Cheapest charger that will take long (70mm) 18650

I got a couple cheap zoom lights to give to people, but the batteries I'd like to include with them are the 3000mah ultrafires... which come in at a full 70mm long (18"65"0....), and don't fit the cheap chargers I was going to include. What's the cheapest charger that will charge one of these, without being excessively likely to explode? Do the "universal" (nimh+lico) ones take the longer batteries? They can be had for $2.80 or something these days...

Thanks,
--Bushytails

I think this should fit them

http://www.dealextreme.com/p/ultrafire-wf-188-rapid-charger-for-3-2v-3-7v-lithium-batteries-100-240v-44091?r=43033281

And also this

http://www.dealextreme.com/p/trustfire-tr-001-multi-purpose-lithium-battery-charger-12594?r=43033281

Are those the ones you were thinking about?

EDIT: forgot to say, I have 2 of the lico-nimh chargers of what you are talking about and no one fits more than 67mm long batteries.... maybe others yes

I'm not sure that it covers your "cheap" need, but XTAR WP2 is suitable for 70mm batteries!

I got this one with the Trustfire X8 http://www.dealextreme.com/p/18650-digital-battery-charger-3499 , and it works so good that i use it instead of the Ultrafire WF-139. The WF-139 is much slower.

The two charging bays of the small Travel charger are not independent, both batteries are charged together. If you only want to charge one 18650, all the charging current goes to that one batterie, so it is charged much faster. It cuts off at 4,2V every time. For the batteries of the X8 it is very important that they have the same voltage, so it is no problem that they are charged in parallel.

The protected Trustfire 18650 cells are 68,22mm, and if i press the spring of the charger together, than there is some more "play" at the + side, so i think a 70mm battery will fit in this charger.

This charger doesn't cut off at all. It just shows when battery is full (green light) and continues to charge with very low current (can't recall now, but can be up to 70mA). So leaving battery in for longer time leads to overcharge. How much overcharge depends on time and battery itself. Even XTAR 18700 went up to 4.23V, but didn't want leave them longer to see if its protection kicks in. They fit very, very tight, btw.

But if you are around and you stop charging when green led lits up, it's about ok.

BTW, one (nonfunctional, at least not correctly) of them I've converted into voltage checker. See: https://budgetlightforum.com/t/-/2737

They don't fit in a TR-001 - I have one, and already tried it. They kinda sorta fit if you jam them in with the positive bump pushed against the top of the contact instead of the face, with the battery sticking out at an angle, but it's marginal at best, and any vibration makes it loose contact.

The WF-188 is distinctly not cheap, the biggest requirement...

The forums for the 2-bay one show that the new ones are exceptionally poor quality, and that 67mm is a tight fit, so 70mm is probably out of the question. One person says they can't even fit the trustfire blues in. "OK, managed to somehow fit my protected cells into my charger by completely flattening spring contacts on charger and forcing them in carefully, plastic hasn't cracked and seems not distorted too much..."

The only charger I have that they do fit in is a combination ac/12v charger, which was not cheap, and despite being not cheap, badly overcharges them if left in (I once measured one at 4.36v after two days with the light green. Yes, that's a 3, not a 2.), so I wouldn't want to give it to a random non-flashaholic who won't pull them out as soon as they finish...

Any other ideas?

--Bushytails

I just got 4 of these to give out as gifts for $4bucks each. They charge the biggest 18650 Trustfire flames that I have to jam in my TR-001 fit with room to spare. The amazing thing is this charger does Duraloops as well and 9 volt all 4 terminate when they are supposed to. Very good deal I have been rotating using all 4 just to test them good before I give them away. They generate minimal heat as well.

http://www.manafont.com/product_info.php/lithium-battery-quick-charger-f...

Those are the universal ones I was talking about... So one person says they fit, one says they don't?

The Ultrafire 3000s are a bit over 2mm longer than the trustfire flames - can you make sure you have 2.5mm or more of spare room? Thanks!

--Bushytails

Wow - thanks! Can the sliding contact open enough that there's 70mm between the contacts?

buyincoins only wants $2.93 each for them... I'd order a couple and find out for myself, but then if they don't work, this gets delayed another two weeks...

Thanks again,
--Bushytails

So how did it work?

My xtar 2600's fit so they may just fit. The xtar single charger they will definitely fit as they will take a battery 72mm long

I got this charger from eBay, and it works, but it is SLOW! Tried charging up my Trustfire flame protected 3000mah 18650s for the first time last night. They were both around 3.8v when i started charging, left them on the charger for 12 hours and they are still only at 4.15 volt. I know they are not done charging yet, I checked them every couple of hours and the voltage is still slowly creeping up. The charger is rated a 4.2v output of 600mah. If my math is correct, it should take 10 hours to charge two 3000mah batteries. My other 18650 charger is a single charger with a 4.2v output of 1.0ah, it charges batteries much quicker obviously. I think I will charge batteries independtly in that and verify voltages are the same before using together.

Looks like non-independent channels. So by multiply your time by two if charging two at a time.

Right so that would be 300mah per battery or 10 hours to charge both 3000mah batteries.