Test/review of LG 18650 M36 3600mAh (Cyan)

Batteries and Chargers Rechargeable Batteries
1

LG 18650 M36 3600mAh (Cyan)







Official specifications:

  • None



This must be a fairly new high capacity cell from LG.










The battery can deliver up to about 10A. The capacity do not match the rating, but then I do not discharge to 2.5V.
I am a bit surprised that the cells do not match perfectly, usual they do from the big brands.







At 15A the battery gets too hot.















Conclusion

The battery just about matches other 3500/3600mAh cells in capacity and performance



Notes and links

Vapcell told me that I was missing some cells in my comparator and they would be happy to supply them.

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
Compare to 18650 and other batteries
2

Thanks HKJ.

Seems to try hard to be the NCR-GA, but maybe isn’t quite on par.

I guess we need to see the street prices, to choose?

Chris

3

Thanks for the review. Thing I’ll be sticking with GAs!

4

Thanks for the review!

Is this the new LG F1?

5

Barely any better than the LG 18650 MJ1 “3500”, yet they keep inflating the magic number. Is the “3600mAh” figure an actual datasheet capacity claim? No way this cell delivers that down to 2.5V even at 0.2C rate. And neither the NCR18650GA nor the Samsung INR18650-35E are much better.

This is a 3200mAh minimum capacity class cell for up to 3C rate.

Cheers ^:)

6

I expect it from the Chinese brands, but not LG.

Oh well, for 99% of the lights out there, this will ‘probably’ be a sufficient cell, especially if they’re closer to $5 than they are to $8.

Chris

7

Anyone know LG date codes? Seems like the cells are from 2 separate batches. I would expect them to match a little better though. These didn’t overheat either at 10amps like the mj1 and last a good bit longer at 15 amps as well before overheating. There are slight improvements. I would go with whatever cell is cheaper.

I use both mj1 and ga. I like GA for lights that need button tops they usually make contact. Or I remove the little plastic spacers. But in my use I’ve noticed the mj1s hold there capacity for more cycles then the GA cells do. But I use a lot of cells. At least 12 to 20 cells daily occasionally 40 cells charged a day

8

Have you tested blue LG 3600?

9

Because for you, the LG M36 tested in this subject are what color? Lol, Cyan is a kind of blue.

10

New 3600 is dark blue colour

11

According to this datasheet from NKON, the standard discharge specification (point 2.7) for this cell is 0.2C at 670mA down to 2.5V. This is ≈3350mAh typical down to 2.5V in a 5 hour long discharge. ⚆ _ ⚆

Cheers ^:)

12

Do you have at least one picture to prove what you’re doing?

Because, I have never seen or heard of that. For my part I ordered 5 units of LG M36 from Vapcell and another 4 units from NKON.NL a little over a month ago and they are all Cyan. And anyway, if the M36 have changed color wrap I doubt that their performance has changed greatly whether it is at capacity, discharges or temperatures.

13

Seems different colour:
https://eu.nkon.nl/rechargeable/18650-size/lg-inr18650m36-3600mah-10a.html

14

Different cameras and lighting can change what colours look like.

15

Exactly, it’s a question of lighting and model cameras used, more in my LG M36 reviews, the ones I ordered from NKON.NL moreover have exactly the same batch number (Q250I073A7) that on your photo example (taken on the site of NKON.NL at the same time it is rather logical) and I can confirm to you that they are cyan as HKJ had previously described in his test, so there is no new versions or revisions, in addition if they wanted to change colors due to changes in versions or revisions, they would not have taken a blue because it is too close to the cyan, for example the LG M26 has been Revised and changed color by changing revisions, they went from purple to gray, which makes more sense to highlight any change on a cell model.

16

This same URL says 5A now in description.

LG INR18650-M36 3600mAh - 5A

Anyone have an idea why nkon changed to 5A from 10A?

17

Ok, got anwer from Arjan (thanks, if you read this)