ONeil Andes 3 Portable Printer Replacement Battery 7.4V 1800mAh

ONeil Andes 3 / Apex Series — 7.4V Li-ion Replacement Battery (7A100014-1)

This is a 7.4V, 1800mAh Li-ion battery for the ONeil Andes 3, Apex 2, Apex 2i, and Apex 3i portable thermal printers. It replaces OEM part numbers 7A100014-1 and DPR78-3002-01. Capacity is rated at 13.32Wh and matches the voltage rail the printer's thermal head and paper feed motor draw from.

• Andes 3 and Apex series compatibility: These models share the same 7.4V two-cell Li-ion pack format, identical connector pinout, and matching BMS handshake protocol — the printer firmware reads the battery state register on power-up, so a correct BMS response is required for the device to advance past the boot screen.
• Bench tested on actual hardware: We cycled this cell through the Andes 3 under simulated print loads — thermal head bursts and paper feed motor draws — and confirmed the BMS held voltage without dropping into protection mode during repeated high-current print events.
• First-use calibration for the thermal head: After installing this battery, charge it fully, then print five test labels before deploying. The printer's BMS current profile calibrates to the new cell during this sequence — skipping it can cause the thermal head to run at inconsistent temperature, producing uneven print density on early jobs.

Why the Andes 3 thermal head produces faded output at low charge

The Andes 3 thermal print head needs a stable voltage to reach and hold the correct activation temperature across the full print line. When the battery voltage sags below roughly 6.8V under load, the head operates cooler than the paper coating requires, and the result is pale or patchy output. This happens most often mid-batch when the cell is partially depleted and the motor and head are both drawing simultaneously. Charging the battery above 7.2V before a print run eliminates this issue.

Bluetooth drops during an active print job

The Andes 3 and Apex printers share their power rail between the radio module and the print mechanism. When the battery is low, peak current draw from the paper feed motor pulls the rail down far enough that the Bluetooth radio momentarily loses power and drops the host connection. The printer does not always show a low-battery warning before this happens. Keep the cell above 50% charge for jobs longer than a single label burst, and confirm the battery reads above 7.0V before starting a multi-label print queue.