 3 with a stock 1800mah 5.7 battery, can we upgrade to a 3000mah 5.7 battery with no harm? Trying to find a method for knowing what changes we can make with increased performance and not increasing liability. The 3000mah battery is sold as a Bugs 3 upgrade but not sure what might happen. Thanks in advance.

Is it safe to draw 200 amps from 5.2Ah lipo ( 40C) ?

What does it mean if a battery is broken in?

When I get a new lipo, I usually give them a few quick runs just to make sure I don't have a faulty battery. When you have a multirotor drawing 80amps, if there is a slight defect in the battery, then there is a possibility you could lose an aircraft never mind a battery. Although I've only heard a couple of stories of a new battery catching fire on first flight, just a few slow flights to give me the confidence I don't have a duff battery is enough for me. Not so much breaking in the battery, more for safety and to make sure the battery isn't duff.

i remember racing 10th scale we had a string of light bulbs to completely drain the batteries and the smart chargers would condition the batteries for say a 4 minute race if we were doing most laps .we used a 6 cell nimh

Im sure you could find a developer pretty cheaply to write some software to automate this test to make it a little more empirical. And the plus, im sure the dev would enjoy writing it, and not a boring test for you :)

It's like ads for health products. "This product MAY help reduce weight. (When combined with regular exercise and a healthy diet.)"

Is there any update on this? I would like to know a more long term test and how the batteries held up?

FYI, Wh is V x mAH, not V x A. A suggestion: make a CC (constant current) discharger with auto cutoff and timer. Watching one of your battery tests, the "60A" was moving all over as voltage dropped and timing was not accurate, two huge variables that should not be. CC circuits are pretty easy to make, i personally would you a hall sensor for the current measurement, but not mandatory. You also mention cooler batteries preform better, but in most cases that is opposite, also you might want to check temp before and after the test to see the delta. Thanks for the videos!

I am kinda sad to see that there is no test on the cell voltage difference.

Josh talking about battery I finally got a 4s 1300 mha graphine . My quad flies fine with a 1300 3s then I put on the 4s half throttle it flips and looses power.

Used your link, but obviously those 1300's are under restocking 😖

What about charging your lipos with higher amperage than 1C? Can i do that straight out of the box or do i have to run a few 1C cycles first?