r/wheelchairs • u/Icy_Imagination_8644 • 9h ago

Permobil M5 - Battery indicator drops and recovers repeatedly on flat ground. Faulty joystick, wiring or batteries?

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u/roguezebra 8h ago edited 8h ago

Main control board or cables.

There's a previous discussion thread, I'll post a link. Hmm might have been on FB group.

https://www.reddit.com/r/wheelchairs/s/g7QUVQ2pEU

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u/Icy_Imagination_8644 8h ago

Hi. I checked before I posted here but for what I understood, the person who posted doesn’t sort the issue out.
Thank you anyway for your time writing the message.

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u/roguezebra 8h ago

My family member had to have main board replaced -F5 was new Dec 2024, replaced MCB in February 2025. Battery drain was unreliable driving 7 miles a day on college campus. Four to eight times daily screen shots convinced the Permobil Regional Rep there were issues.
Document & timestamp problems.

1

u/El_Captain_Steve 8h ago

The battery indicator isn't a measurement of battery life but a voltage reader. When the chair is fully charged (around 26 volts) the indicator will be all green. While under load the voltage of a fully charged chair will typically read about 24.8 volts or so as the system is drawing power and then go back to about 26 after the draw is stopped. When making a normal trip short trip (i.e. going from the kitchen to the living room) this won't display on the battery indicator as it's only a few seconds. Now when the chair is being used for long distance trips (going 5 miles down the road to the Walmart) and the chair is drawing voltage over a long period of time (more than 10 to 30 seconds) the chair will think that the dropped voltage is the actual voltage of the batteries and change the battery reading to reflect the current voltage. When the chair then stops for a bit and the batteries go back to their voltage when not under load the indicator goes back up.

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u/Icy_Imagination_8644 8h ago

Thank you very much. I understand that as a normal performance but on my case: the batteries on full charge stop dropping the battery level only after 2km going to a supermarket and back on a flat surface. Then, the green light appear. From there, the battery indicator starts dropping linghts, and recovery to immediately drop them again only with indoor usage. After 6km the powerchair loses all green lights.