We are having an issue with our team’s gen 2 IQ battery, where we left on a 90W charger overnight, and got back the next day and saw that it was only showing 1 light of charge. When it is plugged in, it doesn’t show any lights, the only light that shows is when the button next to the indicators is pressed. After putting it in the brain, it showed 45% charge, which was how much it had when we plugged it in, then it dropped to 35 in under 5 minutes of use. Has anyone had this problem, and if you have, could you offer us some advice on how to fix it? Thanks for your time.
I would try a different charger / cable. It’s quite possible that it didn’t charge at all. That would lead me to the simplest reason is the charger.
Weird older house story. I had a room with an overhead light in it that was controlled by a switch. At one point I plugged electronics into the receptacles in the wall and everything worked. I came in one day and the clock was flashing 12. I reset it, did my build things in the room and left. Came back clock was flashing 12. It took me 2 more clock resets to clue in the receptacle was switched. But only the top half was switched, had I plugged the clock in to the bottom I wouldn’t have known (or cared).
Now that you know my story, you may leap to the theory that you to have a switch and when you went home the switch was turned off and so was the charger. And you may be right, but a simpler answer is the charger / cable didn’t work. Because many roboteers have seen a charger fail, but very few people have rooms that have switches controlling receptacles that don’t know about it. Pick the simplest thing first.
TL;DR@32092boi asks a question giving well above average information for a VEX forum question. Foster sticks in one last very long story before 2024 ends and suggests checking the charger.
As @Foster said, the cable and charger could be bad. Have you tried charging it on a different charger and cable to see if it charges normally?
Also, try seeing if wiggling around a cable gently in the charging port that is plugged in makes the battery try to charge. (This would show either a dirty charging port or a dodgy connection)
The charging port on the battery may be dirty. I would try blowing on the port to clear debris from it. (or if you can use some compressed air source)
It is also possible that the 90 Watt charger could have inflicted some damage on the battery internals if Vex did not put any protection in them for such a high charge rate. I doubt that the battery wouldn’t have proper current limiting. Hopefully something will fix it!
Usually when the battery is charging the green LED will flash about once per second.
Has this battery been charged before ?
Are you using the same charger as before ?
The battery only charges somewhere around 5W to 10W, but using a charger of higher capacity will not damage it. Although it uses a USB-C connector it will not negotiate higher voltages or charge rates as compared to what a USB-A cable could supply, I usually use a USB-C to USB-A cable plugged into a charger with a USB-A port.
When the battery is on a charger and there is 1 indicator light blinking rapidly, I’ve seen this happen when the battery has a charge that is really low (I am not sure the exact percentage, maybe below 10%?) and after a bit of charging the light begins flashing at a normal, slower speed. I think it normally flashes at an interval of 0.5-0.75 seconds, and fast blinking is more around 0.2-0.33 seconds.