What’s a reliable place to get genuine high capacity 18500 cells? I never knew they existed until a moment ago, when I started searching around the ’net. Seemingly, there is such a thing as a 2000mAh Panasonic 18500. I’ve read a lot on BLF in the past about fakes, clones, etc. from some of the stores we buy flashlights from. So, I don’t know who to trust to send me only a genuine cell from a trustworthy brand. It doesn’t have to be the Panasonic. That’s just an example of what I found with a quick search. I’ve only ever bought good cells from Richard at Mountain Electronics. But he only has one 18500 cell - the Efest IMR v1 1100mAh. I don’t need the high drain of an IMR necessarily. I’m looking to get more capacity instead. Anybody know where to buy? A link to a product in stock would be great. I’m looking to buy >10 cells, so a discount price would be appreciated greatly as well!
Update: 5/23/2016
Oh no… I think I may get sick… :confounded:
I ordered some of those Panasonic 18500’s linked below from Banggood. Well, I just received them in the mail today and noticed Made in China stamped on the labels! :cry: I went back to the banggood listing and looked at the pics again. Only one pic shows the ‘back’ of the label. It’s the pic with 4 cells, each turned a different way. It clearly shows Made in China on the label. How did I miss it? :person_facepalming:
Guys, I can’t afford to buy fake cells - especially at the price I paid for these 18500’s! I don’t know what to do. Is there anybody that has these same Made in China cells that can confirm that they are real Panasonic high capacity 18500 cells? I thought Panasonic was a Japanese cell. HELP!!!
Thanks! I’d looked at those while searching around, but I wasn’t sure about them. I thought fasttech was one of the places that people have complained about getting fakes before. Good to know those are real. I’ve got that page bookmarked now.
How consistent are they with each other on discharge capacity and charge termination voltage? I need to use some of these in series, which is why a genuine top brand cell is VERY important!
These are known good Sanyo cells.
If at least you take care on balancing the cells before using them in series, you could do with just a protection PCB in one of them, if you care about this. But most of the time this is unnecesary in the Land of The Mindful Ones.
I have two of the sanyos and two of the keepower protected 18500, both work good.
There is not much progression made in the last years with this format…but on the other hand I just use them in a few lights which were designed for 3xAAAs and for this they are perfect.
I recently bought a pair of 1700mAh Sanyo 18500’s from FT, and I like them very much for a medium drain (3.5A max) S2+shorty mod. They do not work for a hotrod direct drive triple (shorty S2+, ww Nichia 219C, BLF-A6 driver, 14A on a purple Efest 18500), as soon as you switch to turbo, low voltage is detected and the driver switches to moon.
My Opus BC 3100 says the capacity is 1720 mAh.
They are flat-top, they may just, or may not, allow to be used in series.
Yep, try searching for Panasonic/Sanyo “NCR18500”. However, they may be hard to find/source.
For now, I’d look at the KeepPower 2000mah 18500 (which I believe are protected re-wraps of the NCR18500), and the Sanyo 1700mah UR18500F (unprotected). The latter will give you a bit shorter run time, but a flatter voltage curve. If you want a protected version of the UR18500F, I believe the KeepPower 1700mah 18500 uses that cell as well.
I have over a dozen of the Sanyo 18500 cells from Fasttech. Half of each of the ones listed above. They all work perfectly with my Malkoff drop ins. I use them in bored Surefire 9P and Malkoff MD3 hosts. Highly recommended.
Thanks to this thread, I have some of the 2000mah ones on the way from Banggood. I built a shortened pill S2+ 18350 sized triple, now with these 18500’s shoehorned into it, I will have about 80 minutes of runtime on high, compared to 30+ minutes on a 18350 in the same sized light…
Yeah, an X5 with an 18500 tube would be perfect. Especially on the Cu version, where any additional weight in the tube/tail/battery would be welcome to offset the top-heavy head.
Maybe an X5 2.0 is in order…
) yet i didnt got any bad ones from those yet……but you never know….