Massive fraud on 18650s in the Littokala Aliexpress stores!

I’m going to go with Simon and Convoy lights…
I might order a red white and blue, make one patriot and sell the mismatched ones off at a discount…

Guys, if you want some real legit stores that I have ordered from, I would recommend the liitokala Official Store and Sunway store since I have bought cells from them, and confirmed they were legit.

I bought 6x 30Qs from the Sunway store:
https://sunway.aliexpress.com/store/3173029?spm=2114.search0104.3.5.1848cb3eLEeQ51

I bought 6x LG F1L from the liitokala Official Store:
https://liitokalahongkong.aliexpress.com/store/217753?spm=2114.12010615/itm2home-3.1000002.18.783e40b5HMjMSM

That liitokala Official Store is the REAL one. All others can be considered much more risky to order from.

Greed? Maybe. But I’m overspending on this hobby already and I prefer to cut costs by buying cheap as opposed to not buying.
It causes some headaches. But it’s worth it for me.

Will not buy from that store again. Will buy from other stores though.

The liitokala Official Store has now also 30Q pictures with four wings as product pics.

And sb. from Poland acknowledge getting 4 wings 30Q.

I bought the batteries here. Video and Photos on page 12.

Well… $29 for 4x30Qs is not exactly a good deal.

From EU i’d rather buy from Nkon.nl.

It is if it’s about the only place that will ship (and free, too). I’ve got the VTC6’s from that store earlier this year, and they’re genuine (cheaper than the 30Q’s for some reason, too). If you factor in shipping (free), it’s a decent deal.

Personally, I’d avoid the 30Q’s from anywhere on Ali, until the mess with the fakes is sorted out. Maybe the fakes aren’t in every store, but if the Official Store is showing the 4-prong fakes, it has me concerned.

@patmurris, I ordered from them when there a sale.

That sale is over, and prices are back up.

And of course if you are from the Eu I would order from nkon. However, in Canada, we have almost nothing.

Sorry, i forgot to factor in the shipping problem with some parts of the world… So far we have been rather lucky over here.

How you doin' fellows?

Right now I am undergoing two dispute procedures for both 4x 30Q and 4x 25R packs. 30Q cells purchased from liitokala Faketory Store (725333) and 25R ones from lietokala Official Store (217753).

30Q cells have 4x lobed top, higher internal resistance and capacity about matches, but not as consistent as genuine cells. The 25Rs have a 3x lobed (but different) top, higher capacity, higher internal resistance and also lack genuine cells' consistency.

I've opted for “product not as described” and half refunds, sellers do not seem very cooperative despite this though.

We'll see how it goes, but I think it's pretty much nailed down.

Did you thought… if getting a PayPal refund is easy in this regard, did I found a mine of free li-ion cells? :-D

Cheers :-)

@Barkuti
You posted you wrote to Samsung about the four hole cap. Did they respond?


Can remember, case Seems like I got a six-pack of counterfeit/fake Samsung ICR18650-30B cells :-/. Unforfunately, Samsung never replied. I'd like to believe something different, but I think AliExpress right now is pandemonium ground for rogue li-ion battery sellers. And fuck with that. :-|

Cheers :-)

I’ve got 4 NCR18650B with tabs from LiitoKala Official Flagship Store
I suspect them being counterfight. The wrapper is bit different (tipical wrinkles on both sides) and letters fonts are different too. Before any disputes I’ll do discharge test with curve plot in parallel with unused geniue I’ve got two years ago . This will definitively show what cell is really inside.
For additional comparation I’ve ordered same from VariCore Official Store but it will take time…

Recorded in a single unrehearsed shot to be used as dispute evidence. Sorry for my rough pronunciation. :-)

Have fun!

I bought four. They’ve taken like two and a half months to get here. The worst shipping period I’ve ever experienced from a seller. They’re just as everyone else has described, fake but I literally CBA’d to start a dispute for the sake of less than a tenner. I’ve left feedback stating they’re not genuine.

Please understand they use the absolutely cheapest shipping service available, maybe even to the point of declaring the contents as “something not li-ion cells”. FastTech only quotes me shipping for cells via two carrier services, “PostNL” airmail or “China Post” (slow) ground shipping, and neither is free so this is the reason those sellers are using hacks for super cheap shipping.

With regards to going dispute I've done it for my 30Q 4-pack and even for a 25R 4-pack (https://www.aliexpress.com/item/liitokala-for-samsung-18650-2500mah-lithium-battery-25r-inr1865025r-20a-battery-for-electronic-cigarette-Free-shipping/32800243313.html). Paid for PostNL in that last order, got fakes and I've attained half refund favourable resolution. It really is not that much about the money, but to get the AliExpress Case Management Team more aware of what is going on in their yard. My 30Q review has been a 2/5 because the capacity is there, packaging was good and they may be HG2s (still to determine). The 25R order (from store number 217753) is gonna receive a major spank in the ass, not only less consistent fake cells but the seller, literally Ashley zhang caps typo included, was using a photo of Elsa Pataky. See here.

From now on and until something changes in this respect, I'll stay away from AliExpress for ordering big OEM high discharge cells.

^:)

Made discharge test to compare geniue Panasonic NCR18650B to tabbed ones I’ve got from LiitoKala Official Flagship Store

I’ve got almost the same capacity at 2A, but the curve looks quite different. Wondering which cells are really under wrapper. Funny enough voltage curve is higher for the most of the time. Will try to use HKJ data to compare.

PS. The closest match by curve in HKJ comparator was Sanyo NCR18650BF/BL 3350mAh, but not by looking at them. I think I’ll need to unwrapp them.

Got my 30Q and 25R half refunds, but in the 25R case the cell appearances didn't convinced the AliExpress Case Management Team. My photos were very clear and well focused, so fuck with that and them. They bite the bullet because capacity was different, sent them combined photos of my Lii-500 result display shots.

There's some cylindrical li-ion cell crime syndicate out there in china. They're mass rewrapping cells, obviously. Hope they get spanked, preferably soon.

Cheers ^:)

I will be very interested in your findings as i got the same 18650`s from that store and they were all 5 x lobed top, all there capacity’s were above 3200mah.

Roll the dice!
I wonder what cycle life we can expect from all these unknown cells. Main problem here is: do we need to go through all this uncertainty? :-| If we could get the cells in their original OEM wraps at least we would have a nice chance to get a datasheet and we wouldn't feed those criminals.

My $0.02