Faulty Charging Circuit

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Racerboy
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Faulty Charging Circuit

Post by Racerboy » Tue Sep 13, 2016 11:29 am

So I'm having a problem with my charging circuit. I'm using a Powerboost 1000C, 2000mAh 3.7v Lipo, and a DS Lite Charger. I have the charging port on the DS Lite Motherboard wired to the USB and GND pins on the Powerboost, as well as the Bat and GND pins wired to the battery.

When I first plug in the charger and battery, the charge LED turns on and the Pi boots. After I let it sit for a while (~15 seconds) the charging light goes off, and soon after the low battery LED flickers on. When this happens I measure the battery to be about 3.3 to 3.4 volts, but for some reason the charging voltage decreases rapidly until it is next to nothing, about 7.0 mV. Even after I disconnect the charger from the Powerboost, it still gives me a very low voltage reading. I can unplug the charger from the outlet, let it sit for a while, then plug it back in and it gives me a 5.4V reading again. Plugging it back into the motherboard puts the powerboost charging LED back on, and it just repeats (charging LED turns off, low battery LED turns on, etc...)

The charger is rated 5v at 450mA, but I should be able to charge the battery at whatever rate I want.

Anyone know what's going on?

Racerboy
Posts: 129
Joined: Thu Jun 02, 2016 4:49 pm
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Re: Faulty Charging Circuit

Post by Racerboy » Tue Sep 13, 2016 12:48 pm

Here are some pictures of the setup. I disconnected the battery because the enable pin is open and I couldn't take a decent picture with the LEDs on. The wires near where the charger plugs into the motherboard (marked Vin and GND) are wired to the USB and GND pins on the Powerboost.

It works perfectly fine when I use a USB cable to charge it, not sure why the DS Lite charger can't handle it. Might have to make a custom charger for this.

Image

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