Test/Review of Kinoko IMR18350 850mAh (Gray)

Kinoko IMR18350 850mAh (Gray)



Official specifications:

  • Brand: Kinoko
  • Nominal Voltage : 3.7V
  • Capacity : 850mAH
  • Lowest Discharge Voltage : 2.50V
  • Standard Charge : CC/CV ( max. charging rate 1.5A )
  • Cycle Life : > 500 cycles
  • Weight: 28g
  • Diamter: 18.18mm
  • Length: 34.65mm




This is a 18350 IMR cell, i.e. it has the same diameter as 18650 batteries and the length of CR123 cells.










The cell works fine up to about 3A and the capacity does track fairly well.















Conclusion

Good capacity and good current handling, this is good batteries.
The rating can only be acceptable, because they are from a new and unspecified brand.



Notes and links

The batteries was supplied by Illuminationsupply for review.


How is the test done and how to read the charts
How is a protected LiIon battery constructed
More about button top and flat top batteries
Comparison to other LiIon batteries

My favorite battery for the RRT01!

Lovely, thanks for the tests!

These look very promising. :slight_smile:

Having half the volume of a 18650, isn’t the capacity a bit low?

This is an IMR cell, and 18650 IMR’s, such as the one from AW has approximately the double capacity of this one, so it’s a chemistry thing.

I haven’t seem any good ICR 18350’s though. :~

Oh, didn’t notice that, sorry

I'm getting both today. :)

That can be discussed. High capacity 18650 is made by the best LiIon factories in the world and the technology is constantly updated. The size is also made in extremely high numbers.

All other sizes is made in much smaller numbers and a lot of sizes are only made by second rate factories. These factories may do their best, but they do not have access to the top rate technology.

I.e. you will not see top capacities in anything but 18650.

This cell is doing fairly well for an IMR cell, either it is a perfectly made LiMn cell or they have used some of the chemistry improvements on it.

There are 3 decent cells in that size, protected and good for 2A (you should use IMRs if you want more current than 2A anyways):

http://dampfakkus.de/akkuvergleich.php?akku1=363&akku2=165&akku3=203&akku4=&akku5=&akku6=&a=2

Thanks for the info.

Unfortunately they have similar capacities to this IMR cell, so in essence, this Kinoko IMR cell both provides 800-900mAh even at high currents, while the ICR cells’ performance drops at high current (even seen at 2A).

As HKJ stated, I don’t there are 18350’s with 1500-1700mAh capacity (half of the top tier 18650 cells) simply due to the lack of demand and technology. :~

Capacity can't be half of an 18650. The space required at the ends is the same no matter how long the cells are.

I wouldn't be surprised if there's a shift away from 18650's in the coming years. Tablets don't use them, and they're eating into sales of laptops, and will continue to do so now that they're becoming quite powerful and there are hybrid tablets now too. Actually, the hybrid tablets are more of a return to the format brought about with the TC1000... The big variable will be electric cars. If they had the clout to influence development and production of lithium ion cells, would they prefer a different cell type?

I do believe that Tesla has a lot of influence on LiIon batteries, they do buy a lot of them.

That’s true, but should be closer to half, not to a quarter of it. (In my perfect world. :wink: )

I’m genuinely surprised the Model S is using thousands of 18650’s as apposed to li-po packs, just like in modern laptops.

I would think the same, but I suspect they're wary after the trouble with Fisker/A123.

The resistance looks exceptionally high for an IMR cell. At 0.16 it's 4 times higher than a Samsung INR 20R. Looks like the AW and Efest 18350 IMR's do much better, below 0.10.

Good catch.
Do the discharge graphs reflect the relatively high IR?

It is important to remember that I measure the Ri at high current, usual it is better to compare the discharge charts.

Yes - comparing the AW IMR against this Kinoko at 3A shows the AW is clearly better, and the Efest is better too. All I care about is high amps (Smile) and that's where internal resistance is critical.

Respectfully, for higher amps usage, I would stay clear of these cells.

Yes, you get higher voltage from AW or Efest, but also slightly less capacity.

Yes - the 850 capacity is nice bout these. Only 350's you've tested that's higher are the XTAR's, but they have that weird initial drop in voltage - not good for XM-L2 single cell high amp applications I would think.