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I've completed the testing/balancing of the 2 battery packs used in the Neato robot.
The robot has 2 NiMh battery packs rated at 7.2V 3200mAh.
Battery 1 had the following cell capacities in mAh:
2840
2900
2760
2820
2790
2830
Battery 2 had the following capacities in mAh:
2890
2770
2720
2860
3020
2350 Refresh cycling brought this up to 2670
As you can see, the batteries generally have 88% of the rated capacity, with 1 cell dipping down to 73%. Cycle charging brought it up to 83%. This seems acceptable to me.
However, I tossed the batteries back into the Neato, and it immediately said the batteries were low. I selected the menu option "new battery installed" so that it would reset what it thought the capacity was, and then placed it onto the charging pad. It charged for about 15min before showing fully charged.
Excited, I pressed the clean button and watched the Neato go to work. It ran marvelously for about 4min before declaring the battery weak, and heading back to the charging pad. It charged for about 20min and then resumed cleaning where it left off, this time going for about 6min before heading back for a charge. Again, after charging for 15min, it ran for about 11min before giving up and heading back for a charge.
The Neato gives up its cleaning mission if it cannot complete it in 3 cycles.
I just don't understand why seemingly good batteries don't give the robot a longer run time. I've thoroughly cleaned everything to make sure there isn't an excessive load, and the robot itself appears to run and function just perfectly, minus the short run time.
Any ideas as to how my battery might be failing prematurely? I've decided to buy 2 new batteries to get the thing running again, and keep the old batteries around to scavenge cells when the new pack gets weak.
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