Nobody asked you about 18650 to listen to any advice on them. I do not need these 18650s, and I have already told you all this many times (I even showed a graphic picture), so it was your own decision to waste your time in vain.
Indeed, there are too many other things in life to spend on studying batteries. However, I asked where you got the information that the Shockli-5500 are items from PLB? Why, for example, is it not a PAC?
I suspect that if it was possible to communicate to ali-express as on a forum (write more than 1-2 times reviews), the list of exploded elements continued to grow. In this case, most likely, this is due to its IMAX charger, whose form of charging currents is very wrong. These elements of LiitoKala-5000 turned out to be especially sensitive to this. I personally never liked IMAX, especially because it causes a significant increase in the temperature of the batteries during charging (their chemistry just boils inside). In addition, this customer chose a charging current of 0.5C (with such current forms as IMAX - 2.5A - this is very much). The shape of the IMAX current is more like a stabilized power supply, rather than a pulse current of a normal charger.
However, it is not only in this example. Look carefully at other reviews, where some people who understand this will soon write about the utter unreliability of these LiitoKala-5000 (and many other versions of it too). That is, for some time they work quite normally, and then suddenly quickly lose their characteristics.
There’s no way to “communicate” on aliexpress. They always call you to vote for an article you’ve bought or to write a “review”, but if you’re writing straightforward and something you’ve bought is a POS (I really mean the article, not shipping or something else), the article you’ve wrote never is published or the article-number is deleted, but the article from this seller is published under a new article-number so that no one’s able to read your review.
The whole aliexpress voting- and review-system is buyer-scam.
I understand your frustration, but let me point out some advices:
You do not have to give feedback for a just received article. Close the give feedback page which automatically opens when you confirm receipt. You have a one month window to submit feedback.
Oh. In this case it was a wall charger. I’ve bought two of them, on usage they went so hot just near to firing up. So yes I was able to give a feedback next day or so. The charger called “Xenain” is in fact a dangerous peace of shit.
After that I’ve sent one of them to HKJ for testing and tear down. Maybe he’s writing a test once in a time.
So see this as a warning from Xenain 4-port wall charger Ke-Ke-QC-04.
After nearly 2 months, four blue 5100mAh “LiitoKala” 26650s arrived today.
These are different then the blue 5000mAh cells HKJ tested and probably different than the Black and Gold cells HKJ reviewed in this thread. The Black and Golds are sold by a different LiitoKala. liitokala.com.cn and liitokalahongkong.aliexpress < shrug >
The label on the blue wrap includes a link to the liitokala.aliexpress 133859 store I bought them from. Are they fake? Looks likely. Are they junk? The wrap and labels are sloppy. (see photo)
I’m analysing one now in my ISDT C4. It will take a few days to cycle through all four.
The originally rewrapped cells are known to be a little bit wider (≈∅26.7mm) than other 26650s. Measure them, carefully remove those stickers to see what's going on underside and take a shoot at the wrap markings. If willing to, unwrap them. Make a nice close up shot of their positive poles. If you are able measure their DC internal resistance, should be no higher than 28mΩ.
I don’t think “fake” is the correct word. How can a new, original product be fake? It can’t be.
I think you mean you suspect the capacity to be incorrect or the cells to not be very good. Do you suspect they are not actually Liitokala brand?
I’m very curious about your tests. I wish you had a light with a FET driver, xhp70.2 that used 2 of these cells to see how many amps it’s pulls. Do you already have an idea of its internal resistance?
Are these storefronts for the same company? Is 133859 selling LiitoKala knock-offs? I don’t know. Store 217753 used to sell fake name brand batteries but now gives them names like 100% original LiitoKala for LG HE4.
The stickers on 18650s from store 217753 have a url that leads back to store 217753
The sticker on the pink 21700s from store 133859 has links for both LiitoKala websites. < shrug >