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Storing Lithium-Ion Batteries...

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David H. Hartman:
Storing Lithium-Ion Batteries...

I did a search and found nothing on this topic here at Nikon Gear though I suspect this topic has been visited here in the past. I though now might be a good time for a review.

Some years ago I sold my original DSLR, a Nikon D2H. I had forgotten to charge the batteries periodically and one battery pack was fully dead. Not discharged to the point that the camera would not start but so dead that the charger for my D2H did not recognize the battery and there for could not charge it. The battery that was totally dead had been left in the camera. A very poor practice. I had a second battery and that battery took a charge so I was able to sell my D2H.

Many Lithium-Ion batteries have a CPU inside that will shut a device such as a camera off and save just enough power to allow the CPU in the battery to communicate with the charger. As a Lithium-Ion battery sits unused it will slowly discharge to total zero and that battery will become useless or even a fire hazard. If the battery is in a device that is never *totally* off like a typical digital camera the battery will discharge faster then one removed from the camera.

Besides the Nikon D2H battery I was given a MacBook Pro with a swollen battery. I replaced the battery but the trackpad is distorted though functional and the graphics processing unit was damaged such that it can't be used, it will crash the computer. I had to hack the OS such that this MBP will not switch to the GPU but restarting the computer after it's such down may take 1 to 12 tries until it starts without the GPU. Apple replaced the Logic boards for a time on computers like this one but stopped long before I owned this computer. I hope one day to convert this computer to Windows as I will then be able to force it to start and run without using the GPU. At this time this MBP is my toe in the door to the macOS so I'm not ready to convert it to windows.

Anyway I though it might be useful to the group to bring up the topic of Lithium-Ion battery storage.

Here are a few links at https://batteryuniversity.com/ that might be useful...

How to Awaken a Sleeping Li-ion

How to Prolong Lithium-based Batteries

Charging Lithium-ion
 
I thought some of us may keep old cameras and other devices as backups and forget about them or even keep them as they don't seem worth the trouble of selling them.

Here is one more link at How-to-Geek regarding old Lithium-Ion powered cell phones and the like...

How-To-Geek: Your Old Gadgets Are a Fire Hazard, Here’s What to Do

Best,

Dave

David H. Hartman:
Here is another article on the topic of storing lithium-ion batteries...

DNK: Complete Guide for Lithium ion Battery Storage

Dave

mxbianco:
I appreciate your reporting the aforementioned sites, there's a collection of guidelines that aren't entirely new to me. for example batteries at 60% charge store better than batteries at full charge.
Nice to have all these guidelines and observations in a single place/site.

Regarding your D2H (and D2X, D2Hs, D2Xs), one good thing about cameras from that period is that they used a small lithium battery (CR2016 if I recall correctly), to maintain the clock circuitry running, while other (recent) models have  a condenser which is kept charged by the main battery, and will keep the camera's clock running up to a month if you remove the main battery. Recent models have a greater risk of depleting the main battery. When the condenser runs out of power, you would get the usual warning "Clock has been reset", and you will have to re-enter y.m.d.hh.mm.ss  (usually the date is reset to 0:00 of  January 1 of the year camera was produced).

It's easy to miss the small lithium battery , some people have never noticed it, it's located in the same compartment as the main battery, and covered by a small sliding door. Lasts years.

Ciao from Massimo

Stephan:
In the D2X and D3 it's a CR1616.
Had to replace it once in my D2X, D3 still going strong (14 years). Expected lifetime according to Nikon is 4 years!

mxbianco:

--- Quote from: Stephan on April 15, 2022, 16:50:27 ---In the D2X and D3 it's a CR1616.
Had to replace it once in my D2X, D3 still going strong (14 years). Expected lifetime according to Nikon is 4 years!

--- End quote ---

You are correct, a CR2016 is 20 mm wide an 16/10ths of a mm thick, a CR1616 is only 16 mm wide (same thickness) and is the correct size. In an emergency (no CR1616 available), I was able to use a CR1632, temporarily replacing the battery door with a thinner flexible one from a plastic milk bottle (!): it bulged a little but it did fit! With this one I think I can apply for the Nerdy category... :)

Ciao from Massimo

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