Laptop Packs

So, let’s see if I can get this straight. You paid a little for these batteries yourself. You said most show 60% - 70% of original capacity through the laptops diagnostics. Now, you’re looking to sell off some of them to make back some money. But you want to make a little bit more off of them, so you can buy a couple of hobby chargers. You’re willing to sell at $2.50/pack plus flat rate shipping for a box load of them.

If that is all correct, I think you should get smaller boxes. Leftye said that about 25 packs fit in a box. You mentioned two sizes of flat rate boxes. We need to know if the 25 packs/box number is for the large or the medium box. I just tore open three laptop packs this weekend, and I have two more to go. One of the packs was full of dead cells. But I still think I have plenty of cells to power all the lights I have now plus whatever I may buy in the next year or two. In other words, four good packs is enough for me, at the rate of 6-9 cells/pack. I would think also that the people on here who have more lights than me have already obtained some cells along the way. So, not many should be hurting for 25 packs’ worth of cells. You need to find a way to make the box smaller and get shipping cheaper, so people can spend smaller chunks of money per box, especially since the packs are unknowns.

Where are you located

I’m just chiming in to point out that the tape is free too. Flat rate means priority mail, and priority mail tape is free.

Started a for sale thread. I am located in West Virginia. Always willing to do face to face. The small flat rates were too small. The mediums can hold up to 22, or 23 if I get creative. Hope the prices are fair if not please berate me and throw things at me from close distances.

I might be able to fit them in the envelope mailers… Have not tried. But the small boxes were too small. I will look to see if I can find the other size small boxes and see if it fits in them.

I don’t believe they give out free priority mail tape anymore.

Without data on the condition of the individual cells (laptops can be... let's just say overly optimistic in reporting, they can be programmed to report whatever the maker wants) after they are removed and tested in a way that individual cells are normally tested, these packs are worth approximately what you paid for them.

Which is the reason they are being offered for 0.30$ a cell. I am currently using several of them in a mechanical mod and in a few single cell lights. No issues for me, so I am very happy.

Since Hagg911 prefers comments about his batteries here, I've copied this post here.

Great cells? They were at some point. That certainly doesn't mean they are now. Even your testing so far indicates that they're not. Capacity isn't the only test. Worn out cells are going to sag hard at higher currents, even just 1A, which does lower the capacity in testing at that current. If you tested at 0.2A or lower, I bet you'll see a couple hundred more mAh.

Perhaps these cells are good, perhaps they're not. Your testing indicates the latter. The seller isn't doing testing, so it's up to customers to take the gamble. In this case you may have lost. It'd be good to know for sure.

Anyhow, let's diagnose your hobby charger. If it's a Turnigy B6 or clone, you can calibrate the voltage. Do so with a cell that has rested long enough for the voltage to stabilize. If you install Cheali open source firmware, you can calibrate the current too. Hopefully for the seller it's your hobby charger that's bad, and I encourage you to check that and post the results since you've already cast doubt as to the quality of these cells.

Don't make yourself out to be too much of a saint. You've indicated that you're getting these packs for free. Since you've already sold about a hundred, you've probably made $300-500 within 3 days of starting to sell them and still have many hundreds more to sell. Even if you sold them for $1 each, you'd still make hundreds of dollars. I don't begrudge you for selling them, not at all, but I think you're helping yourself a LOT more at that price than you're helping out members. There's nothing wrong with that. You're free to make money like anyone else. Obviously people are happy to pay that price to make that gamble. I've even tried helping you get shipping prices down. You're no downlinx though--he's given away batteries to me and others on this forum that he also got for free.

If you want someone to test your batteries, I'll test a couple if you want. I'll give it the full treatment. You can look at my signature to see what my tests are like, although I'll be adding more data than is in those tests, like temperature, comparisons against smart analyzing chargers, fitment in different lights. It'll probably be two weeks though. Since I'm a bit burned out on battery testing right now, it'll be about a week to test a pair of cells. One pack is more than enough though unless you have different types of packs with other kinds of batteries inside.

EDIT: Let me revise my offer a bit. I already have some batteries in the mail from Supbeam/Acebeam. Because I offered to test their batteries first, when those arrive, I'll immediately start testing them through completion even if I already started testing your batteries.

Do stagnant Li Ion cells need a few charge cycles to “perk back up”?

Those of us who can test these cells in their entirety get a set and test them

I don’t think Hagg911 is a shyster seller trying to screw us over, he is also unaware or uneducated on the specifics of the cells, not saying that is a bad thing but NOT knowing can also be an issue (remember mistreated or damaged Li Ion can potentially become miniature grenades if the conditions are met for venting)

Those who can test em, please step up to the plate and check em out

I might be too open and accepting of peoples and have fallen for a few “too good to be true” dealers and have gotten burned [we all have], but the Marines has taught me one thing “Trust, but verify”

I have sold about 200$ in batteries. I have traded 21 packs for a hobby charger. I have offered a member that is not able to open the packs I have sent them to open another set of packs and resend the batteries as singles without sending back the original shipment. Due to a box being eaten by USPS one member lost 4 packs and I have offered to resend them the entire shipment as amends.

Seriously I give up. I will honor all outstanding orders and take down the WTS page. I went above and beyond what I thought was right and fair to the users that have ordered from me. Once I figure out how to test these packs and buy the necessary equipment I will repost it.

Don’t accept defeat man…just realize the guys asking these questions are doing it for the benefit and safety of the entire community man.

I think what you are doing is a selfless and NOBLE endeavor…and you are not out to screw anyone or make a quick buck at others expense.

If you do want to continue to sell them I offer a slight suggestion…send out the remainder of the orders, get your hobby charger, test test and more test (maybe even recruit a few good battery tester folks here), then come back and sell them knowing they are good to go.

I for one am very grateful for your openness and good dealings, and honestly believe you are “one of the good guys”

Truly you are sitting on a goldmine, you could easily get 2x the price for these cells or more and still offer a “GREAT” deal, however knowing you are selling safe product is a good thing right?

Please don’t give up…just regroup, then come back kickin’ butt and taking names

I don’t know your level of knowledge about batteries but learning what you are dealing with will give you a better incite on the value of what you truly have, and keeping everyone including yourself safe, after all knowing is 1/2 the battle :wink:

http://www.sony.com.cn/products/ed/battery/download.pdf <- a great resource for edumication on batts

I'll be honest. I'm relieved. Doing a thorough battery test takes a lot of time and effort, and I wasn't looking forward to doing all that with worn batteries. I already made the offer, so I won't retract it, but it sounds like you'll be doing it yourself anyway. I think it'll be great for your buyers if you're testing all your batteries. Testing will severely slow down how quickly you can sell them though, at least if you're doing it with your new hobby charger.

Comfychair did have a point though. The $5.85 you were asking per pack in quantities of 1-5 was profiting you about as much for batteries that I pull from packs, cleanly remove the solder tabs, clean up all the glue, rewrapping if necessary, discharge testing and bringing back to storage voltage, and discarding bad cells. Because of all that, I can only sell 4-6 per day. From where I stand, you had a GREAT deal going for you, but not nearly enough of a good deal for me to buy because I know how much trouble it takes to do all the work I do. If you're willing to do all that work and still sell for the same price, then your buyers will really have a great deal. Good luck to you.

So you expect better quality control from me than all of china? Could you give me a list of equipment that I need to order and if possible how to run the tests and which tests you think I should run. Also are you suggesting I need to test every cell? I have 1800+ cells on hand and another 3600 on the way.

There's no way to know which packs have had easy lives and have been treated well, and which ones were abused and are all clapped out. I wish I could say that you should only have to test enough at random to get a good picture of what the entire group is like, but sadly, I don't think that will be the case. I don't think anyone could test at random and be able to draw an accurate conclusion about the entire batch, so I'm not just picking on you specifically.

Used cells of any age are risky, old but unused cells are nearly always in near-new condition. Even a pack that's been fully charged just once and then put in storage, or charged & discharged and then stored, will be in much much worse condition after 3-5 years than a brand new pack that's never been charged and stored in the same conditions for the same amount of time.

I hope I'm wrong, but I don't think you're 'sitting on a goldmine', I fear that they will turn into a burden and you'll have a helluva time finding someplace that will take them for recycling. Brand new but old packs with better cells than these turn up from time to time on ebay for $12-15, and the cells inside are indistinguishable from brand new bare cells. Please be realistic about what you really have there.

SO then what is wrong with selling them as used untested laptop batteries. That is where we seem to be at odds. I am selling them untested and cheap to make up for it, yet you seem to be upset by this.

Even if they are degraded by 20% they are still good daily driver cells right? Or even power pack cells

Heck…they are probably better than brand new Ultrafire Chinese mAh cells that are being hocked everywhere

Either way it’s his call…

Are you comparing your batteries against those like Ultrafire? I suppose that's not a bad comparison. Ultrafire is suspected of recycling their batteries and they don't perform to the ratings printed on their labels. Your prices are better than Ultrafire too. However, they do sell them as separate cells with clean wrappers and ends. Advertising them as "comparable to Ultrafire" may not be a good idea though!

In your case, for expediency, I think you're best off using Opus BT-C3100 chargers. It won't give you awesome discharge graphs that really tell you what's going on, but at least you can do discharge tests at different currents and test the internal resistance, and most importantly, it's a lot faster and easier to test four batteries with one of those than with a hobby charger. Maybe you can get Gearbest to offer you the old group buy price if you order a few of them. If you can't get a good deal from Gearbest, you might want to try contacting Basen about their charger. Iirc, someone on reddit said Basen would sell them for about $17-18 each. And I'm only suggesting a single test at one current for each cell, not at a range of currents like I do in my tests.

The problem here is that charging eats up some time that could otherwise be used for testing. Maybe you could use your hobby charger to charge the batteries in parallel so the Opus chargers can spend more time doing discharge tests. Then there's another problem. After the test, do you keep them depleted, charge them fully again, or put them at a good storage voltage? The first two are bad for the batteries, and the latter eats up more time.

Testing each cell will eliminate the gamble for your customer and will be generous. Like I said before, you could just put them up for sale at whatever price people are willing to gamble at, and be easy and profitable for you.

I thought that was what I was doing lol.

Do you have a hobby charger yet, or some way of measuring capacity? Something that can directly measure internal resistance would be a bonus but not strictly necessary, you can get a pretty accurate idea of IR by comparing capacity test at 0.2A to capacity at 1A. The larger the difference between them, the higher the IR.

Do you at least have a charger ordered but not arrived yet that can measure those things?

Earlier when you gave the numbers of what the laptop reported about the packs, what did you use? A working laptop of the same model these were made for, using the battery calibration function in the BIOS? Or just the onscreen 'battery remaining' scale thing? Or do the packs themselves have a little barcode '% remaining' indicator on the side? Because only the BIOS calibration thing can tell you anything about capacity, all the others are only voltage indicators and tell you only about the state of charge, but nothing about capacity.