Maestro won't power up after being left on shelf

Russ

Maestro won't power up after sitting on shelf for almost a year. I followed the instructions sent from Support on how to charge the tablet with an external charger using the cable that was suggested and there was no change.  After reading several forum posts I opened up the tablet and reseated the battery connector. I measured the battery voltage and it read 0.07vdc leading me to believe the battery was discharged too far to be charged again.

When the tablet is plugged into a 5v 2a charger it never draws any current. I would think  it would draw something when plugged in even if it can't charge the battery.  Does anyone think replacing the battery is worth a try?  I'm not interested in sending it back to Flex for repair since this seems like it could easily reoccur. 

Paul - K6HR

Yes, replacing the internal battery will resolve the problem. Totally worthwhile to replace yourself.

Mike-VA3MW

Hi Russ

Sorry to hear about that.  I assume you have a support case open.  You might want to follow up with that.  

Mike va3mw

Russ

I do, but the email mentioned it would be $100/hr to take a look at it so I'd like to explore other options.

WX7Y

just put it up for sale "as is"  just let the buyer knows that it needs a new battery

Russ

I'll see if a new battery will revive it as my plan is to sell the 6700 and it would be nice if it had a working Maestro.

Erika - KØDD

I have brought my Nikon Camera battery back to life and IT'S been working nicely 6 more years from when it was discharged below where the charger would recognize it.
(same with car and motorcycle batteries)

I had at the time a LAB power supply it had zero - X  adjustable output voltage and it had a current limiting adjuster...  It was a 2AMP maximum supply...  Quite precision device...  I hooked the battery to the supply set the current limiter and brought the voltage off zero...  I kept the current limited to 1.5A until the thing started obviously taking power.

As the battery started indicating less current I'd bring up the voltage.  Over most of a day I monitored the battery temp by touching before I turning up the voltage.  When it had come up to whatever I felt was a goodly amount I then plugged the battery into my fast charger. You don't want to rush things...  the battery for my Nikon was nearly $70 and I wasn't going to give up on it that easily...  As I've said the battery made complete recovery...

**** me I accidentally left the camera on overnight after that once more and went through the process again to bring it back, now I check for leaving it on, the thing won't auto off...  Anyway...

Some of these other batteries if not swollen, but just discharged may be recovered utilizing such a laboratory supply..  I ended up selling the supply on eBay as its only function around here was fixing an old battery twice in my life...

It is possible...  Erika DD

Steve K9ZW

Russ, as you are already good with accessing the battery you could try charging it directly?

73

Steve
K9ZW

Blog:  http://k9zw.wordpress.com 

Erika - KØDD

I would but you really need to follow the cautions and procedure I outlined in my post. Nothing worse than a battery explosion.  However a gentle touch could save you additional expense.  Unless you can't gain access to a supply that can slowly bring up voltage while limiting the current to a safe value.  Erika DD


Russ

I tried charging the battery directly (after doing a lot of reading about it) using a Sparkfun LiPo charger at 500ma and  brought the voltage up to 3.6v from 2.4v.  It still has no voltage on the battery connector when plugged in and won't charge using the internal charger.  I think the battery packs protection is not resetting. I'm going to wait until the new battery arrives in a few days before going forward.

K3SF

https://www.flexradio.com/downloads/maestro-a-internal-battery-charging-procedure-pdf/?wpdmdl=3128&a...


the above link is how to revive the battery in the tablet of a Maestro  

When this battery falls below restart level of the tablet
as when it has been let to sit for a while without power being applied...
and
another issues is
leaving it always powered up causes the table battery to swell and warp the Maestro Screen to make it look like it has burn in issues...

all of these are well known issue for ALL Maestro

there is similar procedure for rev B maestro
Paul K3SF

Russ

The new battery came in today, I installed it in the tablet and it WORKS!

Thanks for all the information.

Russ

WX7Y

would you mind letting us know the battery number ?

Thanks a lot
Bret

Russ

This is the battery I used: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01N06RWFH