The blue/green (I have a green from Nealsgadgets) are shorter than the QB by 1.5 mm or so and have a higher current rating possibly. The Ni03 I tested on the green cell pulls 28 amps, but the QB gold one only about 24 amps. Maybe because it was new vs the green having about 4 cycles on it, but the green seems to be a higher drain cell.
Hmm, interesting…so not the same cells then. This could be a good thing in the end. Thanks, Sirstinky.
Sorry, I don’t know anything about those other 26800’s and none are in the queue (no requests yet). I’d take the time to test them though if anyone wanted to send me two of each.
Cost might be problematic just due to shipping them individually (i.e. not inside a device) from Asia, but if something can be worked out I’d sure chip in. I’ll put a post in our main 26800 thread here, maybe it can happen.
These new 21700 are really impressive. Cells seem to have plateaued for the most part and then boom, driven by industry we suddenly see some real gains!
I’d be very interested in this review. Would you have a link?
‘r/mooch’ shows nothing, ‘QB26800’ has many hits, none regarding his review.
I can’t guarantee they haven’t changed what cell they are wrapping but here’s my test report:
After much digging (“mooch315”), and finding your review some umpteen pages (been over a year), finally got to that linked forum.
Many thanks, I’ll dive in…
Yea, I reallllly need to get my web site up and centralize everything, indexed, with search, etc. LOL…in my copious spare time.
As I have your attention, perhaps enlighten me. I’m into designing my own builds and balancing cell discharge to LED current demand. The newer LEDs are power-hungry.
Trying to interpret those current graphs, they are in Amp-hours (capacity). I’m looking for sustainability (my preferred would be 3 minutes) and at no less than 3.6 volts (battery sag). These LEDs don’t perform at their peak below 3.6 volts, many at 3.8 volts (I’m disregarding those above as inconceivable to attain such with 20+ amps draw).
So how do I calculate or interpret those graphs?
Choose the discharge current level closest to that at which you are operating. Then follow the discharge curve plot line down to your cutoff voltage, 3.6V or 3.8V or whatever you choose. Whichever cell(s) deliver the highest capacity at that cutoff voltage will be the cells that give you the longest run time.
Odds are that the cells running for the longest down to my 2.8V cutoff will also be the ones running the longest down to a higher cutoff. You could use these tables to narrow down your choices:
If HKJ has tested any of the cells you’re considering he has a much wider range of discharge current levels you can check for highest delivered capacity at your cutoff voltage.
That’s what I’ve been doing, but how to translate Amp-Hours to minutes?
Example:
Ah is just amps * hours.
Convert the delivered capacity in mAh to Ah (Ah = mAh / 1000). Then divide the number of Ah by the current (amps) and you’re left with hours. Then you can convert to minutes. Since the discharge is constant-current you can do this.
You can do this directly using mAh and minutes but you need to handle the units carefully. I leave this as an exercise for the reader. 
That’s the maths I’ve been doing. As per the above example:
0.73 AH ÷ ~8 (estimated) ÷ 25 A = 0.004 Hours x 60 = 0.219 minutes (~13 seconds)
I’ll reverse engineer the graph so to what current can be sustained 3 minutes.
With some fiddling, about 18 amps.
I was thinking you could get that number just from the math but I deleted my post on that since I think the difference in voltage sag at lower current levels will have a big enough effect to make the math method not accurate enough.
It’s ok. I’ve been doing this for a while now and just ballpark figures do give me an insight as to what to expect.
Strange, the West Mountain Radio graphic uses such an awkward AH scale.
Nevertheless, those QB26800 cells from Aloft (the gold wrapper ones) don’t live up to my expectations. Originally was supposed to be ~10 mΩ IR (1kHz). And they cost me much with the shipping to Canada.
Looking forward to the eventual test with the green and grey wrappers. I would like to contribute but these were above my paygrade ($54 / 2)
Ah is the industry standard so it’s the default for most testing. They allow plotting by run time or Wh though.
But all this analysis gives you an insight into what we flashlight enthusiasts have as current capacity, that’s to say below ~3.6 volts isn’t worth considering for a power-hungry LED. And they have some at above 30 A !!!
Have to add, I bypass the FET driver for such high demand – hardwired direct drive, single-mode ON.
Sorry to hear they didn’t work out!
No good boost regulators to help out with that?
Hmm…actually, there would be a decent chunk of heat to deal with using that regulator and I bet you’re already dealing with a lot of that from the LED.
I like that bypass solution.