broken lezyne power drive?

Tim · Post by **Tim** » 21 Sep 2013 12:09

My power drive has stopped working. Only had it a year / used for 1-2k miles. The light flickers as usual when charging through usb to indicate it's charging but it won't turn on or comes on for a second before going off.

Could the rechargable battery need replacing?

Thanks

Andy_Craddock · Post by **Andy_Craddock** » 21 Sep 2013 15:05

Hi Tim

I have a spare battery I will bring with the rollers for you to try.

dweben · Post by **dweben** » 21 Sep 2013 16:33

I had a similar problem with this light though a different flashing of the light. Then it wouldn't stop flashing when unplugged until it ran out of charge. Sometimes while riding it'd just shut down and not come back on.

Needless to say I sent it to Lezyne and got two mini-drive as a replacement.

Pedlo Mudguardo · Post by **Pedlo Mudguardo** » 21 Sep 2013 20:04

They're under warranty. Contact whoever you bought them off and don't take no for an answer.

The distribution company, Upgrade, are excellent in this regard so don't let the shop/ web-company duck out...

Tim · Post by **Tim** » 21 Sep 2013 20:16

Cheers Andy for trying the battery least I know somethings up with the light and it's not the battery. Will get onto the shop and/or lezyne got a feeling I may have bought through an eBay seller. Will check. Thanks too for the rollers lend not had chance to give them a go yet, don't worry Andy I won't sue if I break my neck!

Tim · Post by **Tim** » 30 Sep 2013 16:17

Luckily I bought from Chain Reaction 11 months ago. Top marks they replied to my warranty enquiry within 24hrs and have refunded within 2days of receipt of the light.

So question now is do I use £50 to get another power drive? Was happy with it til it stopped working. Spend extra £10 and get Super Drive XL or go for something else like Knog Blinder?

Andy_Craddock · Post by **Andy_Craddock** » 30 Sep 2013 21:46

Tim wrote:Cheers Andy for trying the battery least I know somethings up with the light and it's not the battery. Will get onto the shop and/or lezyne got a feeling I may have bought through an eBay seller. Will check. Thanks too for the rollers lend not had chance to give them a go yet, don't worry Andy I won't sue if I break my neck!

Your welcome. I think falls on rollers are more comical than causing actual injuries!

You managed to ride them yet?

Im considering using my fixie on a turbo, now that is recipe for disaster!

George · Post by **George** » 08 Nov 2013 13:07

A couple of sort-of related questions:

1. I have sometimes read a) that charging a battery when it's only half-empty isn't good for it, and b) that leaving a battery on charge long after it is full isn't good for it either. However, I find that avoiding those two things often isn't practical. Most of my winter rides are 60-120 minutes, meaning that a fully charged battery sometimes won't quite do two complete rides; I need to recharge after every ride (when the battery's only half discharged) to be sure of completing the next one. And I find that if I don't put my light on charge immediately after a ride, I'm liable to forget ... but if I do put it on charge immediately after an evening ride, it isn't done charging at bed time, but is more-than-charged by the next day.
Am I shortening the life of my battery by regularly putting it on charge for 12 hours, when it's only 50-60% discharged?

2. I saw in another thread that Alan keeps a spare battery for his Lezyne. Alan, do you charge the spare in the light, or in a separate charger? If the latter, what charger do you use? Because the battery is too big for my ordinary charger.

AlanW · Post by **AlanW** » 08 Nov 2013 14:50

George wrote:A couple of sort-of related questions:

1. I have sometimes read a) that charging a battery when it's only half-empty isn't good for it, and b) that leaving a battery on charge long after it is full isn't good for it either. However, I find that avoiding those two things often isn't practical. Most of my winter rides are 60-120 minutes, meaning that a fully charged battery sometimes won't quite do two complete rides; I need to recharge after every ride (when the battery's only half discharged) to be sure of completing the next one. And I find that if I don't put my light on charge immediately after a ride, I'm liable to forget ... but if I do put it on charge immediately after an evening ride, it isn't done charging at bed time, but is more-than-charged by the next day.
Am I shortening the life of my battery by regularly putting it on charge for 12 hours, when it's only 50-60% discharged?

I think that I am correct in saying that with the new era of lithium batteries you wont suffer any ill effects. As I understand it and I'm sure that someone will correct me if I am wrong, but lithium batteries do not suffer from any memory effect unlike NiCads used to. I charge my battery after every ride not matter how short the ride was. The same applies with my Garmin Edge, that also gets charged after every single ride.
And now that the dark nights are properly here, I leave my battery on charge all the time and only remove it from charge when it is going to be used. I also do the same with my Lumicycle battery and that is coming up to five years old now, so it would appear that it has not caused that any long term effect?

George wrote:Alan, do you charge the spare in the light, or in a separate charger? If the latter, what charger do you use? Because the battery is too big for my ordinary charger.

I tend to alternate between the two batteries to be honest, so after a half a dozen rides or so I'll swap batteries around, just to even the wear. But I'm sure that it make little to no difference to be honest.

EDIT
Just found this -
Unlike NiCad batteries, lithium-ion batteries do not have a charge memory. That means deep-discharge cycles are not required. In fact, it's better for the battery to use partial-discharge cycles.

There is one exception. Battery experts suggest that after 30 charges, you should allow lithium-ion batteries to almost completely discharge. Continuous partial discharges create a condition called digital memory, decreasing the accuracy of the device's power gauge. So let the battery discharge to the cut-off point and then recharge. The power gauge will be recalibrated.

slogfester · Post by **slogfester** » 08 Nov 2013 16:02

Yes, most smart phones now come with lithium batteries that do not require such re-charge discipline. And yes they benefit from occasionally being run COMPLETELY flat. But this is more to do with (calibrating) the intelligent battery management systems in smartphones. I am not sure if bicycle lights are that smart? Maybe the real posh expensive models?

George · Post by **George** » 09 Nov 2013 00:06

Cheers, both.