Are my Eneloops genuine?

Comparing my cells to what don has mine are the exact same except mine says HR6......and i have had these cells over 5 years now, bought them at wallmart when you could get it ther.

Hmmm, thanks for the pics Don! Mine are "Size AA HR6", I'm not sure why that is different from yours. And the precautions bullet points are in a paragraph instead of aligned in a list, as this terrible picture kind of shows:

Thanks Al. Do yours have the precautions written in a paragraph with bullet points or in a bullet list?

The R6 is AFAIK the ISO designation for that size of cell (Actually the IEC is the standards body - the International Electrotechnical Commission AFAIR) - it may be that the ANSI standard is different. Turns out I'm not entirely right on this - at least according to the source of all that is apocryphal. The ANSI name as far as I can figure out from a poorly written article is 15H. The HR may be for the part of the world that goes by ANSI instead of IEC.

R6 is the size of the cell - the H prefix means NiMH rechargeable. So both R6 and HR6 are correct though HR6 is more correct. I suspect a typo in the Wiki as it says the H should be a suffix which would make the proper name R6H. Actually as it is in Wikipedia I'd need signed statements from three known expert witnesses before I'd necessarily believe that water is wet.

All of mine look exactly like yours sb56637 and they all have been purchased at Thomas Dist. no earlier than Dec. 2009 so it looks like all of your eneloops are all legit.

What is the date code or yours?

Sweet, thanks!

Sorry, where is the datecode?

Heres mine....Sanyo must have changed the label at some point or another.......Yes my cells have been through hell and back, what did you expect from 5 years of use. And this is what happens when you force the cells into a tight fitting tube made for alkalines.

You will find that on the seem....your going to have to hold the cell right next to a light so you can see it since its basically pressed into the label.

It's normally underneath the paragraph but it's not in colored print. It's stamped on there so you need a magnifying glass and the right angle to see it. Here are a few of mine:

09-07TK (Jul. 2009)

09-0610 (Jun. 2009)

09-07TG (Jul. 2009)

Ahh, I found it. 09-09S

So yours is September 2009

Cool, it looks like they're genuine then. I got them from this seller on eBay.

08-02RT mostly with some

08-02RQ

Not bad a price indeed.....very good in fact. So how do you like them man...have you used it yet.

Those are a little cheaper than the ones I buy at Thomas dist. so I think I'll try them out next.

I haven't really had a chance to do runtime tests, which is what most interests me. ;) I'm currently charging the cheap BTY NiMHs that came with my charger to make sure the charger won't destroy my Eneloops. The charger cost $7.00 including 4 AAs and 4 AAAs. It's not exactly a high-quality device. It's supposedly a low amperage charger, which is what I wanted. And it does appear to have four individual channels. The only problem is that when I put in more than two batteries the individual red lights above the batteries don't light up, just the green one in the center. The green one in the center seems to run all the time, so I doubt it will indicate when the charging cycle is done. I guess I'll just leave them in for 24 hours. It does appear to be charging them, because I gave it 20 minutes and tried one of the batteries which I had previously drained dead, and it had charge in it. So we'll see.

As I remember it is a 200mA charger which is neatly on 0.1C (a tenth of the rated capacity). The standard for charging at 0.1C is for 16 hours. They are probably safe in the charger for a day or two but it is a bad idea in general to leave cells on charge indefinitely. Nor is it necessary with low self-discharge cells to top them off before use. It is best to run them well down (Around 0.9-1V per cell) then charge them back up. If your power is flaky or prone to brownouts, a little longer won't hurt. If you can, it is a good idea to keep an eye on the power supply voltage - the cheapest of multimeters will usually do this- just remember not to electrocute yourself.

Overcharging kills more rechargeables than anything else.

Thanks Don, I was planning on topping off the Eneloops, I don't think I will now. I guess I'll just commence with a runtime test then!

I normally fully discharge all my nimh batteries with the c9000 before doing a regular charge, r/a or break-in. I keep records on all my cells so with a full discharge, I get pretty accurate mAh totals.