Tello battery mod

simhaindia · Apr 26, 2019

Hi,

I just came up with an idea for battery mod.What if the tello battery is breaked and we use the circuit and body of it with a new battery with increased capacity.

will the tello accept it.

Has anyone tried this earlier?

Guorium · Apr 27, 2019

simhaindia said:
Hi,

I just came up with an idea for battery mod.What if the tello battery is breaked and we use the circuit and body of it with a new battery with increased capacity.

will the tello accept it.

Has anyone tried this earlier?
[/QUOTI suppose as long as the operating voltage is the same it should work. Question is, how will you find one with similar size and shape and higher capacity?

Oscar · Nov 12, 2019

I am not sure, motors could get overheat

Seaking6 · Jan 27, 2020

This idea is one I think about, surely there is better battery for longer flight time.

bigred143 · Jan 29, 2020

How about doubling the batteries. But you'd have to make another way to have both batteries be able to be removed and charged? Any ideas?

Customerx · Feb 2, 2020

Tried many variations for this mod. From small coins cells in parallel, tello extra battery etc. From what I've found there is limited ways of achieving this without motors overheating or the tello struggling and getting error 13 codes

Customerx · Feb 2, 2020

Not saying this cant be done but I left it alone, I made a mod for the Xiaomi mi and had it powered onboard the tello, rather than use the tello battery. This worked well.

Customerx · Feb 2, 2020

This was eventually used for the 2 repeater mod.

Seaking6 · Feb 2, 2020

Brilliant, shame about battery life.

SleepyRobo · Feb 15, 2020

If anyone were to increase the 1S battery (3.7v) to a larger mah then you would want to upgrade the motors to a higher Kv. The stock ones are 15,000kv so a set of 17,000kv or slightly higher would be a good balance for a heavier battery. Remember the better the power to weight ratio is the longer the flight times you will achieve

alihan · Apr 1, 2023

Hi,

I am applying these bat mods as well. Currently I soldered the original battery out and soldered my own 1170mah 3.7V battery. The drone turns on and ready to flight OK. But it occurs two scenarios:

1) completely cancelling take off due to critical low battery error (even though I charged it fully)
2) propellers turning for couple of rotations and cancelling the take off due some unknown error and drone reboots itself

Could you please help?

b4mz79 · Apr 10, 2023

alihan said:
Hi,

I am applying these bat mods as well. Currently I soldered the original battery out and soldered my own 1170mah 3.7V battery. The drone turns on and ready to flight OK. But it occurs two scenarios:

1) completely cancelling take off due to critical low battery error (even though I charged it fully)
2) propellers turning for couple of rotations and cancelling the take off due some unknown error and drone reboots itself

Could you please help?

Test with your original battery spare (non-mod), does both symptoms still occur? If NOT, than the problem might be in your BMS board. If YES, than the problem came from the power management in your tello core board.

alihan · Apr 10, 2023

Hi thank you for your reply @b4mz79!!

I have tested and when using non-mod battery everything work fine, it files flawlessly.

However on modded batteries this issue occurs. I can only assume the BMS board has some kind of software logic in it, which senses the non-original battery by its voltage/ampere values or it kind of lets itself trigger a switch when you cut/unsolder original battery connections.

I will try another kind of mod, which propose to not cutting/unsoldering original battery and connecting an extra batter in parallel. Even though this kind of puts extra weight on the drone, I don't know what else can I try?

Cheers

b4mz79 · Apr 10, 2023

alihan said:
Hi thank you for your reply @b4mz79!!

I have tested and when using non-mod battery everything work fine, it files flawlessly.

However on modded batteries this issue occurs. I can only assume the BMS board has some kind of software logic in it, which senses the non-original battery by its voltage/ampere values or it kind of lets itself trigger a switch when you cut/unsolder original battery connections.

I will try another kind of mod, which propose to not cutting/unsoldering original battery and connecting an extra batter in parallel. Even though this kind of puts extra weight on the drone, I don't know what else can I try?

Cheers

Yes, I have some experiment like yo did, This is what i have been tested
(1) replacing the original cell with another cell, and get the symptom like you are;
(2) parallel the original cell with another cell, the symptoms disappear, the drone can take off and run normally, but unfortunately it would not take along much till critical low battery error occur again, and the drone getting much hotter than before.

My best guess it's related with the cell, there are some type of lithium battery cell, (1) High voltage, high drain cell which is common in drone cell battery (2) High voltage, low drain (3) low voltage, low drain and (4) low voltage, high drain. And the original cell tello battery not using this four kind of lipo type, they use "custom" type above High voltage, high drain cell. Thats why they battery has 4.35 volt full charge specification which the common lipo battery has only 4,2volt full charge.

PS. I've seen some guy in youtube that parallel the battery but this done by not directly connecting the cell, instead the additional cell connected directly to the battery pin 1 and 3 in the core board. He claims it improve flight times couple minutes.

alihan · Apr 15, 2023

b4mz79 said:
Yes, I have some experiment like yo did, This is what i have been tested
(1) replacing the original cell with another cell, and get the symptom like you are;
(2) parallel the original cell with another cell, the symptoms disappear, the drone can take off and run normally, but unfortunately it would not take along much till critical low battery error occur again, and the drone getting much hotter than before.

My best guess it's related with the cell, there are some type of lithium battery cell, (1) High voltage, high drain cell which is common in drone cell battery (2) High voltage, low drain (3) low voltage, low drain and (4) low voltage, high drain. And the original cell tello battery not using this four kind of lipo type, they use "custom" type above High voltage, high drain cell. Thats why they battery has 4.35 volt full charge specification which the common lipo battery has only 4,2volt full charge.

PS. I've seen some guy in youtube that parallel the battery but this done by not directly connecting the cell, instead the additional cell connected directly to the battery pin 1 and 3 in the core board. He claims it improve flight times couple minutes.

Hi many thanks for your detailed answer.

Yes I am also suspecting that it is somehow limited software-wise by the custom designed origin Tello battery specs. I am havinv very hard time to find a lipo wich has same specs. I got a 4.35 HV lipo however it is again refused to fly..

Now I will try to connect an additional battery in parallel to the original one. However it will create another issue regarding the extra weight Tello should carry and it puts load on motors which in time degregades motors more quickly I think :/

I am now kind of trying to communicate with the tello battery producer firm in China or somewhere else. Any further help on being able to use external cheaper lipo batteries to fly Tello would be much much much appreciated

longlong7211 · Jan 10, 2024

hi all, i tried removing the battery cell of the tello and then I directly soldered a new battery cell to the tello and it said the battery was invalid, but if I connect the bms circuit (only the circuit without the cell) then everything works normally. If you use a 3.7v battery cell, it won't fly for long and you should use 3.8v to be accurate.