A co-worker of mine had his cellphone battery ‘die’ over the weekend. The issue was that it suddenly wouldn’t take any charge. When plugged in and turned on, the battery would never go over 1%. Basically, zero charge.
My wife has had a similar issue with her old Elixim camera battery. She wouldn’t use it for long periods of time, as we now have these fancy all-in-one smartphones. When she decided to blow the dust off and try to charge her Elixim in the cradle, the red light would blink. Solid light = charging BTW.
Back then I did a Google search and found quite a few forums scattered throughout the web that mentioned how to use a 9V battery to basically ‘reset’ the Li-ion battery.
Equipment needed:
- a 9V battery
- 2 pieces of wire or a bent paper clip (split into two, make the pieces as straight as possible)
- Remove your battery from your phone/camera.
- Place the 9V and Li-ion batteries on a flat surface. You’ll want to line up the + and – terminals on each, so you may need some napkins or a thin book under the Li-ion battery.
- Connect the + and – terminals of the 9V to the same on the Li-ion battery using the wire or paper clips.
- Hold for at least a minute. I usually set it for 10 mins to get a good ‘reset’.
- Plug in your phone.
- Replace the battery and boot up.
- Check to make sure it starts taking charge. It may be very slow at first. Let it charge fully.
- If it doesn’t seem to be working, try the above steps again.
- If it does work, monitor the battery. It’s not a guaranteed, long-term fix.
I don’t profess to know the reasons or physics behind this, but it seems as tho Li-ion batteries, especially those left with zero charge for a period of time, can reach a state where they refuse to recharge from zero. This will sometimes do the trick and save you the headache of waiting for a new battery.
Let’s hope they never have to try this on the Boeing 787s!
Credit to the interwebs!
blog of hair 