Some of you may have heard that at HIDCanada, we have an obsession. If we do something we, do it right. Case in point is in batteries where we test each and every battery and label it before it goes out. A prime example is our recent distribution of batteries from a known vendor were ALL under performing. We’re talking about more than 40% with some DOA as well. If we accepted the labels at face value, it would be a bad situation or even dangerous for the customer. Imagine this — charging a battery you expect to have ~600 mAh nominal capacity but actually only has ~200 mAh. We’re not talking “xxxxFire” here, we’re talking a good named manufacturer.
With that out of the way, I’d like to offer some food for thought or why AW batteries are a sure win when buying untested. Here is a raw sequential test of a small brick of AW ICR 16340, then two XTAR 16340 (randomly picked), then two AW ICR 14500.
What can we learn from this?
1. mAh don’t tell the whole story (see the discharge curve)
2. variances can be significant when not buying AW ICR 16340
3. buy your 16340 from a vendor that tests batteries or just go AW
Of the many batteries that come through our doors, only the AW 16340 and 14500 withstood the test of time and still is the top brand (especially to buy untested) in our opinion. Everything else like 3100mAh 18650, others have surpassed AW.
On a final note, only Keeppower and Nitecore major brands have managed to hold their own against AW in the 16340 and 14500 space. Unfortunately this comes at the expense of being several mm longer and “fatter” which has it’s own issues.
By the way, we’ve done the same tests on a half brick of TrustFire (blue) protected 16340 and the deviations were huge (capacity bet 220mAh to 401mAh). The average capacity of that half brick being 304mAh. Needless to say we opted not to sell any xxxxFire batteries at all.
All my TF protected Greys (16340) and TF protected Blues (18650), and TF protected Blues (14500), and TF protected Flames (26650), work perfectly fine in all my lights so far. Of course I charge them and try to maintain them up to snuff on quality chargers like Intelli-i4’s too so maybe that has something to do with it. I buy all my batts from DealExtreme, which means I pay a little more than Ebay unknowables, because I figure DX sells a crap load and if they’re selling counterfeits and complete junk it’s gonna come right back and bite them in the heinies. I don’t think they’re that stupid. Too many knowledgeable people watching them. Safety in numbers IOW. I’m not much of a battery snob yet but I can see where hard data can make you one.
I’m of the school right now that if it works and it works well enough for what I use it for then it works. Now if I was a Navy Seal in combat ready mode I’d buy the best Panasonics known to man.
BTW, ya hear that DealExtreme? Don’t ever mess with stupid profit motives when it comes to Li-on batteries.
I used to use xxxxFires myself and am still around (touch wood). As with anything in the world, the more you know about something, the more you realized how little you knew before After the shop setup the testing regimen, I stopped using all the xxxxFires. This is only speaking of 18650 and 16340. The performance varied quite a lot and some had “strange” discharge curves meaning they sagged horribly but hung in there to the very end — messing up anyone testing purely by capacity. Pop those bad boys (literally) into a high drain light and better hope the protection IC holds.
Again, not knocking xxxxFires, you just do need to know what you’re getting into. My point here is only that if you want to be just about 100% certain your 16340 is top notch without guesswork, AW is definitely the way to go.
Here are some grays we tested a long while ago… among their bad blue boys:
TrustFires? I kinda think they’re a sh*t load better than Ultras but maybe I’m delusional even when I see them working just fine in my torches. I mean just look at my photo taken by an orderly at Bellevue Hospital last Thanksgiving. I’m nutz.
Haha. Let’s just shorten down to *Fire. Stay safe and try to not charge those *Fire 16340/14500 alone in that i4 (e.g. go in pairs) so it never uses the 750mA charge rate against them
Now I will say I’m definitely a certifiable NiMh hardcore loon snob when it comes to brands. I only buy Eneloops. One hell of a fine battery and quite frankly, why bother buying anything else?
($19.99 for 10 AA’s or $19.99 for 12 AAA’s at your friendly Costco. I know Costco is gonna sell me the real-deal. Again, safety in numbers.) No brainer, baby, no brainer. Now I must get back to my porridge before the orderlies turn out the lights.
I’m not quite with you on that one. I stocked up on Imedions as they’re usually better dollar value vs capacity and it’s served me well UNTIL I found they don’t fit in the McGizmo 2xAA body — or an Eneloop USB “Booster Pack” (of course!). Now I have four white Eneloop AA sheep among the black Imedion flock. Nexcell LSD Energyon D batteries, that was another fiasco for another day…
With more manufacturers [ sources ] and the number of counterfeit’s [ yes counterfeit xxxFire ]
Buying batteries has become a nightmare , and I expect there will be more incidents [ flame outs ] as a result of the utterly appalling cells hitting the open market .
Protected cells or not , rubbish is dangerous !
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Im currently considering new 16340 , but AW is priced to high when factoring in postage …
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Id almost be prepared to retire my fleet of 16340 lights in favor of the AA lights … Simply due to the lack of a reliable source of affordable 16340 batteries [ My AW 16340 are getting long in the tooth ]
Not at all. Imedions offer comparable performance with usually better capacity/dollar value where I am, that’s all. If I want a bulletproof battery (say recommending to non-flashaholic), I’d just say Eneloop, hands down.
But hang on, if you buy from the source, postage is only like… $5-10 for up to 6 batteries? My numbers could be off but only very slightly. If your lights aren’t picky with length, I highly suggest Nitecore or Keeppower as an alternative — just from experience in testing.
But for the price of 1 AW battery you can get 3 or 4 *fire batteries. It would be worth it to get well-matched consistently performing for 16340’s where you are probably using them in pairs, but in a single cell use, typically 18650 for me, I’m not that worried about maxing out mAh. Trustfire flames and XTARs are okay for me for that. To put AW’s in my top 4 to 6 lights would be $100 or more.
Oh of course. The problem is the inconsistency and low capacity. You can bet an AW 16340 has at least 600mAh without testing. With xxxxFire, you’ll get anywhere between 200-400 … I’ve seen 422 once. The discharge curve is also much lower for xxxxFire. Now just ignoring the curve, AW can do up to 1.2A draw relatively safely. In contrast, that xxxxFire can be anywhere from 0.4A to 0.8A. The problem comes when charging or using it in a high drain light. Unfortunately most 16340 lights are pocket rockets which will highly overdraw that xxxxFire. For example, the V11R on turbo draws in the area of 2A. The AW will hang on but the xxxxFires are a time bomb or extremely low runtime at best.
Remember comparing tests are only as good as the testing methodology. Ours is detailed on the link above. We always test using 0.5A constant current to 2.75V (used to only do 2.8V) using the CBA III Pro. Charging and rest period also makes a slight difference.
It’s all down to what data you choose to follow. As you can see, we tested a full brick of 50 16340 above and you can see the consistency and results. You can then directly compare to the AW 14500 and XTAR 16340 testing using the exact parameters mapped on the same test graph. This also means when I say the Ultrafire blues are testing to 200-400mAh, there is a direct comparison to our AW capacity test of the same.
Make sense?
EDIT: By the way you’ll notice (and I just did as well) our product page notes the nominal capacity is 550-600mAh. Two bricks from this shipment so far have exceeded 600mAh on all cells so far. I wonder if they got better? Also note that HKJ credits the test time (or battery time) as May 2012. I doubt much could have changed but who knows?
EDIT2: Just found a post on CPF by me back in January noting the avg capacity for the AW we ran through back then was 580mAh. Go figure.
After the shop setup the testing regimen, I stopped using all the xxxxFires. This is only speaking of 18650 and 16340. The performance varied quite a lot and some had “strange” discharge curves meaning they sagged horribly but hung in there to the very end — messing up anyone testing purely by capacity. Pop those bad boys (literally) into a high drain light and better hope the protection IC holds.
