Vantage Vue battery dead already?

Just looked at my Vantage Vue and its saying Transmitter Battery Low. I just bought this in October new. Is this normal to only last 5-6 months or are the batteries that come with the ISS junk?

How much sun is the solar panel getting? You might want to verify the solar panel is working. I wouldn’t think the batteries would be dead already unless the solar panel is not receiving direct sunlight.

# SOLAR PANEL Energizes the station during the day. On-board super capacitor provides power at night. Lithium battery provides backup when needed.

Well there have been lots of days here without sun since its winter. It’s on the roof on a pole. I guess I’ll get a 10 pack of Panasonics.

There have been posts on other forums from Vue owners suffering premature battery failure, I would suggest you contact Davis support while it is very clearly in warranty.

Yeah wouldn’t hurt calling them but I’ll order the 10 pack anyways.

P.S. I hope the battery lasts till the new pack arrives.

It’s worth checking to see if the transmission LED on the underside of the Vue ISS is flashing unexpectedly. This LED is designed to start flashing after you’re pressed the channel selection button/transmission test button. But it should stop automatically after some minutes and remain off unless/until the button is pressed again. If it hasn’t stopped (or has restarted of its own accord - which can happen under some circumstances) then the battery will have only a relatively short life because of the extra battery drain caused by the flashing LED.

Let us know if the LED is flashing unexpectedly - there is a simple fix that may work.

LED on the ISS itself?

Yes.


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Once I get the batteries I will have my Dad check it out. He doesn’t like making multiple trips up there. LOL I notice the display isn’t showing low batter during the daytime when the sun is blasting. Now as far as the battery goes it ran a lot this winter. One month we only had like 15% available sunlight.

Funny, batteries haven’t arrived yet but the low battery warning has stopped. Wonder why.

You might be getting a charge now that the sun is out.

See this thread on another forum, it probably isn’t the batteries so much as way it monitors them.
I think it briefly gets a false message batteries are low and this remains on console until it resets at midnight.
You can reset it yourself by entering set up mode then exiting set up without changing anything.

Current theory suggests moisture is causing issues across (unused) contacts near the ISS battery.
I think there’s more to it than that, maybe bugs or dust affect them too!

A reset of the console didn’t cure the problem for me. However, I did remove the batteries from the ISS to check their voltage, which were almost full. I then gave everything a good clean whilst it was at ground level and replaced everything as it was. That was about 6 weeks ago and since then no more battery warnings, fingers crossed for the future. :roll:

Same issiue here and I have mine for only one month. I went through the reset suggestion and it corrected itself but I am not convinced it will not appear again.

Yup…looks like it is off to the store for a new battery already, will put gell on too.

It won’t actually need a battery, but no harm in getting a spare one.

So I changed the battery and applied the gel and reset the ISS by pressing the button and rebooted the console. The LED light flashed. I cam down off the roof and ISS and console are not communicating. Guess it is time to call Davis and find out what to do next.

:frowning:

I called Davis and a new ISS is being shipped to me. But it will not arrive until the July 12th.

He did not even hesitate, in 30 seconds he told me he was sending a new one. They must have defective units!

I got to go with the solar panel as well. I also would call Davis as this seems to be the leading issue with their unit. Ask them what their solution is, I bet they have one.

I am noticing that on my battery powered stations that the batteries are being depleated quicker on my VP2… so I bought a fancier new battery and hopefully this will do the trick…

I would make a log of when you put in the battery and when you replaced them. I also would call Davis next week , about Tuesday after the weekend holiday and ask them what is going on… I would call rather than email because they sometimes don’t answer their email when they get behind for weeks.

I am sure there is a solution.