Realistically your flight time should always consider at least one go around. Esp. If your lz is tight.
Having flown the X4 with no bms i think I’d prefer the cut off disabled. I want to decide between damaging cells or catching a tree top when the decision needs to be made, rather than let the bms make it for me in advance.
I think that’s what I’m going to do with mine. As well as low-cell cutoff, the BMS is another thing that can fail and leave you in trouble. So after making the metering more dependable, I want to have the ESC connect directly to the cell stack.
Eventually I would like the handle to read from the BMS (it already gives a nice data stream for the bluetooth dongle) and give emergency warning to the pilot in case of a low cell or over temperature condition. The BMS will still be there for that purpose and to protect the cells while charging.
It is not an ESC situation. Your responsibility is to keep an eye on your screen and learn your machine’s behavior over time depending on the kind of input you give it. I had two cutoffs so far (low voltage) - my own mistakes. A third one because of a broken plug inside the throttle when the cable snagged onto the side bar during an inflation. That flight was ok., but overtime one pin inside the broken plug and jiggling the throttle in flight started to move the connector pins away from the other side before it took a hike and the result was the same as a hard cutoff. There are risks involved no matter what but the hard cutoffs due to low voltage was my responsibility to avoid - my bad. I learned from the experiences and I am now more cautious/aware of what could happen if I do not keep an eye on the screen.
Would someone who has a BT battery with a “soft switch” be willing to send me screenshots of all of their Daly app settings? I don’t want to put my 30 minute battery back together and give it a charge until I check all of the settings. The battery is 6P24S, and the Daly main screen indicates 24S…but the “Balance Screen” indicates 16S and won’t let me change it.
Anyway, thanks so much for your help. Once it is all working, I will include all of my screens in the photo album above. I have already begun posting “tear down” and some “rebuild” pictures. It has been easy so far…just don’t have any BT BMS instructions.
Again, thanks for the help!
Bill
Hi Bill,
I was wondering if you can you give us more info about your 19’ fiberglass pole please?
Is it all custom-made, or you bought some pieces? How does it work?
I would like to do something similar, I think it’s a great idea! 
Hugues,
Here are links to the pole, streamers and spike:
The bottom reinforcing ring is about 1.46".or about 37.1mm.
It came with a large rubber cap on the bottom, but I took it off and sanded down a 1" pvc cap, inserted it into the bottom to keep everything from falling out and then superglued it in.
The top had a small rubber plug…as I remember, and it kept falling out, so, I printed a proper petg cap and used velcro to hold it onto the pole.
Here is the model of the 19’ pole:
The pole would not fit into the spike tube, so, I took my Dremel, cut the welds, and used a worm clamp to hold a section of 1/2" ID Sch40 pvc pipe to the spike. It works great!
I know this all seems like a lot of trouble, but I prefer this setup to the others that I have been around…I do not like windsocks either. I can read the long streamers much better than any windsocks. I liked the first pole I made so much, I made a second to keep at another location.
As far as the bracket that I bolt onto my SP140 carrier, I just welded it up from scraps. It works great too. At different LZs, one will work better than the other for me.
I hope this helps!
Bill
My battery is finished…Bluetooth monitoring and basic settings work fine.
Want to see something ODD??
I would like the binary number scholars out there to tell me why these looks wrong. 
I plugged it in with what I thought was OFF…FORTUNATELY, there was no lightning bolt!! A “footnote” should be included in the instructions for the SP140.
It was a fun project. 
Hopefully, I’ll be flying this beast again in the FL Panhandle soon!!
Bill
BTW: If you have a Bluetooth SP140 battery, let me know if yours works like this too. Thanks!!
I do like the protective covers that came with my connectors:
As I get the Daly app settings figured out that pertain to our Bluetooth BMS and battery, I will post my screenshots here. I have made several adjustments to the screenshots that Paul sends with each new SP140. My goal is to monitor the battery voltage on the throttle in flight as I do with my X4 and to set the cutoff parameters just low enough that it won’t cut off on me before I land at 80V. Battery deciding when to cut power on approach is "no bueno!"
Bill
The journey/education…continues! 
I replaced the original BMS in my 1/2 hour battery (6P, 24S) with the newest BlueTooth version. In doing so, I discovered that String 23 was low, but String 24 was off by .34V. I am considering taking my Turnigy charger, setting it to 1S and attempting to bring the voltage up on those strings. So far, BMS balancing has not produced the desired results. The Daly app needs some updating too.
I am 66 and don’t enjoy running in the sand with the hour battery (11P 24S), so, I am going to cut it down to 7P, 24S. Since I will have extra batteries, my backup plan is to use 12 of them to replace strings 23 and 24 in the 1/2 hour battery. All of these mods should be fun!!
I will keep you posted.
This is still an opensource project, so, changes are to be expected. Battery tech (chemistry/management) are still in their early stages; therefore, we have lots of room for improvement. Makers are welcome!!!
Have you considered a Trike with beach tires?
Patrick,
Our sand is very soft and deep white quartz. Even beach cart tires struggle with it. I only fly the hour battery on days we have about 8mph wind…but it is still too heavy just walking out to the wing. My Tornado 280 is 15 to 20 pounds lighter than the 140. The 30 minute battery is no problem. Besides, I enjoy foot launching too much to give it up. Also, a trike would be extra equipment for me to keep up with in a high rise beach condo.
I also have my X4…which is still my favorite. With two 30 minute batteries for my 140 plus my X4, I can have a good afternoon at the beach with my friends!
Cheers!
Bill
So far, so good. I think the weight of the 7P24S will be OK for me.
Ready for Kapton, polyester and fiber tape! 
Getting closer!!
I just finished another “Josh Bixler” solder joint. The best method out there! Thanks, Josh!!
Bill
Ready for the case!! …then the Anderson ends…and then a rest. Working around 100VDC is a bit stressful; especially since I was using a Dremel with a small diamond blade separating a pre built pack. Lots of room for mistakes. I don’t recommend doing this, but…all in all, it was a good experience.
Bill
Back to the FL Panhandle next week to try it out.
Yippee!!!
I thought the bms is about 300A and the discharge is throught it. It seems it’s 80A.
The Founders Edition had a 100amp BMS (without Bluetooth)…I suspect that is continuous. Surge should be much higher. I m 190lbs and cruise at about 55amps. After each flight, I check temps…no problems with heating so far. Paul could probably give you a technical answer. Thanks!
Bill
Hm…55A at 80-90v is 4.4- 4.9 kw, that’s good news…for me at 150lbs 
if I will get under 4kw for level flight with a 26m prion 5 beginner wing and a 68lbs 2,8kw eppg, it will be nice.
Finished my battery late this afternoon and charged it to 65% to check it out. I’m really looking forward to having a second “light” battery at the beach!
BTW:. The Daly BMS has some nice features, but it does a poor job of balancing strings. Although one of the screens has “active” balancing settings…if I had to guess, I would say it is passively balancing the strings. Basically, it makes little difference in the charge cycle. Maybe a firmware upgrade will improve balancing in the near future.
Happy flying!!
Bill
Ok, I did some research and confirmed that the Daly BMS only passively balances. I ordered a Daly 24S BlueTooth Active Balancer that balances at 1A. It works great, and I believe it saved my battery packs. With the BMS, my 1/2 hour battery (6P 24S) had gotten so far out of balance that it shut off in flight 4 times. 
Totally unacceptable…a bit exciting though! …and good practice.
Anyway, I opened my 1/2 hour battery again, installed a second harness for the “active balancer” to use. Here is a short pictorial sequence:
I enjoyed this MOD and will do the same to my 7P 24S battery in a day or two.
I really don’t recommend anyone doing this, but lithium ion batteries need active balancing…and I was willing to take a chance. My LiPoly batteries on my X4 are over 4 years old…they are actively balanced…and they are still serving me well.
Bill
Great that you found a solution, although it is still crippled and takes lots of space on the outside.
If you have not yet bought the second balancer I strongly urge you to buy a ANT bms instead. It is 300A and have balancing options that gets the cells to 0,001V or less. It can balance the cells while charging or I can turn on the balancing manually at what ever state of charge with my phone without charger plugged in. Also, unlike Daly BMS, it will actually balance the cells down to zero delta during your charge while Daly balances only until the highest cell reach your preset value which is incredibly stupid.
On plus side you only have one device that handles everything. On minus, it is slighly too thick so the top cover will need a spacer made, a few mm thick. I will most probably swap out my Daly bms with Ant instead.
I uses this one on electric bikes with great succes
