Trustfire 18650 (flame version) warm whilst charging !!

Hi guys i just got some of these and put them on charge, they seem to get quite warm when charging is this normal ? also they seem to smell a bit when on charge too is this also normal ?

Thanks guys

Charles

P.s also got the Ultrafire 501b MCE

Warm is OK. Hot is not. If they get too hot to touch turn off the charger, get an oven glove and get them outdoors - fast! And leave them there till they are cold. 60oC is the danger point.

It'd not surprise me at all if new cells whiff a bit. This will fade in time and with use.

Thanks for that Don, there no more hotter than nimh batteries that i've had on charge for a few hours but because these are lithium and new to me i just wanted to make sure.

Charles

Does anyone use an electric fan near their charging station like I do?

I normally keep the fan on LOW a few feet away just for extra ventilation.

I don't, but I do touch the cells regularly to check temperature and anything that feels too hot (I never charge my Eneloops above 800mA) gets pulled and left to cool. If it is too hot to touch, the charger has probably missed termination and it is a good idea to pull it before it gets charged to death.

If the lithium ones are noticeably warm I'll keep on touching them every few seconds or pull them from the charger, let them cool and then check voltage.

If my junk cells that get used in cordless mice and the like get too hot - who cares? It may take a week off their time in the mouse but there are plenty more where they came from. When they give up in under a month in a mouse it is time to recycle them.

I don't use a fan for my NiMHs and my "Omnipotent" charger that quick-charges in only 12 hours. But I do leave the plastic top open. It never seemed to me like a very bright idea to put a top over charging batteries in an exothermic cycle.

It happenend the same thing to me. Bought these cells for a friend, and the 1st time I charged them, thought they got hotter than the blue protected ultrafires. Let me rephrase: Not hot, but warm. They didn't smell though. With my DMM thermometer, they got to 21ºC, as I recall.

The charger was a WF-139.

Is the charger new or just the cells ? Some times the charger gets warm and transfers some of the heat to the batteries , sure the smell didnt come from the charger ? the WF-139 can run on the warm side and when mine got warm , it did smell of electronics .. Which is why I got out the motor tool and cut some cooling holes in it [ better convection cooling ]

With 1x18650 the WF-139 runs cool , but put in two , and the more charge they need [ lower starting voltage ] , the warmer the charger will run , and mine started to emit an electronics odor as the components heated up .

501+ MCE - dont forget to wrap the pill in al-foil for better heatsinking ...

Matt

Hi yes it is the ultra fire wf-139 and it was getting hot with two batteries charging i've just got one in there now and the smell is much less. So OLD4570 your spot on..

Also thanks for the tip with regards to the 501. i've put the drop in in a ultrafire L2 as recommended by Don and will wrap the pill in foil before i use it properly. But on first use of the light with fresh cells i'm very disappointed it's no where near as bright as i expected it to be, it doesn't seem to be any brighter than the Luna hunter "bargin" light i have.

Its the driver -- Very low performing .. When I got my MC-E P60 drop in , very poor , a driver swap latter and wow !

Did you get the 5 mode . or the 3 mode ? [ I had the 3 mode ]

Hi Folks, I decided this might be a friendlier place to talk after having a recent post rudely deleted, without so much as an “excuse me”, at that ‘Other Place’. I hope more make the switch so that BLF becomes the favourite lounge for us budget light connoisseurs.

I’ve got an UltraFire U4-MCU Cree Q5, which I just love, and some DX sku.20392 TrustFire 18650s and a DX sku.13820 charger. The charger works well except that it doesn’t auto turn off when the cell is fully charged but I’ve found that if I switch it off and on about every 5 mins when the charging is nearly complete, the LEDs flicker rapidly between red and green when the time is up. However I’m now thinking that charging to about 4.15V might be more prudent that going for the full 4.20V charge.

After reading about the various lithium cell explosions and how some people have resorted to charging their cells inside a metal box, I decided that my oven (off, of course) might be a safer place than the benchtop. So I now put the charger on a thin plastic sheet on the lowest rung in the oven and have the door ajar so the power cord can fit through. I’m thinking that if a cell does throw a tantrum one day the oven should contain most of the excitement without destroying my house. What do you experts think – good idea or bad?

Hmmmm... I'm no expert, but - how expensive is your oven? ;)

Welcome Chr1s. Good to have you here.

Personally, I'd not be that keen to charge them in the oven just in case one does vent. The products of such venting are nasty indeed. I'd not be keen to eat anything from that oven afterwards. There is also the possibility of the oven's being inadvertently turned on - get any lithium ion cell above 60-70oC and exciting (in a bad way) things are about to happen. But the real reason is "out of sight, out of mind" and overcharging is not good for cells either.

Ideally one should charge them outside but given the UK's weather this would get expensive in drowned chargers.

That said, I charge them on a desk behind me in my study....

Ok . charging is not really an issue . leaving the battery in the charger for hours on end after completion might be an issue , just do your charging when you can keep an eye on the charger , and if it turns green [ done ] and it takes you a little while to notice , its not the end of the world . Or buy a slightly better charger .... One you can walk away from and know it will shut down on completion [ test it first to be sure ]

For about $10USD you can buy the Shekor , another one that could work for you , Xtar 2 bay ...or WF-139 / WF-188 [ WF-188 may have minor issues ]

Matt

I found out that the first hour of charging my cells gets warm not hot. The warm should be up to 40 C. If they would get hot by charging at around 500-700mA and around 50 C i would probably ditch them. Later on they stabilize on what i would call ambient tempertaure a bit colder then neutral on touch. Fully charged they are room temp.

Welcome to BLF Chr1s! Here, you can put the links!

UltraFire U4-MCU ; TrustFire Protected 18650 ; OEM 2*18650 Lithium Battery Charger

Love that light too! It was my first "real flashlight"!

As for charging, just charge on a table top, and from time to time, check the cells with a DMM for voltage and with my hands for heat.

Hi i got the 1 mode version, how do you go about changing the driver? is it a big job? i'm a dab hand with a soldering iron but i don't posses any special soldering equipment so can i do this with a bog standard soldering station? Also can you give me a link to the driver you you used please..

Thanks

Charles

http://www.kaidomain.com/ProductDetails.aspx?ProductId=1845 This one

Or go to shinningbeam.com . they have a 3 mode SSC P7 / MC-E driver ...

Thanks for your replies and the ‘welcome’ everyone. The oven doesn’t get much use for cooking these days but would certainly be a lot cheaper to replace than the house.

I watch my cells like a hawk during charging and check the voltage frequently with a DMM and they never seem to get more than slightly warm to the touch so maybe I’m being a bit paranoid. Perhaps I’ve been watching too many of those spectacular YouTube videos.

Does anyone know what happens when a single 18650 explodes/vents/whatever in a charger? Maybe ‘explodes’ is not the correct term here. Are there any videos of this out there?

These lithium cells are relatively new technology (certainly to me) so do we know what happens when they die of old age? Do they die quietly like the old carbon/zincs and alkalines or do they go out with a flash-bang "rapid disassembly" due to dendritic growth causing internal short circuits or something? http://www.mpoweruk.com/lithium_failures.htm Has anyone outlived a lithium cell yet?

I’ve seen the rather alarming photos of the multi-cell ‘pipe bomb’ torches that have exploded and have wondered if it might be a good idea to drill a large hole in the side of my single-cell torch and put a rubber grommet in it to release pressure more gently, just in case. A bit drastic I know, and it would be agonizing to have to disfigure my beautiful little UltraFire in such a way, but it might prevent the loss of a hand, or am I being too paranoid again? Actually I believe a little bit of paranoia when dealing with highly exothermic chemistries is a good thing and being super-cautious is probably what got me through my teenage ‘bombs and rockets’ phase in one piece so it would be very annoying to lose a hand now.

Matt, thanks for the charger tips. I read your review of the Shekor (http://kaidomain.com/ProductDetails.aspx?ProductId=9650) and it looks perfect for me.

Also the XTAR WP2 (http://www.qualitychinagoods.com/xtar-charger-1450018500146501767018650-p-1786.html)

Chris

Quite a few. All the original RCR123s I bought have died. All of them completely undramatically - they just stopped being able to hold a charge. They would have ben three or four years in my possession at the time. I killed one protected RCR2 by leaving it in a light that had about 10 minutes runtime. Doorbell rang and three hours later I got back to the light. The protection circuit had failed to work and the cell leaked a nasty smelling liquid.

Not to mention all those laptop battery packs - which may contain some usable 18650s even after they have long since ceased to be able to power a laptop.