Lithium Ion - totally discharged

My Sony Cybershot DSC-P1 digicam uses a rechargeable 'InfoLITHIUM' battery. (FWIW, original was Sony NP-FS11, but at present it has a replacement, PowerMart VSN017L28D.) I'd used it only a few days ago, so was surprised last night to find it completely discharged. Not even a display on the camera's LCD screen. I've now recharged it and will see if its capacity is 'Full', as my camera claims.

Any ideas on why the discharge would apparently be so sudden and complete please?

To increase Sonys profits?

I have a Nikon 3100. It took it several cycles to 'learn' about the batteries I was using. Before that, it kept claiming they were dead when they were not.

fualty camera or battery ? My camera drains its battery too quickly , i dont often use it but when i go to use it its always flat wich is anoying, i realy wish theyd put proper off switches on things these days.

Colin =^.^=

Infant failure mode ? Not unknown. It's probably totally unreliable.

Graham

Hang on - you mean the original Sony battery went duff ?

I expect it's got tired of life. Rechargeable cells do nasty things on you like that.

Graham

The original Sony battery gave me some trouble of a similar nature (but not so extreme) about a year ago, 2-3 years since buying the camera. I changed it to this 'equivalent', so that is now about a year old.

Thanks, I'll try that tomorrow.

Ahhh, Ok.

I do believe they can die suddenly like that though. You're absolutely sure it was previously *fully* re-charged ?

Graham

I use Li+ batteries in some products, and one thing to watch out for is severe over-discharge. If you do that, it's sometimes possible to revive the battery (well, ~80% capacity anyway) by charge cycling a few times (I have found if it doesn't recover after 3 cycles, it's gone). Severe over discharge happens for LI+ at about 2.3V per cell, although that varies by manufacturer. Li-polymer is slightly different - they get severe over discharge at more like 2.5V per cell.

In my products, I have a battery disconnect switch so it can't be over-discharged (of course, the switch is powered by the battery, but we're talking a few microamps) as the products are industrial and customers want replacements from us if they die :)

Cheers

PeteS

I've recovered a sony Li-ion camera battery from 10mV cell voltage, in which state it had been left for at least a couple of months. Charging at 1mA showed a smooth rise from 10mV to 4.2V. Capacity is at least 50% of original (based on number of pictures able to be taken - which could be optimistic at the manufacturers end). Charge retention is 2-3 months (in the camera, being drained)

Thanks for the further input. The battery appears to have recharged OK, although suspiciously quickly to its 'FULL' level. I'll check it regularly over next week or two.