My Canon battery killed my cameras, with an "s." Help.

[NoRealChunks]

Canon Rebel T2i worked for 5+ yrs. Dies. Full OEM battery, when switched on, blinks once and nothing. Looked online, tried micro-switches, nothing.

After some time, bought another Canon Rebel T2i, I placed my original OEM battery into the new one: works. So it's not the battery. Used it for a day. Next day, I switched it on, blinks once, nothing.  My conclusion is that the old OEM Canon battery pack LP-E8 killed both of my cameras. Be warned!!! And if someone can charm in with some input. Super appreciated.

""Update"" Solution found. It was my micro SD card. The camera just won't work with it. Insanely stupid. But hopefully, others find this and won't toss their cameras.

Side note: that's what internet does these days, no? You believe in something, all you could find is what supports that belief, and you won't even think/look for answers that go against your belief.

[BurnUnit]

That would be a bizarre coincidence for sure. Do you have just the one battery? How old is it? I could see a situation where the battery might appear to be fully charged, but only have what I think is referred to as a "surface charge". The voltage appears OK but the amperage that actually does the work just isn't there.

Have you tried another, newer battery in either camera?

[NoRealChunks]

Old. 5+ yrs guaranteed. Lost count. Both fully charged OEM Canon battery yields one red blink, and needs to be fully charged again. But I'll def look into this "surface charge," before I buy a new battery.

[wq9nsc]

You probably have a severely compromised battery, and likely a nearly dead cell, within your old battery.  Like other common batteries, Lithium Ion types accept a finite number of charge/discharge cycles before they become fatigued and in some cases one of the individual cells that make up the battery will develop severe issues leading to intermittent/odd device problems.

It is very difficult for a battery to damage a device other than leakage which was common in some older cells.  Otherwise, you won't get component killing excessive voltage out of a battery except for poorly designed equipment where the rechargeable battery also has to function as a filter and regulator when the device is being powered by an AC adapter. On a related note, this is why it can be expensive to "jump start" a modern vehicle that is suffering from a defective battery because in the vehicle the battery also acts to absorb voltage surges that can otherwise damage the many controllers in a modern vehicle.

With some types of rechargeable batteries, it is possible to reverse the polarity of a single cell when heavily discharging a battery with unmatched cells but it won't result in the entire battery polarity being reversed.  Reversed polarity is another way to kill equipment but your LP-E8 can't do that unless someone rebuilds it and reverses the cells during rebuilding.

I suspect if you load tested your current batetery, and in terms of LioN life, elderly original battery that it would fail miserably.  During device start up, at points there will be a heavier current draw and your old battery is probably falling below the critical voltage level when this happens causing the device to not operate.  Modern cars are VERY prone to this issue and can do some interesting things when battery voltage drops below a critical value during start up.

Rodger

[Ray-uk]

Just buy a new battery, there is just about no chance that a battery can fail and damage the camera apart from corrosion.

If it is the original one that is 5 years old then it has almost certainly reached the end of its life.

[NoRealChunks]

Truly, genuinely thankful for the info. I'm ignorant to all this till you told me. And yes, once battery is fully charged, switching camera ON once will drain the whole battery, and needs recharging. However, I have a question: How is it that my new camera worked with my old OEM battery for a couple of days? Is this consistent to what wq9nsc said?

But despite all this, I'm gonna buy a brand spanking new battery soon, and this will have a conclusion. Thx again to Burnunit, wq9nsc, and Ray- uk.

[ebiggs1]

"I'm gonna buy a brand spanking new battery soon,..."

Good idea.  But make sure you get a real Canon battery.  There are very close looking counterfeit batteries and third party batteries.  Do not buy one of them.  If you did, get rid of it. You problem is 90% the battery for whatever the reason.

counterfeit batteries

[wq9nsc]

NRC,

No two cameras are exactly the same and your new camera may have slightly less current draw AND also cleaner battery contacts so something that didn't work at all in your old camera might work marginally/intermittently in the new camera.

I just got finished working through a similar electronics issue with my new pair of Hensel studio flashes where proximity to another WiFi device caused one of the flashes to slightly delay firing.  Apparently some WiFi devices REALLY put out a strong signal unlike the Hensel strobes when one is acting as the access point.

Rodger

[NoRealChunks]

Bad news. New battery: same problem. Fully charged, switch on, blink once, battery needs to recharge again.

In a vacuum, the old battery has been consistent. It's def possible, both cameras were on their way out, but that's crazy coincidence.

Not sure what to do, don't want to spend any more money. If anyone has any idea what's going on. Greatly appreciated.

[wq9nsc]

When you state in your last post, "It's def possible, both cameras were on their way out"  do you mean that the new battery is not working in either camera?  If so maybe your battery charger is the common fault and the battery really isn't being charged properly to a full charge.  If the camera was truly draining the battery in one blink you would have enough smoke to look like a mini version of a Tesla car fire.  That little battery can source over a hundred amps for a brief pulse and if your camera was dissipating this full charge so quickly it would turn into a crispy critter with lots of smoke and smell.

Rodger