battery shipping (China to Philippines) anecdotes..

After I lost my trust ordering from local battery sellers (LG HG2 that has only 2500mAh instead of 3000mAh), plus exorbitantly expensive prices, I decided that I'll look for and buy batteries from more reputable foreign sources (BG, GB, AliExpress). Unfortunately BG and GB do not ship to the Philippines, so that leaves AliExpress stores.

Since I'm quite new with lithium-ion batteries, I only order a few pcs at a time so I can test its capacity if it's real or not. The problem is that after I've tested the batteries are true-rated (and thus appears to be genuine), I'd like to reorder, but unfortunately that seller has stopped shipping to the Philippines (or in other cases, they only have $50 expedited shipping options).

Now, I still continue to actively search for battery deals in AliExpress, so I found a good deal with a pack of 4pcs Soshine 14500. Ordered it, the seller shipped via China Post (which does not support shipping of batteries to the Philippines). It's very strange because when AliExpress system indicated "packaged shipped via China Post", I immediately sent a message to the seller to tell them that China Post does not ship batteries to the Philippines. The seller insisted for me to wait.. and so I waited 2 months, the tracking only indicated "China, posting of item" -- which seems to mean the batteries probably were not allowed to be shipped. Opened dispute and was able to work out a solution with the seller.

Now, I searched for another seller in AliExpress for another 4pcs 14500 (the price is double of the above; but that seems to be acceptable now, rather than "cannot ship" or $50 shipping.) Now the AliExpress system indicates the package has been shipped out.... via Hong Kong Post -- I double checked HK Post website which specifically indicates lithium ion batteries are disallowed for shipping with them. So I sent a message to the seller to tell them about this issue.. and this is the reply:

Hi,Sir

Glad to hear from you. Yes HK POST doesnt allow shipping Lithium batteries. but we just have a try, it is 50% chance to be successfully delivered. dont worry, 7-10 later we can confirm if it is successfully passed. We will let you know then, and you can apply refund if it is detained.

Hmm.. let's see after 2 months...

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For now, the "correct" way of shipping batteries from China to the Philippines seems to be via Turkey Post or BPost (Belgium Post). Although I've not had Turkey Post for awhile now.. so that leaves only BPost. Problem with BPost is that it has very very few tracking updates, so sometimes I'm at a lost as to where the package is already. But 50-60 days is about average (considering the batteries have to travel from China [Asia] to Europe and then back to Southeast Asia).

For a while, the LG HG2 was one of the most counterfeited 18650’s out there. They became (and still are) a very popular vape battery in multi-cell devices. Fortunately the fakes turned out to be 2500mAh LGHE2’s which are an excellent higher drain cell than the HG2. Being only slightly less capacity, most people never knew

I see. Thanks for the explanation. There are many sellers in an (local) online store here in our country. That’s also where I got my first LG HG2 3000mAh, the price is OK (would be equivalent to about US$7 for a pair of the LG HG2s, including free shipping). But testing the capacity, it only has around 2500mAh. so they must be LG HE2 (or HE4). They do appear to be high drain capable — would there be some way of determining of these “fake LG HG2s” are re-wrapped LG HE2s or are they LG HE4s? (since both are around 2500mAh capacity).

I couldn’t possibly try to buy every LG HG2 from the local online stores to find out who has fake and who has genuine. Almost all of them have very similar price (ie. around $7 for a pair LG HG2s)…

Yes, either HE2 or HE4. Both excellent cells. The way I figured it out was, I had a vape device that takes three 18650’s. Every time I’d go to charge them 2 were of equal voltage and one wasn’t. Then, just like you, I tested the one odd cell to roughly 2500mAh, and the other two tested to about 3000mAh. I removed the wrappers and there was no printing on the bare metal can of the two HG2’s, but there was printing on the odd cell which matched a HE4 (if I remember right)

This is what the HE2/4 looks like. This cell was once wrapped in a HG2 brown wrapper. The real HG2’s are completely blank on the bare can.

There is one more possible way to tell. The white gaskets on the fake HG2 and the HE2 & 4 are shiny. The white gasket on an authentic HG2 should be a dull or matt finish. Which was exactly the case with mine.

Can you identify which ones are genuine LG HG2 and which are not?
I got them from 3 different sources.

one of them has label EGDBHG21865 instead of LGDBHG21865 (the other has a sticker which I haven’t peeled off to check the errant letter);
2 of them have the same bottom serial number

Have you tried fully charging them and do a discharge test?

Yes, did a full charge / discharge using analyzing chargers a few times with similar results. I even tried discharging up to 2.0v (connected to EBD-USB+ and discharge at 1A rate, after a full charge) to see if it would reach the 3000mAh but it didn’t.

The one on the left is from a Lazada seller and measures only around 2500-2600mAh. The other 2 (center and right) from 2 different sellers in AliExpress registers around 3000mAh. The one from the right has a “LiitoKala” sticker. The one in the center is from a lesser-known store in AliExpress (but does ship to the Philippines), after the seller of the “LiitoKala” stopped shipping to the Philippines.

d_t_a,
Did you ever find a source of 18650s in PH? I’m looking now.

Thanks,
-Steve