PS3 DS3 Controller Battery Mod (ongoing)

The stock DS3 battery is only 630mAh, I think, and with rumble turned off, I get 30 hours of life out of it, usually. Haven't measured it, though, so that's just an estimate. How big are the AAs? Also, do you have rumble turned on? I always keep it turned off since my battery life gets cut in half with it on. (I might turn it back on now that I've always got a controller charged and ready to go, though.) If it's on, though, your mod is magical!
 
The stock was 570.

These particular lithium AAA's didn't advertise their mAH rating. However, the rechargeables right next to them were listed at 870 each.

And yes, rumble is turned on. The other night, just to see if I could get the battery meter to drop a bar, I played a few hours of Motorstorm with rumble set on high.

Didn't work.

I'll play some more tonight.
 
Well, I'll be damned, I can't find where it said 630 mAh any more. I could swear it was on the sticker on the back! But it's not!

Curses.
 
My lithium pack shows 570 right on the back.

Controller still shows full charge, son's been playing LBP all day.
 
On this date and time of 2-25-2010 at 9:15 A.M., let it be known that the PS3 controller finally died.

Upon confirmation of depleted battery status, two things are now known resultant from this mod:

Under moderate gaming use (2-6 hours per session,) the controller lasted for 14 days without charging.
The controller does not report accurate battery life to the PS3.

I will be yanking this apart today, confirm depleted battery state, and attempt a recharge of lithium AAAs, just to see if they 'splode. There is a problem with the controller not reporting accurate charge level: the batteries may not charge through USB as I had hoped.

There is a small chance this controller died without depleting the batteries.
 
robm said:
I will be yanking this apart today, confirm depleted battery state, and attempt a recharge of lithium AAAs, just to see if they 'splode. There is a problem with the controller not reporting accurate charge level: the batteries may not charge through USB as I had hoped.
Click to expand...

Rip apart the original battery, there's probably some sort of fancy circuit in there. Maybe you can dupe it somehow.
 
Awesomeness update:

The battery reports accurate battery life with standard alkaline AAAs. The batteries finally died last night, so 15 days of moderate use with standard alkalines.

The awesomess?

They charged just fine through USB.
 
Yep, wife's playing with it right now on a recharge.

Obviously, alkalines don't like being recharged a whole lot, but whatever - next batch is going to be a good set of rechargeables, now that I know that the controller does indeed have the protection circuit built into the controller itself, as opposed to being in the battery.

Once I move and stuff, I'll finish it off with Bondo and retake pics. This is officially a successful mod.
 
Almost all batteries say this.

Also, when alkalines explode, it's like when you're popping those stupid pressurized biscuit cans. You expect explosion, but really, it just kind of splits open.

Only with a AAA, it's more like... leaks open. Worse that might happen is that the seam is a little stubborn and it pops a little bit. Not a whole Heck of a lot of energy there.

When I was first getting into electronics, when I was 5 or 6, I popped a AA once. Thought I was going to die, with all the things we hear about battery acid being corrosive, etc etc etc. It sprayed battery acid onto my arm.

Turns out, battery acid isn't all THAT corrosive. Does bad things to clothes, but unless you're a girly man, it rarely does anything but negligently irritates the skin. Unless you leave it sit there, instead of washing it off.

Also also, once recharged, the controller only lasts about a day with heavy use. Next set will be rechargeables.
 
The electrolyte in most AA-type cells is a mild alkali of sorts, so it's not a battery acid, more a 'battery alkali', and like you say it won't do much but slightly irritate the skin unless you rub it in your eyes or something.
In a car battery though, the electrolyte's a pretty strong sulphuric acid(hence battery acid), and it's actually quite nasty, girly man or not. ;)

Also, nice mod, I never liked proprietary batteries in stuff like this, especially when using AAAs give you more runtime like you did here.
 
daftmike said:
The electrolyte in most AA-type cells is a mild alkali of sorts, so it's not a battery acid, more a 'battery alkali', and like you say it won't do much but slightly irritate the skin unless you rub it in your eyes or something.
In a car battery though, the electrolyte's a pretty strong sulphuric acid(hence battery acid), and it's actually quite nasty, girly man or not. ;)
Click to expand...

Also, if you bridge a car battery it'll probably do more than pop. Like, it'll probably melt whatever you bridged it with, or at least severly mangle it. And charging the thing won't do a Dang thing, because it's rechargable. Unless you like plug it into AC or something.

I've shorted, but never popped, some AA batteries. They got pretty hot.
 
daftmike said:
The electrolyte in most AA-type cells is a mild alkali of sorts, so it's not a battery acid, more a 'battery alkali', and like you say it won't do much but slightly irritate the skin unless you rub it in your eyes or something.
In a car battery though, the electrolyte's a pretty strong sulphuric acid(hence battery acid), and it's actually quite nasty, girly man or not. ;)

Also, nice mod, I never liked proprietary batteries in stuff like this, especially when using AAAs give you more runtime like you did here.
Click to expand...
Don't let battery acid get into open wounds. Personal experience.
 
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