I agree to Bills method calculating, but there are several risks. Your batteries are changing with every cycle, the capacity depends on many factors. So calculating is one thing, to know facts is another.
the current if you are floating is another than doing acrobatics, so depending on the conditions it is hard to say what the consumption really is. I fly with voltagecontrol and announcements for many years now. the picolario tells me every 0,1V when voltage gets lower. This means that there were 10 anouncements from 5,5 to 4.6V in at least 3 hours (normaly I choose the type of battery this way) many of my customers are asking me, what is the voltage when need to recharge. But this is the wrong question, the voltage and the capacity left are two different things. Of course there is a function between voltage and the time left, but there are many factors and some of them are changing. type of battery, wires, switches, current and last but not least temperature have influence on it. Using a Voltage control like the picolario the interesting thing is less the voltage but the timeperiod between two changes. Usually the voltage decreases to 5.2V within a relativ short period, then it rests for a long time. >From 4.9V, the period of time within another 0,1V are lost are getting shorter. So it is easy to determin when charging is required. there were some interesting reports from customers one of them had problems, his retract. gear did not close properly and the current consumption of the servo was very high. Thus the Voltage gets lower within minutes. this pilot heard the announcements and landed. Discharging the batteries showed that he had just a few minutes left. Using voltage announcements this way works perfect, in former times I charged my batteries every day I go flying, now just when needed. There is only one problem, when you are used to ask your glider for battery voltage, the feeling is not so good if you flying a model without. Thommy (www.thommys.com) RCSE-List facilities provided by Model Airplane News. Send "subscribe" and "unsubscribe" requests to [EMAIL PROTECTED] Please note that subscribe and unsubscribe messages must be sent in text only format with MIME turned off.
