Mini-Review: USB Battery Box 4x18650 Aili (Newer Version)

USB Battery Box 4x18650 Aili (Newer Version)
Purchased from: eBay link.
Paid: $9.39

Externally, this box is the same as the Aili that was tested by HKJ here.
However, the box functions slightly different than described in his review, so I thought that I would point out the differences. This is in no way a comprehensive review. I got the model with the white top and black body, but there are several color combinations available.

Differences:

  • No side button for LED activation/deactivation (double tap power button at any time to activate/deactivate LED)
  • No battery reconnect button (batteries auto-reconnect)
  • No red LED for low battery (lowest 25% LED flashes instead)

Similarities:

  • Physically the same, including battery compartment
  • Automatically shuts power off after ~1 minute of no draw/extremely low draw (need to push power button to turn back on)
  • One USB port is coded as AC charger (fast), the other is USB charger (slow)
  • Can have USB charger hooked up at same time as discharging and batteries will charge (to the extent that input exceeds output)
  • AC coded port charges my smartphone fast (seems to have good output)

Discharge cut off is ~3.05 battery volts, charging cutoff is ~4.23 volts. The box doesn’t get warm, even under full load and seems to be fairly efficient. It charges my phone, ipod touch, and tablets as fast as my 2 amp wall charger. The styling and build quality are good for the price. I have been using it every day for a week now and don’t have any major gripes with it so far.

Verdict:
Recommended.

Would you be able to post a photo of the board inside? Something like:

?

Thanks,

-d

Thanks RMM. This looks promising. Would you take a guess at what it charges the batteries at? HKJ mentions it took about 10 hours to charge.

I’m curious if all the chips are the same, if so then the charge should be the same …. ?

Does yours lack the side current selection switch, 0.5A, 1A, 2A?

Possibly, I haven't looked to see if I could take it apart yet since it works so well! I have used mine a LOT and have given several away as gifts, I have no complaints whatsoever with it yet especially for the price.

"Does yours lack the side current selection switch, 0.5A, 1A, 2A?"

No, it has it. I just leave it on 2A since the device I'm using will only draw so much current anyways, I'm not sure why they even include the switch.

"Thanks RMM. This looks promising. Would you take a guess at what it charges the batteries at? HKJ mentions it took about 10 hours to charge."

No idea, very slowly. With four big 18650s in there you are very much limited by even 2A USB bricks and the large voltage drops across most USB cables. With four empty Panasonic 3400s I think that it take longer than 10 hours with a 2A wall charger.

The best thing about this for me is that one of the ports charges really fast, just as fast as a big 2A wall charger.

I still recommend this one after a few months of use.

Thanks RMM.
You mentioned using it with tablets. Have you noted the charge % it can provide on your tablets?

What do you mean by "charge %"?

It sure is priced to sell. This is so cheap, I think I’ll get one.

If you tablet is at 10% battery, can you get a full charge, twice perhaps?
I know its a pretty inaccurate way of judging its efficiency.

At least! Biggest device I have is a Nexus 7, but it will charge it at least twice, maybe more. My in-laws have an Ipad they charge it with and they also can get more than one full charge out of it although I'm not sure exactly how much. It doesn't heat up too much under heavy load which tells me that the efficiency can't be too bad.

I bought four of the newer versions of the Aili power banks, off the bay, as I liked the look. I was pleased from the performance, they seems to have a rather high efficiency. I use the power bank in conjunction with a 7 inches Tabcore tablet, mainly used as ebook reader, so it is not difficult, in a soggy day, for the power bank to operate half day at time. I use the LG2600 mA/h 18650 as they are a good compromise between price and performance; four of them exceeds ten consecutive hours of operation of the tablet at max brightness.
The nice feature of this power bank it is very low leakage current (the standby power consuption), which is an hair above 50 microampere which is shared among the four cells for a total of 12.5 uA each; consider that a typical protection circuitry of a protected 18650 draws between 3 and 4 uA from the cell. By connecting a 400 mA load to the 5 Volt output I measure 600 mA from the batteries, which accounts for 85% efficiency. The stability of the output voltage is below 5% between 0 and 2 Amps. The only possible drawback or this power bank, as I do not see premature aging caused by overheating, is the 220 uF filter capacitors which over time - I suspect - will dry out, causing voltage instability and additional 100 KHz noise in the output. In a future, quick mod I will replace the two caps.
I experimented with cheap 18650, namely GTL and Trustfire, plus some no-label; they tipically have variable capacities and self-discharge rates, but - irrespective of 5000 mA/h capacity indicated on the label - they rarely exceeds 1000 mA/h of capacity and 50 charge/discharge cycles at 80% SOC. Well (or maybe, NOT well) these batteries, most of the times, will not allow the power bank to complete the charge, in the sense that the 100% LED of the power gauge never stops blinking.
As the four 18650s are wired directly in parallel, I want to emphasise the need to use good quality batteries, with includes a PTC device, and make sure that they are balanced before you install them. As matter of fact, if they are not balanced, they may start to discharge one into another, because of the their parallel configuration.
A note about charging. By using REAL 18650s, in particular way the new LiNiCoO2 3450 mA/h cells from Panasonic, the power bank will draw about 1.2 Amp from the charger for 14-16 hours, and the vast majority of the best quality 5 V 2 A USB power supply are simply not designed for such treatment. Especially the USB chargers using the viPer chip (a high voltage power MOSFET with driving circuitry in a 8DIP case), or the 12 V cigarette lighter USB adapters. Usually they are protected by the USB to micro-USB cable (2 Ohm resistance for 30 cm. lenght), but usually they overheat and not allow charge to complete on time. I bought a proper power supply and a good micro-USB cable, and it complete the charge of the LG or Panasonic batteries overnight. The proper charger and cable are more expensive than the Aili. All in all, the power bank is the least expensive component of the set constitued by a set of 4 Panasonics, the power bank and the 5 V main charger, costing me as ONE of the Panasonic cells!
Regards to all
Anthony

I recently bought the newer version of this power bank from Ebay and I’m did some tests.
The old version has a cut-off voltage of 4.19-4.22. I owned three. New version has a cut-off voltage of ~ 4.31-4.34V. Discharge cut-off is ~3.07V. The tests has been done both with high internal resistance batteries(4.34V) and with new, good quality batteries (4.31-4.32V). Interesting, resting voltage immediately after cut-off is 4.29V in both cases. It seems that interrupts the charging current from time to time to check the voltage. To conclude, dangerous for the 4.2V batteries, good for the new 4.35V batteries. I’m curios if that is consistent with all these new power banks or only my version cut-off at 4.32V incidentally.

Hi dso,
received e-mail from BLF about your post, so here I am.
My new Ailis (luckily I received only one old version in six of them) all cut off charge at about 4.3 volt. This is no good for standard LiCoO2 Li-Ion battery, as they have no margins for excessive overcharge. A standard 1C 18650 will lose 40 percent of cycle life if charge is ended at 4.3 Volts. The charge/lifecycle curve is pretty steep for standard LiCoO2; at 4.6 Volts termination, battery is dead after 3 (three) charge/discharge cycles.
Matter is totally different when we are talking about more modern (and more expensive) hybrid cathode batteries. A 3450 mAh battery from Panasonic (according to its datasheet) has LiCoNiAlMn cathode and graphite anode. Newer releases (3900 mAh) from end of year 2015 will have a silicon anode.
Hybrid cathodes are more resilient, having a wider de-lithiation window, and less grow-shrink of the cathode (and anode) masses during charge-discharge cycle, so charging them at 4.3 Volts will cut maybe 15 percent off their lifecycle, which - at this point - I tend to disregard as a minor inconvenience.
If you use 18650 cells recovered from laptop batteries, which were all pure LiCoO2 chemistry, you will end up with shorter battery life in the new Aili.
My suggestion is to buy four Samsung 18650 - the 2600 mAh capacity, with a pink jacket colour - which are very commonplace with all Internet dealers and can be purchased relatively cheap, and are of hybrid chemistry. They keep in balance very well, and will not suffer too much from the 4.3 Volt termination. Set and forget it.
Hope this helps
Anthony

Thanks for the detailed explanations. I use this power bank with Samsung ICR18650-30B. They are batteries that can safely charged at 4.35V. I didn’t know that Samsung ICR18650-26F (pink) batteries can be classified in so-called hybrid category. It seems that this classification is relative. Not only the IMR batteries are hybrid.

For a full-encompassing explanation of the term “hybrid” we should get into definition of “olivine” and “spinel” batteries. For easygoing say, a Li-ion battery which has a cathode with other elements in addition to the cobalt, is called “hybrid”. Pure LiMn (the IMR types) battery aren’t, strictly speaking, of hybrid olivine-spinel nature. IMR are good for high current rates (use it in my e-cig mod and HID flashlight) but have low power density and don’t balance well.
I was surprised to find out in the datasheet of the 26F that it was a LiCoNiMn battery, since it is commonly used in laptop batteries. Anyway I was surprised by their quality, as they lose only 1 mA/h of capacity per each 80% cycle at 1C, a value that is normally in the realm of LiCoO2 batteries. They do suffer a bit when discharged at 2C, which is not true of the newer 3450 mA/h Panasonics.
Regards
Anthony

Did I read correctly that these units will charge and discharge at the same time?
Im looking for a good solution to keep vehicle mounted 4G hotspot active when ignition is off.
these might do in the meantime. ?….?

In the old version, yes, can charge and discharge at the same time. The new version can charge, at the same time, any device connected to it, but if you turn off the charging current, the charging is interrupted in both and the box goes into stand by. If the charging current returns, charging resumes in both. In fact, I think, the charging current only passes through the box and charge and everything else connected to it at the same time.

Pitty. Was hoping to route the power for my dovado through one.
was the old design any good ?

Unfortunately, I don’t have any one of the old version to can recheck this feature. Maybe someone else can confirm if it is so or not.