Charging The Equinox Battery

Our phones and laptops are lithium batteries...do you top them off?

Do I, or should I? I do. Again, I'd rather have the device working for me, than me being a slave to the machine for that extra bit of battery service life.

Should I? Same philosophy applies, for absolute max battery service life, no, don't top off.

However...some devices may be "smarter" about how they "stop charging" at 100%, and may be ok to leave plugged in and charging all the time. As per the manual, you should unplug the Equinox once it's charged as full as you want it. I leave laptops plugged in whenever possible, and the batteries last for at least a decade, with plenty of juice when I run them on battery. I think my cellphone would be ok to leave on the charger too, but nobody does that. My main concern with it is wearing out the usb-c connector. So -- unless I know I need a full charge the next day, I wait until it's down to 15-20% before overnight slow charging to 100% -- to minimize plugging and unplugging the charger cable in. I keep my phones for several years -- typically until they physically break, or become obsolete.
 
Our phones and laptops are lithium batteries...do you top them off?

It depends, but I avoid doing so when I can.

When I know I'll be around my laptop or phone for a while and also have time to charge it when it gets low, I will deliberately keep them unplugged to get a "fuller cycle" out of them before recharging.

This is very important when using laptops and smartphones for use on passive income farms where you run your laptop or phone to make cash through GPT activities.

Under normal use, I've seen an OEM laptop battery last years without issue when used as a laptop should, ie runs off battery for a few hours at least once every few days. But when you keep that laptop on and plugged in 24/7, don't be surprised if within 8-12 months, that battery bites the dust...like, the-laptop-can't-last-more-than-3-minutes-off-battery-power gone.

I've definitely noticed that smartphone and laptop batteries last far longer if you occasionally run the device off the battery for a few hours.

And I'm not alone with my observations. Back in the day when passive income farming made a lot more money with smartphones (we're talking $10, $100, $300 per day for just keeping a group of $50 smartphones plugged in and connected to WiFi) some people would install special timers on their power strips to force their smartphones to run off of the internal battery for at least an hour or 2 a few times a day to lengthen the time before the lithium batteries would become bloated.
 
I seldom ever let my batteries on my equinox's get below 50%. I have consistently topped off the battery on my oldest unit since I got it. It's 2.5 years old now, and I have yet to notice a difference in run time. It's had far beyond average use. I also have a backup pack on my oldest unit. If either of my batteries die I have the backup power packs to get me by until I can replace them. Most packs are rated at least double the run time of the stock battery and if mounted under the cuff make the balance better.

I would not be concerned about the battery unless I had the unit in the water constantly where I couldn't use the power pack. I would probably go ahead and buy a new spare battery to have on hand if that was the case. I see no issue in changing out the battery myself if and when the time comes.

same here also. I have had my equinox since Spring 2018 and top mine off after a hunt that goes down 1 or 2 battery bars or sometimes even if I have 3 bars. To me it would be too hard to figure out and watch for charging to the 85% level. Waste of time. Battery goes dead, buy new battery.
 
Just replaced my battery a couple weeks ago. Mine started exhibiting the randomly flashing charge light when on the charger. Called minelab who referred me to Detector Center (aka Fort Bedford Detectors) and purchased a new battery for $35 +s/h. Took all of 5 mins to replace. All the talk about charging lithiums makes my head hurt because everyone has their own theories about how to do it correctly, but what nobody mentions is that the Equinox is going to charge the battery to a safe, predetermined level, and then cut off. No need to manually remove it from charger.
 
Just replaced my battery a couple weeks ago. Mine started exhibiting the randomly flashing charge light when on the charger. Called minelab who referred me to Detector Center (aka Fort Bedford Detectors) and purchased a new battery for $35 +s/h. Took all of 5 mins to replace. All the talk about charging lithiums makes my head hurt because everyone has their own theories about how to do it correctly, but what nobody mentions is that the Equinox is going to charge the battery to a safe, predetermined level, and then cut off. No need to manually remove it from charger.

This issue isn't how long to charge lithiums. The issue is how to charge them, ie keep them topped off or not, what state of charge to put them in when putting your machine away for the season, what the ideal level of depletion is for recharging, etc.

Us civilians don't know exactly what the ideal charging practice is for Equinox's lithium battery, but there's a lot of good information online that gives us a good idea of what NOT to do.
 
Just replaced my battery a couple weeks ago. Mine started exhibiting the randomly flashing charge light when on the charger. Called minelab who referred me to Detector Center (aka Fort Bedford Detectors) and purchased a new battery for $35 +s/h. Took all of 5 mins to replace. All the talk about charging lithiums makes my head hurt because everyone has their own theories about how to do it correctly, but what nobody mentions is that the Equinox is going to charge the battery to a safe, predetermined level, and then cut off. No need to manually remove it from charger.

https://metaldetectingforum.com/showthread.php?t=285894

Check out post #15 where I addressed this. IDEALLY the Equinox should not over-discharge or over-charge the battery, but mine was still pulling current, even when "fully charged" and not turned on. I'm NOT leaving mine charging indefinitely!
 
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