If you’ve read the datasheet put out by some of the battery manufacturers, you are aware of the break-in procedure for new LiPo. Basically, this amounts to being gentler on the new LiPo for 5 cycles or so.

I call it nicely waking the new cells from slumber. Because nobody likes a rude awakening. Proper LiPo care dictates that it should not be put away for storage in a fully discharge state, nor a fully charge state. Thus new LiPo will come from the manufacturer, resting at about ~3.8v.

So the first five cycles, I generally keep the discharge current at 3C or below. With 180mAh cells, this amounts not pulling more than 0.54A during the first five cycles.

Currently, I like to use my LiPo charger to break in the new cells. That way, I can see the discharge curve. and it also helps me determine the grade A cells from the lot.

Here’s a graph and you can see the chemistry working and waking up from storage. I used the same Miniaviation cell (MA1), charged and then discharged to storage (DS1 through DS5)* at 0.5A            *I accidentally overwrote my 3rd cycle (DS3), so I don’t have have the curve for that.

You can see that the cell performed better and better with each cycle. I included the first few discharge curves for the Hyperion 160mAh to illustrate this phenomenon happening with other LiPo cells as well.

Got a good deal on the 15c Miniaviation cells. These await connectors to be soldered on.

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