Discharging Batteries

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Bruce
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Does anyone out there in the ether know if there is a way of forcibly discharging batteries. I'm referring to the Canon E4-N battery.

When not in use I personally don't like leaving them charged up.

I was under the impression that the charging unit could also be used to discharge them but can't figure it out.

If, as I assume, you can't do that with the charger, can one purchase a discharger. I've looked at Canon, Amazon etc and can't find one, so, if anyone does know I'd appreciate it.
 
leaving li ion batteries in a discharged state is not a good idea they should be left in a charged state when not in use

li ion / li poly batteries have a discharge threshold if they go below the threshold they will not recover
the threshold tends to be around 3 volts per cell the LP E4N is a 3 cell battery ( 3.7v per cell ) making 11.1 volts meaning if the overall voltage drops below 9 volts it could mean the battery becomes unusable and will not recover or charge

in some batteries probably the LP E4N included they have electronic circuitry that can put a battery into hibernation the main use for this is when the batteries are manufactured and tend to be charged to around 40% of there capacity but it's a one time process the first time you charge the battery from new it brings the battery out of hibernation
if you let the battery discharge too low it will go back into hibernation but will never recover or come back out of hibernation

it's all to do with safety because li ion / li poly batteries can go short circuit or a very low resistance when discharged to a very low level which isn't a good thing


Edit....
must type quicker :)
 
cosmicma said:
leaving li ion batteries in a discharged state is not a good idea they should be left in a charged state when not in use

li ion / li poly batteries have a discharge threshold if they go below the threshold they will not recover
the threshold tends to be around 3 volts per cell the LP E4N is a 3 cell battery ( 3.7v per cell ) making 11.1 volts meaning if the overall voltage drops below 9 volts it could mean the battery becomes unusable and will not recover or charge

in some batteries probably the LP E4N included they have electronic circuitry that can put a battery into hibernation the main use for this is when the batteries are manufactured and tend to be charged to around 40% of there capacity but it's a one time process the first time you charge the battery from new it brings the battery out of hibernation
if you let the battery discharge too low it will go back into hibernation but will never recover or come back out of hibernation

it's all to do with safety because li ion / li poly batteries can go short circuit or a very low resistance when discharged to a very low level which isn't a good thing


Edit....
must type quicker :)
Click to expand...

Thank you Mark, I wasn't aware of this and in fact believed that if left charged they will gradually discharge over time and as a result of not reaching a fully discharged state can suffer from 'memory'. Is that right or wrong?
 
The memory issue is to do with older no cad batteries abd was so called eliminated in ni mh batteries the newer li ion / li poly batteries don't suffer from memory problems
 
cosmicma said:
The memory issue is to do with older no cad batteries abd was so called eliminated in ni mh batteries the newer li ion / li poly batteries don't suffer from memory problems
Click to expand...

Thanks Mark.
 
to add to the last bit all batteries lose there charge over a period of time but li ion / li poly batteries take quite a long time to discharge
under normal circumstances it shouldn't be an issue
 
cosmicma said:
to add to the last bit all batteries lose there charge over a period of time but li ion / li poly batteries take quite a long time to discharge
under normal circumstances it shouldn't be an issue
Click to expand...

Thanks
 
Also, if you don't know what you are doing, discharging a lithium ion battery can be quite an experience.
 
And not a good idea to leave any battery on float charge. Yrs, it keeps it at 100%, but can over a time reduce the batteries capacity.
And, each battery technology has it's own quirks.
 
Thank you all. I'll leave alone I think.
 
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