Ruinovo 4 cell powerbank

Hi guys. My powerbank stopped charging so i took the cells out and they all measured 1.49V.so i have to toss them. Did my unit fail or are the cells just too old now?

Connect the powerbank to a USB 2.0 port on the computer.

You want the powerbank to charge the cells as slowly as possible back up to lessen the chemical damage inside of the cells under 2V. Leave the powerbank connected to the computer’s USB port until it’s fully charged.

I dont even think the charge initiates. Usaully the blue light tells me it is charging but it didnt this time so i knew something was off. Not going to attempt recovering these cells as they are a few years use now. More worried why the box didnt have LVP. Hesitant to put new cells in.

I have the 4 cell Ruinovo power bank that I got off of FastTech some three years back.

It came with 4 Sanyo UR18650FM 2600mAh cells and they’re still working fine. Mine hasn’t self discharged at all, but I charge it back up every few months, just to keep it full (hurricane season right now.)

Try replacing the cells and see what you see?

Chris

I stuck in some pulled laptop LG cells and it lit up giving me 4 bars. Hmm guess the last set just decided to give up.i read HJKs review and it didnt mention anything about LVP so from now on i will charge it up at 50%.

That’s good news. At least in my instance, FastTech offered some quality cells for a minor up-charge, but FastTech lists their cell offerings as being ‘authentic’ and then the other ‘versions,’ so who knows what you actually got?

Another thing is that, as per HKJ, these power banks can shut off at anywhere 3.0v-3.3v, but that doesn’t address parasitic drain, which sounds like what happened to your unit, perhaps?

Keep that in mind going forward and keep monitoring things when you’re not actually using it, would be my suggestion.

Finally, my Ruinovo stopped charging up on the 2A port after a few months. With my USB voltage meters, I’d get at best 250mA of charge into the unit using that 2A circuit, while charging at ~1A on the 1A input.

I ended up buying a second barrel>USB cable and tried that and got just over 1A in a barely depleted state, so maybe it was a bad $2 cable that I had?

Anyhow, it still works and I’ll have it ready for the next storm. It came in handy with the neighbors last year during an 84 hour power outage due to IRMA.

Chris

I bought it bare from fasttech and the cells were from a lenova laptop pack. They were orange Sanyo UR18650ZT 2800mah. I think I just drain them too much. I was using them to charge my Note 4. Thanks for reminding me about that 2A charge port. I keep forgetting to use it. In fact I don’t even know where it is. I think it is a pretty decent power bank but because I don’t have any apple products I find that both ports give me around 1A each. And it is hefty so I tend to leave it at home. because of the weight I went with the Miller ML106 for a bit but the one cell I found wasn’t enough. Just ordered the Xtar PB2. A compromise in size and fuel I hope. I have one of those mini USB thumb lights from fasttech as well. They would work great for outages. What did your neighbors is the bank for? Cell phone charging?

Ruinovo made a couple of different models 3 cell, 4 cell, 4 cell with LEDs on the top cover, but here’s mine:

Ruinovo 4 cell power bank…

As you can see on the far right, there is a 2A barrel connector charging (INPUT) port, where you need a 3.5mm x Y mm connector. This allows for a bit faster charging of the power bank.

I got up Sunday morning after IRMA had past and I’m seeing all of my neighbors in their cars, either idling in their parking spots, or driving around our condo grounds. At first, I though they might have just been hot and were running their car’s AC, as it was hot already.

They were all charging their phones and their cars were the only way, so it was Chris to the rescue for the ones I liked.

I was able to charge it back up on Monday, so it was no bother.

Chris