topic Re: LP-E6n's dying in EOS DSLR & Mirrorless Cameras

LP-E6n's dying

HeathC — Thu, 09 Mar 2017 11:03:42 GMT

I currently have 4 bricked LP-E6n's. 3 of them are new. I have talked to Canon and CPS and nothing I have tried has helped. My assistant thinks using a 3rd party charger is the problem but the one third party charger I have has been in use for years with no problems. Anyway, I'm not using it anymore and would really like to find a way to revive these batteries if anyonwwhas any ideas.

Heath

Re: LP-E6n's dying

Ray-uk — Thu, 09 Mar 2017 11:44:16 GMT

A lot of rechargeable batteries can appear to die if they are left too long completely discharged, this is usually because the inbuilt chip requires a little power from the battery to initialise the charging sequence and without this power an intelligent charger acts as though there is no battery fitted.

They can sometimes be re-started by applying the correct voltage briefly across the terminals from an external power source but this can be very dangerous and is not something I would recommend unless you know exactly what you are doing.

You say that 3 of the batteries are new, if so then they should be replaced free of charge by the supplier. If you have used them, even only once then they are not new and they are your problem.

It is possible that the 3rd party charger damaged them but in my experience it is unlikely.

Re: LP-E6n's dying

TTMartin — Thu, 09 Mar 2017 13:15:39 GMT

@HeathC wrote:
I currently have 4 bricked LP-E6n's. 3 of them are new. I have talked to Canon and CPS and nothing I have tried has helped. My assistant thinks using a 3rd party charger is the problem but the one third party charger I have has been in use for years with no problems. Anyway, I'm not using it anymore and would really like to find a way to revive these batteries if anyonwwhas any ideas.
Heath

Yep, the third party charger is the issue.

I charge my Canon batteries in Canon chargers, and my third party Wasabi batteries in their charger.

Re: LP-E6n's dying

HeathC — Thu, 09 Mar 2017 16:45:25 GMT

The batteries have been used 1 or 2 times. I can't understand how a thrid party charger can work for years then suddenly start killing batteries. I get a fast blink on all 4.

Heath

Re: LP-E6n's dying

Waddizzle — Thu, 09 Mar 2017 17:11:38 GMT

@HeathC wrote:
The batteries have been used 1 or 2 times. I can't understand how a thrid party charger can work for years then suddenly start killing batteries. I get a fast blink on all 4.
Heath

You don't have to understand how it works, no more than you have to understand how your smart phone works. Just use a genuine Canon charger with your genuine Canon batteries.

The Canon batteries are not just little cannisters of stored up electricity, like an Eveready battery. The Canon camera batteries are intelligent. Every battery has a serial number, and you can use your camera to read them.

None of us fully understand how Canon batteries communicate, not even third party battery manufacturers. Exactly how they work is a closely guarded secret by Canon. Many counterfeit batteries were being sold branded as Canon batteries, and they were failing.

Due to the proliferation of counterfeit batteries, Canon redesigned their batteries a couple of years ago, hence the designation change from "LP-E6" to "LP-E6(N)", where the "N" stands for the word "new." The redesign was enacted to cause incompatibility between genuine Canon products and third party products.

Re: LP-E6n's dying

PaulSoebekti — Thu, 09 Mar 2017 17:15:36 GMT

Here's a Canon article on batteries for future reference.

http://cpn.canon-europe.com/content/education/infobank/batteries/battery_types.do

Paul

Re: LP-E6n's dying

RobertTheFat — Thu, 09 Mar 2017 18:01:11 GMT

@Waddizzle wrote:
@HeathC wrote:
The batteries have been used 1 or 2 times. I can't understand how a thrid party charger can work for years then suddenly start killing batteries. I get a fast blink on all 4.
Heath
You don't have to understand how it works, no more than you have to understand how your smart phone works. Just use a genuine Canon charger with your genuine Canon batteries.

The Canon batteries are not just little cannisters of stored up electricity, like an Eveready battery. The Canon camera batteries are intelligent. Every battery has a serial number, and you can use your camera to read them.

None of us fully understand how Canon batteries communicate, not even third party battery manufacturers. Exactly how they work is a closely guarded secret by Canon. Many counterfeit batteries were being sold branded as Canon batteries, and they were failing.

Due to the proliferation of counterfeit batteries, Canon redesigned their batteries a couple of years ago, hence the designation change from "LP-E6" to "LP-E6(N)", where the "N" stands for the word "new." The redesign was enacted to cause incompatibility between genuine Canon products and third party products.

I was with you all the way until you lost me on that last paragraph. Are you certain of that explanation? I always thought they added the "N" when they increased a battery's mAH capacity to accommodate a new, and possibly more power-hungry, camera. I don't think the LP-E6 was the first battery to use that convention.

Re: LP-E6n's dying

TTMartin — Thu, 09 Mar 2017 18:40:38 GMT

@RobertTheFat wrote:
I was with you all the way until you lost me on that last paragraph. Are you certain of that explanation? I always thought they added the "N" when they increased a battery's mAH capacity to accommodate a new, and possibly more power-hungry, camera. I don't think the LP-E6 was the first battery to use that convention.

Exactly, N was for the batteries with increased mAH capacity and had nothing to do with changing them due to counterfeit problems.

Re: LP-E6n's dying

TTMartin — Thu, 09 Mar 2017 18:45:19 GMT

@HeathC wrote:
The batteries have been used 1 or 2 times. I can't understand how a thrid party charger can work for years then suddenly start killing batteries. I get a fast blink on all 4.
Heath

The Wasabi charger charges the batteries to a higher voltage than the Canon charger does. For example at my charging station I have two genuine Canon chargers and one Wasabi charger. When I'm charging the Wasabi batteries I put one in the Wasabi charger and one in the Canon charger. When they show done, I transfer the Wasabi battery that was in the Canon charger into the Wasabi charger, where it charges for an additional 15+ minutes before it shows charged.

The third party charger killed your Canon batteries by over charging them to a voltage they are not designed for.

Re: LP-E6n's dying

Stephen — Thu, 09 Mar 2017 18:53:46 GMT

Hi Heath,

When and where, exactly, were these batteries purchased?

Have you purchased a genuine Canon charger to remedy this situation yet?

Re: LP-E6n's dying

Ray-uk — Thu, 09 Mar 2017 19:40:01 GMT

TTMartin wrote,

The third party charger killed your Canon batteries by over charging them to a voltage they are not designed for.

_____________________________________________________________________________________________

You really do not understand how battery chargers work !

The maximum voltage output from a battery is fixed by the physical and chemical make-up of the battery, it is not possible to charge a battery to store a higher voltage than the battery is designed to produce.

An intelligent charger will repeatedly check the battery capacity during charging and will turn off or reduce the charging current once a preset limit has been reached. The difference between your 2 chargers is because the trigger point of that preset limit is slightly different between the two. Also the action of removing the battery from a charger when it shows as full and then refitting back to the same charger can cause the charger to go back into charging mode for a short time because the trigger circuit has to have time to reach the trigger point again.

Although batteries have to be charged at a certain voltage it is the charge current that is more important and a charger that exceeds the maximum charging current will cause the battery to get too hot, this is usually what damages the battery.

Re: LP-E6n's dying

HeathC — Thu, 09 Mar 2017 19:47:35 GMT

I think at least 1- 2 of them came with my 5d4, 80d or 5d3, I think the others were from Amazon. I had 5 Canon Chargers but now I only have 3 since I sold some cameras and included chargers.

The charger that I suspect is called a "Dual-ion+". I have had it for a long time but never had a problem. The first thing I noticed was the batteries on the Canon chargers geting the fast blink.

I just checked to make sure and all the bad batteries are LP-E6N, not LP-E6. Looks like the suspect charger does not hurt the LP-E6's

Heath

Re: LP-E6n's dying

TTMartin — Thu, 09 Mar 2017 19:53:56 GMT

@Ray-uk wrote:
The maximum voltage output from a battery is fixed by the physical and chemical make-up of the battery, it is not possible to charge a battery to store a higher voltage than the battery is designed to produce.

Okey Dokey, let me fix that for you.

The maximum voltage output from a battery is fixed by the physical and chemical make-up of the battery, it is not possible to charge a battery to store a higher voltage than the battery is designed to produce, without damaging it.

An intelligent charger will repeatedly check the battery capacity during charging and will turn off or reduce the charging current once a preset limit has been reached. The difference between your 2 chargers is because the trigger point of that preset limit is slightly different between the two. Also the action of removing the battery from a charger when it shows as full and then refitting back to the same charger can cause the charger to go back into charging mode for a short time because the trigger circuit has to have time to reach the trigger point again.

And the trigger point of the Wasabi charger(s) is set too high for Canon batteries and damages them.

Re: LP-E6n's dying

Waddizzle — Thu, 09 Mar 2017 19:59:21 GMT

@HeathC wrote:
I think at least 1- 2 of them came with my 5d4, 80d or 5d3, I think the others were from Amazon. I had 5 Canon Chargers but now I only have 3 since I sold some cameras and included chargers.

The charger that I suspect is called a "Dual-ion+". I have had it for a long time but never had a problem. The first thing I noticed was the batteries on the Canon chargers geting the fast blink.

I just checked to make sure and all the bad batteries are LP-E6N, not LP-E6. Looks like the suspect charger does not hurt the LP-E6's.
Heath

Amazon batteries? That could be the whole problem, right there. Even though Amazon, and eBay, tried to weed out vendors of ill repute, there are some that slip through the cracks. Many of them don't sell counterfeit stuff, they just sell bad stuff.

I am not surprised that the third party can charge LP-E6 batteries. That's why Canon phased them out for the LP-E6(N) batteries.

Re: LP-E6n's dying

TTMartin — Thu, 09 Mar 2017 21:13:00 GMT

@HeathC wrote:
I think at least 1- 2 of them came with my 5d4, 80d or 5d3, I think the others were from Amazon. I had 5 Canon Chargers but now I only have 3 since I sold some cameras and included chargers.
The charger that I suspect is called a "Dual-ion+". I have had it for a long time but never had a problem. The first thing I noticed was the batteries on the Canon chargers geting the fast blink.
I just checked to make sure and all the bad batteries are LP-E6N, not LP-E6. Looks like the suspect charger does not hurt the LP-E6's
Heath

I would agree with your assessment that the LP-E6N's seem to be especially sensitive to overcharging. Like you I hadn't noticed an issue until the LP-E6N. That's why I went to only using a Canon charger on Canon batteries, and the Wasabi's seemed to under charge on the Canon chargers, which is why I charge them / top them off on the Wasabi charger.

Re: LP-E6n's dying

RobertTheFat — Thu, 09 Mar 2017 23:04:37 GMT

@TTMartin wrote:
@HeathC wrote:
I think at least 1- 2 of them came with my 5d4, 80d or 5d3, I think the others were from Amazon. I had 5 Canon Chargers but now I only have 3 since I sold some cameras and included chargers.
The charger that I suspect is called a "Dual-ion+". I have had it for a long time but never had a problem. The first thing I noticed was the batteries on the Canon chargers geting the fast blink.
I just checked to make sure and all the bad batteries are LP-E6N, not LP-E6. Looks like the suspect charger does not hurt the LP-E6's
Heath
I would agree with your assessment that the LP-E6N's seem to be especially sensitive to overcharging. Like you I hadn't noticed an issue until the LP-E6N. That's why I went to only using a Canon charger on Canon batteries, and the Wasabi's seemed to under charge on the Canon chargers, which is why I charge them / top them off on the Wasabi charger.

Whether this has any relevance, I couldn't say. But Canon didn't issue a new version of their charger when they introduced the "N" version of the battery.

Re: LP-E6n's dying

kvbarkley — Fri, 10 Mar 2017 00:57:59 GMT

Maybe the new batteries downloaded new firmware into the charger. 8^)

Re: LP-E6n's dying

rrbond07 — Wed, 18 Mar 2020 18:53:34 GMT

I had purchased 4 LP-E6N batteries. After charging up two of them, they would not power up my Canon EOS 7D Mark II or EOS R. I purchased them from Adorama and their listing says the batteries are compatible, but they are not. I sent them back and ordering the LP-E6 instead.

Re: LP-E6n's dying

rrbond07 — Wed, 18 Mar 2020 18:59:37 GMT

Not so. I have an LP-E6N that came with my Canon EOS R and works fine. I purchased 4 new ones, and after charging a new LP-E6N, it will not power up my camera. I tried the newer battery in my Canon EOS 7D Mark II and it still would not power up my camera.

Sent back all four and purchased the LP-E6 version. There is clearly something not the same in these batteries even though Canon says the N version is compatible with Mark II and the EOS R.

Re: LP-E6n's dying

RobertTheFat — Wed, 18 Mar 2020 19:27:18 GMT

@rrbond07 wrote:
Not so. I have an LP-E6N that came with my Canon EOS R and works fine. I purchased 4 new ones, and after charging a new LP-E6N, it will not power up my camera. I tried the newer battery in my Canon EOS 7D Mark II and it still would not power up my camera.

Sent back all four and purchased the LP-E6 version. There is clearly something not the same in these batteries even though Canon says the N version is compatible with Mark II and the EOS R.

I have accumulated both LP-E6 and LP-E6N batteries over a period of several years and use them interchangeably with no problem. I'm pretty sure my wife's 7D2 came with an LP-E6N. My 5D4 certainly did, and I think my 5D3 did as well.