I have many cr123's of questionable voltage..

Ok, I have come in to the possession of about 30+ cr123 batteries that have been slightly used. I don’t want to put them in series because I don’t know the voltage. I have a few single cr123 twisty lights that use these in but I am looking for a larger light that uses these in parallel. Like a Q8 or SRK but with single cr123’s instead of 18650’s?

Any ideas?

Thanks

Anyone remember the old Blackshadow Queen?

Something like that.

With that design I assume the flashlight battery holder would look like revolver drum. Interesting, did not see such lights much at all.

cant be that hard to find someone with a voltage meter where you live

you may find even crappy ones in 1$ shop that will do the job

but economically I would think twice driving with my car some distance to safely use 30 old CR123s and buying a DMM, even if its cheap

i have several lights that used 16340, whose driver or switch failed.

i use the old cr123s in them (after converting the light to ‘no-switch direct drive’ mode, and using twisty as a switch)

they use the batteries all the way to zero, the cr123s are usually not strong enough [even when full] to damage an led on direct drive

any ‘real driver’ may refuse to turn on under some minimum voltage…

the old cr123s are also good in lights you need to sit around but really don;t get used that often
if you were using AA or AAA, they would
a, run down even not in use
b. leak
cr123s are good in both respects, and a twisty is fine for something i dont; use often

for once the universe is in harmony
(except for the fact that i have so many lights that fail in the first place (xtar, utorch, ultrafire)

wle

I don’t think it’s a good idea to use them on a parallel setup because the higher voltage cells will try to charge the lower voltage cells and charging a non-rechargeable cell can be dangerous

I think you mean in series. This is the position in which one is behind the other. I have many of those lights.
Parallel is when batteries are side by side. Similar to the Blachshadow Queen I linked above as an example.

Thanks

No he is not talking about reverse charging in series.

He is talking about something even worse:
parallel charging lithium primaries.

That is something I would never do, as it is way too dangerous.

Yea, I am not charging batteries.

What your asking about (using them in parallel) would technically be charging them as Blue just explained.

If you run different voltage cells in series the lower voltage cell would be reverse charged (positive voltage going into the cells cathode), in a parallel setup the cells still equalize themselves and since CR123s are primary very bad things would still happen (even though it would just be in a standard, not-reverse charge situation) cause you can’t charge a primary cell at all.

Parallel CR123s would be fine with all new cells but that’s not what you’re asking about. You can not use partially depleted primaries together, parallel or other!

So even using them side by side there still would be a charging effect on the batteries with less voltage. I didn’t know that. I knew that putting two primary batteries of differing voltage in series was very bad.

The charging one [lower voltage] cell receives from another [higher voltage] cell in parallel is a normal charge (not ideal, and still not safe) but the risk is much lower as its just a normal positive charge (zero safety features when this is happening but still “just” a standard charge). When ran in series however the charge is reversed since positive voltage is going INTO the negative end of the battery.

The big problem in this case is that the lower voltage NON-RECHARGABLE CR123 will be charged by the higher voltage one, it won’t be a reverse charge scenerio but it’s still very bad (as is any charging of a primary lithium cell).

Stay safe!