RedVolt Batteries DSMC1 - Fixable?

[Daniel Veras]

I recently saw a reduser buying dead redvolt batteries, which spiked a curiousity in me. Why would someone buy dead batteries, if they were not fixable? I have a few dead redvolt batteries that hold less than 5 minutes of charge. Is there a way to restore them to be able to hold more charge?

 

[Aris_Gavriilidis]

I have no clue why anyone would buy dead REDVOLTs, I have 6 of them myself that died suddenly only a few weeks after I bought them, which was infuriating, given they were $195 each. Could you perhaps redirect me to that thread of the person buying them? That has sparked my interest now!

 

[Daniel Veras]

http://www.reduser.net/forum/showthread.php?172373-Dead-or-Non-working-Redvolt-Redvolt-XL-Batteries

 

[Alex Kiritz]

I believe Redvolts are glued together. If you can get them apart, it should be relatively easy to replace the dead cells, maybe even possible to replace them with more modern higher capacity cells.

 

[Daniel Veras]

That is interesting, I will try this. Anyone has an idea of where to buy cells?

 

[Alex Kiritz]

I’ve bought from https://www.imrbatteries.com/ before. I definitely wouldn’t buy any of the rebranded ones they sell, only the ones from OEMs like Samsung, Panasonic LG etc.

 

[Björn Benckert]

I have no clue why anyone would buy dead REDVOLTs, I have 6 of them myself that died suddenly only a few weeks after I bought them, which was infuriating, given they were $195 each. Could you perhaps redirect me to that thread of the person buying them? That has sparked my interest now!

Hmm, are you sure it's not the charger, 6 batteries usually dont die at once. The volt chargers have a tendency to fail, Think I went trough 5 of them before I gave up.

 

[Lloyd Surdi]

Has anyone actually recelled a revolt?

 

[Daniel Veras]

a video of how is done, I am sure will be very helpful for this community. I think everyone here suffers from dead revolt batteries at some point.

 

[Anthony_K]

I purchased (4) dead redvolt (non-XL) packs. When I got them all the leds on all the packs showed nothing. Of the 4 packs, 2 were completely dead. The two dead packs featured cells below 2.5 volts, which is the beginning level where the battery chemistry inside a LI-Ion can begin to cause dendrite buildup along the terminals inside the battery cell. This is the stage when re-celling a pack is necessary. The cells in my dead packs were at 0.0v and 1.01v respectively. Completely toast.

However, with a lot of Li-Ion batteries, there are cell protection modes of the internal cell balancing IC, where the IC will disable the entire pack if it detects one cell going too low. It will put the pack in a "sleep" state to prevent further damage to the cells. It is possible to wake it up and recharge the pack and make it useful again. Of course, this is a function of how long the pack has stayed in the sleep state. The 2 dead packs were in such a state for far too long, and the cells were at a level low enough that time did them in.
I used a variable lab bench power supply to wake up the two other redvolts and they are still kicking today. The cells in the revived packs were about 2.65 - 2.8v when I got to them. So I saved them just in time.
I repaired a redvolt XL DSMC module, and I thought it could use normal redvolt batteries. I read later in the manual that it could not. Good thing I never put them in the xl module before I found out and just made a plug power supply for the unit instead. Still looking for some dead redvolt XL batteries though.