I trying to buy additional battery with Librem 5 but Purism say me that additional battery cant be sended not inside phone outside USA.
I bought FIRST battery BPP-L503 (4500mAh) for Librem 5 from china. But phone wont boot with this battery and with charging cable always show 91% (a few hours of charging). Battery voltage is 3.088V and wont charging by external charger (current 0A).
I refund money as product defects in FIRST battery and bought another SECOND battery from same seller. SECOND battery also wont working and always show 91% as the FIRST battery.
Now on batteries
FIRST battery = 3.405V
SECOND battery = 3.283V
but L5 still wants to boot with them and show 91% while USB charging.
What’s happening?
Are all these batteries defective?
What should I do? Refund again?
As I recall defective battery would not emit constant RED light (when inserted into Librem 5). Therefore I’m almost sure that those are not defective batteries.
Above just while I’ve noticed somehow (never had time to investigate, as usually just swap to power supply I know/relay upon) that some/many power supplies (fullprotocol ones) are not intended for the purpose of waking up “dead battery” (0%). Please find some other power supply (even regular 5V only above/around 1.5A will do and USB-A port on your PC/laptop might/should suffice as well (low power needed, yet constant …), as BC1.2 up to 0.9A might be just about what we are looking for) with less negotiating protocols (you actually need USB-DCP/BC1.2) involved and give that 3.088V battery some time, few hours. Best way, as already known here, to get this 3.088V battery recharge (from less than 0% shown on Librem 5) is to take out current (good) one (red LED blinking and 0% shown) and swap it with the 3.088V one (by getting constant red LED light).
I’d recommended experimenting with USB-A port (laptop) charging swapped battery at first place. After BPP-L503 batteries swapped, 3.088V one inserted please power off your Librem 5 and live this battery charging for several hours. I think (if no reliable power supply around) this method with USB-A port should be worth of trying, as first attempt (my quick idea here) to wake up those at 3.088V.
Not yet (I have another idea too, but let us wake up somehow those in question here). And, please have a dialog with us, ask myself what I didn’t put well together here. Good luck.
on what was written on the originally sealed package. It was year of 2018. I recall that even Anker PowerPort Atom PD 1 (probably to its built-in controller related) was not able to initiate charging of this old stock power bank. And I don’t mind on telling you which power supply did the job of waking up quite discharged power bank batteries, but this would not lead to solution on your own, not yet. Hope this description here helps anyway to understand what I suggested within my above post. With my main hope that actually Librem 5 will do the miracle with its charging chip and recover your over discharged batteries by itself (through your work around initiative).
My batteries in Librem 5 do nothing. No any light. No power button reaction.
But my batteries in Librem 5 with connected USB power always show 91%, RED light and nothing changed few hours. As soon as I disconnect the cable phone instantly turns off.
I already do this (trying to charge battery by L5 in poweroff mode about 3 hours) and nothing changed.
Then I gave my FIRST battery with 3.088V to amateur specialist (He is engaged in repairing laptops and electric scooter). He tried to recovery battery by external charger and say me that controller in battery is broken and battery cant be fixed. Battery always drop current to 0A at any charging voltage.
Now I receive from seller another one battery with same problems.
Remove the only working battery from the Librem 5, send the Librem 5 to Purism and get Purism to send it back with a battery inside it.
This is only half serious but for the amount of stuffing around you have already had with alternative sources of batteries that may or may not be compatible and which don’t work … you might already have your phone back from Purism.
It may help to post photos here of any batteries that you receive from alternative sources and which don’t work.
Now you mentioned/wrote here what I hoped that it is not the case with those batteries. This flicker means (to me) that those 3.088V batteries are definitively not usable ones (I still have of one those to be recycled) with the Librem 5 (not prepared/checked to be used there). In addition, here is what I did: I payed for one additional battery and wrote to the seller (but I cannot provide this link as not reachable at this moment, not for me) to send to me two batteries together and both of those received were very fine working ones (no flicker from the moment I received them).
IMO, this will not help (as I saw many eBay offers). I think that is more about defective stock (that needs to be rechecked before putting any of those batteries into the package toward customer). Universal battery charger should serve the purpose … @Lvovich needs to tell them to proof things before sending BPP-L503 battery out. This shop (hopefully Aliexpress one) needs to be asked politely to (re)test them (original ones) before sending those to you again (this is important).
Having this dialog helps me to research further. That why I think now that BPP-L503 is protected battery with the lockout voltage at 3.088V (not to be discharged any further/below 3.088V). But it is to late for myself to think any further about this today. Anyway as related BPP-L503 batteries sleep now (being under rated voltage) we need to find the way to precharge those with a current of cca. 100mA (do not think that Librem 5 is capable of this, if flickering of red … doesn’t mean this, just do not know, but about to search (not tomorrow) for some external (low current) precharging device, if helps (might help).
I don’t have a voltmeter at home, so I cant monitor battery voltage status every time.
Today I tested battery voltages at my work by Flux multimeter (I measured voltage without load resistance):
Original battery = 3.9V
FIRST battery = 3.405V
SECOND battery = 3.283V
Trying again to charge FIRST battery by my L5. L5 still wont boot with FIRST battery and show 91% on charging.
The FIRST battery had voltage 3.088V at first day when I got it from parcel and trying to charge first time. Apparently my attempts to charge the battery increase its voltage but battery still loose voltage at load
Here is my short and final judgment: with those two defect batteries you’ll never reach/get or be able to measure 4.20V. Which actually means you’ll never be able to use them with … nothing. Very same behavior with my defect battery, it will never reach higher voltage than approximately 3.40V (not usable today and neither was usable from the very first day I received it, yet its replacement battery worked out-of-the-box, as received from the very same supplier).
I don’t think anyone else than Purism sells officially sanctioned Librem 5 batteries at this moment. If you buy it from some other source, I guess you may even end up with a rejected unit that failed QA process which someone took out from the factory in China to sell for easy buck.
The seller immediately returned all money without returning battery and without any questions.
Perhaps he himself did not expect that there would be a repeat defect.
If seller had better checked the goods before sending, I would be lucky as Quarnero with working battery.
@Hristo, in addition to the Purism source, I know of at least one source that works well for me, as already published this original product photo here. And sure that I can do some comparison (measure real mAh capacity by performing full charge/discharge cycle and/or quickly measure used battery internal resistance that relates to the “age” of any particular battery) tests but currently no time for such on my own (yet confirming that I can rely firmly on this 4400mAh battery). Further info about related 1ICP10/57/53 battery you will get here: subtel GmbH - Mainzer Str. 3 - 10247 Berlin - Deutschland. And link toward this (another) Librem 5 related (QA for certain) battery is here (+ https://www.ebay.de/itm/195237105943), distinguished original product of its own (product that isn’t fake, while includes ★ 3-Year Guarantee ★, and not even having any other markings that might lead you wrongly).
