Short-circuit LiPo battery

batteriesliposhort-circuit

I accidentally short-circuited LiPo battery 7.4 V 2200 mAh 35 C. I measured the pack's overall voltage, but multimeter showed nothing. I also measured the individual cell voltages (via the balance tap plug) and only one cell showed 3.85 V.

Is this a mark that the other cell is totally dead or is there a chance of cables got unsoldered inside the battery, during the short-circuit? What should be my next steps?

Best Answer

You should really get rid of the whole pack and don't absolutely try to charge it. These kind of batteries have very large flat metal pads soldered to a big pcb and it seems very unlikely to me that something fall off: your cells are probably both dead. You might carefully try to rip off the heat-shrink enclosing and carefully desolder the maybe-but-not-so-much alive cell. Then you will need to charge it, but again, this is a bad idea. If I had to do such a thing I'd do it outside, placing the battery in a fire-proof bag and I'd monitor it's temperature constantly. But I would not do that. That's 20$ on hobbyking or whatever and in my opinion it's not worth the risk ad all.

What are you going to power with the single cell anyway?

Addendum: with "get rid" I mean "properly dispose". LiPo batteries contain nasty chemicals and should absolutely not thrown like common garbage. Apart from the pollution that would derive from such an action you would also endanger the garbage collectors.