powerboost battery chain
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Please be positive and constructive with your questions and comments.
- pandadesh
- Posts: 22
- Joined: Mon Aug 18, 2014 1:11 pm
powerboost battery chain
can i chain two 6600mah batteries and connect them to the powerboost 500c?
- adafruit_support_mike
- Posts: 67446
- Joined: Thu Feb 11, 2010 2:51 pm
Re: powerboost battery chain
If you mean putting them in parallel: don't.
Putting batteries in parallel only works if their voltages stay exactly the same (to within a few millivolts) over the whole discharge cycle. If the voltage from one goes higher than the voltage from the other, the high one will start trying to push current through the low one. The usual result is a rather energetic fire (LiPos have about the same energy density as gunpowder).
The only way to make parallel packs safely is at the factory, using cells from the same production lot, and tested for a good voltage match. Even then, most of the lot will get sold off as single cells because they didn't match any other cell well enough.
The odds of making it work with two randomly-chosen cells is pretty much zero. At best, you won't get as much power as you would from either cell alone because they're fighting with each other. At worst, one of them will win.
Putting batteries in parallel only works if their voltages stay exactly the same (to within a few millivolts) over the whole discharge cycle. If the voltage from one goes higher than the voltage from the other, the high one will start trying to push current through the low one. The usual result is a rather energetic fire (LiPos have about the same energy density as gunpowder).
The only way to make parallel packs safely is at the factory, using cells from the same production lot, and tested for a good voltage match. Even then, most of the lot will get sold off as single cells because they didn't match any other cell well enough.
The odds of making it work with two randomly-chosen cells is pretty much zero. At best, you won't get as much power as you would from either cell alone because they're fighting with each other. At worst, one of them will win.
Please be positive and constructive with your questions and comments.