ORIGINAL: CGRetired
Ok. You prefer guess-work because that's what your first post suggests. A reasonable approach would be not to fly the plane until the battery is just about to fail. That's asking for trouble. No matter what calculations you make in advance, you can never factor in servo usage under varying conditions.
I'll stick with my voltwatch. It works just fine, and I am very conservative when it comes to deciding when to fly or when not to fly.
CGr.
I'm not sure why I'm getting an hostile vibe from you CG, we can disagree and keep it friendly in nature.
At any rate, I do not use guess work. I know how aproximately how many mah I use for each flight from experience. I know how many flights I will fly between charges. I use a battery that leave me a very conservative reserve. I discharge the batteries so I know how the general health of the battery is. So if I use approx 150mah a flight and fly 5 times between charges I use about 750 mah. This out of a 2300 mah battery. I hardly think that I am just guessing whether I'm safe to fly. While I agree these numbers fluctuate, not enough to remotely threaten the reserve.
Just curious, what loaded voltage reading do you find safe to fly?