Renishaw Tool Probe Battery Life

[DruMor]

What could cause the battery life in the tool probe to go down by aprox. 2/3? I have always kept track of each time I changed probe batteries, and from the day our 2008 VF-4 was new until last fall I would change probe batteries about every 6-7 months. Since last October, that 6-7 month lifespan all of a sudden become about 2.5 months. I'm not using the probe any more/less than I had been previously. I use the same batteries in the work probe and I have not noticed any issues with battery life with it.

[hitachibos]

you may not be shutting it off when you put it back in tool changer and the flashback sensor on the sheet metal may have been moved slightly.

there is a command to shut it off however if you never used it then the flashback reciever may be pointing up too high. the probe will shut off after a short time of being out of range of the reciever.

in the past doing a tool change put it out of range. it would shut off automatically.

watch the reciever lights and make sure they are not always on and recieving a probe signal. if it is the probe wont shut off unless you use the command.


Good luck

[haastec]

Has your usage gone up? Are you finding more uses for the probe besides the initial X,Y,Z setup?

Could be you got a bad batch of batteries also.

[Delw]

Drumore
funny you mention this as of the last 2 months I been waiting to replace mine and it hasnt happened yet and I use it more. I have the opposite problem.

I wanna say its where you purchase your batts.(maybe sitting on the shelf a long time?) the last set and the 1st set I for them from battteries plus in phx. the 2 times before that I got them at radioshack.
same batteries brand and everything. I was also told not to keep them in afridge as it draws down the life which I have always done.

[KenFoulks]

These are all good suggestions. One more thing you can do is open the manual for the probe. It is very hard to figure out the first two times, but there are settings in the probe that may have changed and you can change them back.

[DruMor]

Delw,
As much as I want to think its bad batteries, I use the same batteries in the work probe and it still goes about 6-7 months between changes, and I use the work probe a lot more than the tool probe that is the problem. Certain parts I probe every single one, and on the other hand, I can sometimes go several days without setting up a new tool.

Ken,
I will get the book out and see if I can decypher what the current settings are and what they should be.

Thanks to everyone for the suggestions!

[Delw]

drumor
if you got them the same pace they could be old stock I didnt mean bad batts just batteries that been sitting for a year or 2

I always replace all batts when one set goes out.

[haastec]

Not sure what brand you are using, but I have been using the Saft brand and I found this blurb about the date code from a Saft factory rep. I also get around 6-8 months of usage.

The date codes on our Li-SOCl2 cells can generally be interpreted as follows: The first two numbers represent the year of manufacture and the next set of number represent the day on which the cell was finished. The letter and numbers that follow are for internal reference.

Good for future reference.