I know this is long and complex, sorry, but I need some help.
What are the chances that I would buy 8 cells and 2 be bad? I mean high quality cells bought from a repuatable dealer. One bad one from a set of four 3500mah GA 18650 button top protected and one bad one from a set of 4 LGMJ1 3500mah button top unprotected. Both bought within a few days of each other.
My charger is a new xstar VC4. Both bad batteries will not read in either my vc4 or nitecore i2 chargers. I tried the bad GA cell in my zebralight sc62 and it would not work. It’s dead. I swear though I charged all 4 up the first time I got them and they all charged the same, I took them out, and they have been sitting in their cases waiting for the tm16gt to show up. Got them out, put them in the light, and it wouldn’t work. Put the batteries back on the charger and one cell wouldn’t read at all, and it’s dead.
The same thing happened to me 2 weeks ago, when I pulled the LGMJ1’s out of the Fenix TK75vnQ that I have. One cell wouldn’t read at all, the other 3 had different voltages.
It gets me to thinking, can a modded flashlight mess up a battery? Can a bad charger mess up a battery? The reason I say this, once I saw the GA’s weren’t working in the tm16gt, I put them in the fenix tk75vnQ and the light worked. I then wanted to compare the lights since I just got the tm16gt, so I put the LG cells in the tm16gt (which worked fine) to compare outside.
Today, I wanted to try the GA cells again when I got home into the tm16gt. It would flash blue a few times and come on low only. That’s when I put the GA’s back on the VC4 charger and one wouldn’t read at all. Pulled out the nitecore i2 and nothing again. Tried the GA in the SC62 which I mentioned and nothing.
I can’t decide if I have a run of bad luck with batteries or my charger is screwed up, or if my Fenix light is messing up my batteries??
I am a very lucky person; my luck is very good or very bad with very little in between. Perhaps you’ve wound up like me.
First thing I’d do is check the cells with a DMM or voltmeter, and if it shows 2.5V or more I’d try them in a known-good single-cell light for maybe 5 seconds. That should not be long enough to cause a bad cell to go ballistic. Them I’d charge them on the lowest setting with safety in mind since these cells are suspected of problems and we don’t want things to get worse. I’d check the suspected light for proper function with known good cells.
And at any point if anything didn’t seem to be “acting right” I’d stop the process with that unit and set it aside for more careful scrutiny. Yes, a shorted light or charger can harm a cell, as can a charger that has lost regulation. In the first 2 instances it should be quickly obvious that something is wrong. The latter may not be so easily discovered but with a cell on charge a DMM should show a charge voltage similar to what the charger reads and never significantly above it’s rating (usually 4.2-4.25V, some will go up to 4.35V).
And yes, it’s possible you got my kind of luck and wound up with more bad cells in a batch than has ever happened to anyone else before.
Ok, I have my answer, and I’m relieved. I talked with Richard at Mtn Elec and he’s had a number of people with bad cells in with the LG and GA’s in his last batch.
He’s sending me new ones and having me send in the cells to be tested to figure out the issue.
Interesting. I’d regard Sanyo/Panasonic and LG as the most reliable battery brands, together with SDI and Sony. Never had any failure with one of these.
Makes me wonder whom Mtn get their cells from.
I’m sure Richard uses a good and reliable source- he strives for high quality like almost no others do.
With anything which is mass-produced, there’s always a chance that a group of products can be bad and get into the logistics system before the problem is discovered. Considering the millions of cells these folks produce, a bad batch this infrequently is actually doing very good indeed.
This does not deserve its own topic A FREAKING ULTRAFIRE CHARGER for more then a good one from a reliable brand would cost.
WUT, would this fall under the category “a bad charger that can ruin your battery”?