All four Anafi Smart Battery LEDs blinking red in sync

[Yemsky]

Hello
I have been waiting in vain for Parrot to reply to a case I logged with them a week ago: Can somebody explain to me what four red LEDs blinking in sync means on an Anafi smart battery, please.


Here's the long version of what happened:
I had not been using a fully charged Anafi smart battery for a couple of weeks and understand that it is meant to go into hibernation, but mine seems to behave differently from how the Parrot website describes it: One morning I woke up and all four LEDs on the spare battery were flashing in in sync in red. I have not been able to stop this by recharging the battery, neither by connecting it to a computer USB port nor to main mains power supply.
This is what I have tried so far: I read online that you are meant to hold the power button for 15 seconds in order to switch the blinking LEDs off. When I do this, they indeed stop blinking red in sync and briefly go through two cycles of individually blinking green, but then revert back to blinking red in sync.
I have tried to hold the power button for longer, approximately 30 seconds. This has stopped the LEDs blinking after 15 seconds and they did not come back on after the full 30 seconds. However, after a couple of hours connected to a mains power supply (during which there was no LED activity at all) I held the power button down to check on the charge: This only triggered the four LEDs to flash red in sync again.

When nothing seemed to make a difference and Parrot did not reply to my case I left the battery on my desk with the four LEDs flashing in red. After three days the LEDs stopped flashing. I assume that the flashing used up the remaining battery charge. Pressing the power button indicated that there was no charge left as no LED lit up at all. I then reconnected the battery to a charger. The LEDs started flashing green in the normal way they should when being charged.
After a few hours the LEDs indicated that the battery was fully charged by having four solid green LEDs.

I then inserted the battery in the drone and tried to power it on.
Unfortunately, the battery went straight back into displaying four red LEDs flashing in sync without powering on.


It would seem pretty obvious that four red LEDs are meant to indicate something bad, but I am really surprised that this is not documented on any Parrot website that I have found.

 

[Liger 1956]

Are you able to measure the battery voltage across the two large terminals on the battery with a multimeter?

 

[Yemsky]

Are you able to measure the battery voltage across the two large terminals on the battery with a multimeter?

I unfortunately do not have a meter. I can ask my neighbour (used to build sound systems) whether he has.

What reading would raise which suspicions for you?

 

[Liger 1956]

Fully charged it should be about 8.7 volts if I remember correctly for LiHv batteries but it may have lost some charge. If it is below about 6.4 volts then I would be very worried.

 

[HighViews]

I have two batteries. One works, the other doesn't. I just found out yesterday about the one that didn't work. I plugged it into the anafi with three green lights and the fourth plunking from when it was charging two hours before, and had no response when I pushed the on bitten. Latter at home I researched and tried the hard reset (a few times). That didn't work. I just measured the voltage across the terminals it's 1.45 volts while the good one with three green lights measures 8.09 volts. I have been flying this drone for about 8-9 months alternating these batteries. I dropped the the inoperable battery from about 3' or 2.5 meters hitting hard laminate floor the night before the problems. Even before that the drone dropped from the sky while changing a setting in FF6 (soft reachable pine branch landing) which at the time I thought was a firmware (updated since) issue. Maybe it was an intermittent battery issue.
Also, this community should know that each time I plug it into charge, I get a red light flash then green light flash then it has three green lights solid and the fourth flashing as if charging normally. Hours go by and it never gets to all lights out or full charge.
Is there any hope for this inoperable battery? Will Parrot support replace an inop battery? Is there any way to take these smart batteries apart and fix them?

 

[Jagerbomb52]

Not sure on Parrots warranty for batteries but I don't think it would be 8-9 months. That battery sounds like its ready for the recycle bin. If it is showing 3 green lights and only has 1.45 volts across the mains then there sure is something wrong with it. I really don't think Parrot will go good for a new battery.

 

[HighViews]

Thanks for the reply. So the low volts across the terminals proves that it is a faulty battery in your view. (Added later) I just noticed you are a staff member so it is time to recycle the bad battery.

 

[Jagerbomb52]

Yes I would say it is. I am really surprised it tries to charge the battery.
Most manufacturers have taken to putting a Low Voltage Cutoff (LVC) on their speed controls. The LVC detects the voltage of the battery, and divides that voltage by the cell count of the battery. So it would see a fully charged 2S LiPo as 8.4V, or 4.2V per cell.
A LiPo cell should NEVER be discharged below 3.0V

 

[Chasbro]

Four red LEDs blinking in red means it is bricked. The cells are probably fine. The parrot firmware has decided to call a halt.

 

[Yemsky]

Will Parrot support replace an inop battery?

Thank you for posting your battery question under my original post from last year August.
Apologies to the other community members for not providing an update on my issue.
I contacted Parrot in Aug / September last year and while their response time is not impressive, they did do a straight replacement of m y battery. I can not remember for sure whether my bricked battery was under 6 months or under 12 months old, but they did not ask many questions and the result was 100% satisfactory.

(I am right now having a discussion with DJI about a case that should be covered under DJI Care and I have to say they are asking a LOT of questions. I hope the outcome will be positive as well, considering that I PAID for DJI Care....)