Review - Folomov A1 Compact Magnetic charger

Flashlight Charger Review

Folomov A1 Mini Magnetic Charger Review

A short review of the mini Folomov A1 charger/Power bank. There are a lots of single cell chargers around that also provide a powerbank feature but this one has a unique design and is does a good job!.

Firstly lets look at what you get. The product comes in small packaging or blister pack which describes some key features on the front side. The instructions are covered on the back of the packaging on a card that can be removed from the plastic cover.

Inside the packing is the charger and nothing else. It's a single unit that comprises of the main tiny body with cables for each terminal (+ and -) along with the two way USB connector.

The terminal leads are labeled in clear manner and contain a strong magnet, that appears to be a rare earth magnet/Neodymium. These easily and securely attach to battery terminals and wont slip off unless some force is applied.

The quality of the build is very good. The leads to the terminals are flexible but not so thin that they would be easily damaged.

The main body section is labeled clearly with the print that this charger can only be used for Li Ion batteries.

The charger is small in size and weight. Overall length is almost 21 cm, and it weighs only 21 Grams. This makes it a very compact charger or unit to use with a battery as a powerbank.

Below we see some examples of where the A1 is being used as a power bank. The left image is using a Folomov Protected 26650 battery and on the right a LG HE4 18650. The current measurements show up as one being 0.91A and the other 1.02A. As a power bank the charge rate appears to be around 1A depending on the cell. In both cases below the batteries were fully charged. In power bank mode the led on the A1 main unit remains lit up as blue.

Two examples below where the A1 is used as a battery charger. Whilst charging the LED on the A1 body flashes Green. Once the battery is fully charged the flashing ends and it remains permanently green.

The rated charge current is 1A. The current measured from the USB charger exceed 1A as per the images below. The charge current at the battery terminals was not measured however I'd expect that it's likely to be around 1A.

At the end of the charging the voltage of the LG HE4 was measured as 4.16V and the Folomov 26650 as 4.17V. Not quite 4.2V which would be ideal but close.

Sellers/Manufacturers Specs and Product Description

Specs shown below. The A1 can only be used with Lithium Ion batteries. As its design uses flexible leads there's no issue with battery length.

Summary

The Folomov A1 is a simply useful compact charger. It's small size and weight makes it a very compact device that can be used at times where batteries need to be charged or there is a need to use the power bank feature to charge phones when they are running low on charge.

Overall a very good compact charger.

Pros:

> Build Quality

> Power bank feature

> Very compact and light.

Cons:

> Doesn't fully charge batteries to 4.20V

Thanks to Folomov for providing this flashlight for review. No compensation received for this review other than the item for the review.

Key sites to see more about the Folomov Tour 5BM Flashlight

Folomov Home Site

Product at Amazon.com

Product at Amazon.uk

Facebook Link

It’s worth noting that unlike most power banks, you do not need a usb cable to receive charge with this unit, it has a full size USB interface, so the only time you need to add anything is to use it to provide charge, and in that case an adaptor would be sufficient, again no cable required.

Thanks for your comment, one I should have mentioned in the review.

You’re spot on the dual sided USB connector with one side Female and the other Male comes in very handy.

There’s a thought, if you had 2 of these, couldn’t you be charging 2 cells simultaneously?
Also, if used as a pass-through, does it provide all signals or just power, ie could you be charging and using a mouse from the same laptop port at the same time?