TF flame 14500 judgement call

Batteries and Chargers Rechargeable Batteries
21

Hologram my a$$!!!

Today i have received shrink-wrapped Protected Trustfire 14500's from DD, and they were supposed to be the ones with the hologram. Clearly, what i had ordered and what they have shipped is different stuff! DD lists three "price versions" of the Protected Trustfire flamed 14500's. To be clear, they are:

  1. Protected Trustfire flamed 14500's: price version 1, US$ 4.39
  2. Protected Trustfire flamed 14500's: price version 2, US$ 4.99
  3. Protected Trustfire flamed 14500's: price version 3, US$ 7.99 (w/ Hologram sticker)

I had ordered price version 3, but today received a 2-pack of cells *without* Hologram sticker. I have tried to reason with DD chat (OttA, otta_) and even uploaded pictures of my received stuff but they wouldnt admit the error.

Maybe those hologram stickers arent produced any longer (wtf knows??) but i had clearly ordered price version 3 specifically for the Hologram sticker! I am going now to contact Summer.. First time that i am getting pi**ed with DD ;)

22

I ordered some TF flame protected 14500s and 18650s (3000mah version) from Mantafont. I ordered from them because people have had good luck with TF flames from them. But neither of them had hologram stickers on them when I received them. Should I be worried? They seem to work great.

23

Maybe any average user shouldnt be too concerned to use un-hologram'ed Trustfires but i paid EXTRA money to get in possession of that damn sticker. I want the sticker!!, because it's 100% original and ..etc.

Anyway. i am not an average user. *GG*

24

Basically what I was trying to say is, just because they don't have the hologram sticker, does that mean they are fake? If so, the TF 14500 flames and the TF 18650 flames that I got from Manafont are fake.

25

my previous Flamed protected 14500 TF's were from DX. no hologram sticker. worked fine. until i dropped my flashlight exact bezel down (see OP, this thread's topic).

So yours are probably no fakes, and neither are mine (wtf knows?).

i had paid extra money to get the extra assurance and to get the explicit da*n beautiful sticker. (My 2nd hobby is collecting of hologram stickers, forgot to mention it! ;) )

Apparently, DD ships hologram'ed packs!! So wtf is mine??!?!!

@Summer

see your PM, thx.

26

Here is another helpful post, thanks to MixoMaxo for the documentation!

So how do we find out that a Trustfire is FAKE? (What's the weight of a hologram'ed Protected Flamed Trustfire 14500??)

27

Usually fakes have different flames and worst quality of the wrap; in originals all the battery warp change color looked with a different angle(where is not deep painted), you can see that better on the written from "WARNING" to "water" and on the big TRUSTFIRE logo

my 14500 flames weight is from 20,54 to 20,66g(I tested 5) btw chk the weight is not ever infallible...

look at HJK new test of 18650 flames(from DX) are different(bin logo) and lower weight of mine 43,1g and worst performance of all tested flames

I wish to add that on my next DD orders I got 6 pairs of original protected 18650 flames with hologram and of "correct" weight ~47,7g

28

Thanks for the useful info!! Now i need to get a precision scale... hehe

29

Hi kreisler,please give me your order number, I will do it for you.

30

I ripped the pcb off of my AW 14500 because it wouldn't fit properly in my nitecore d11 v2. Works great.

31

never mind, CS helped me in the end. received a giftcard. happy customer back i am! :)

thanks anyway!!

no further action required. i will buy some kickass multimeter probably. more useful than an imax, gorann ;)

32

Yoh, total confusion now. MixoMaxo said that the 4.99 ones came with a hologram sticker. So next time i will order these instead of the 7.99 ones.

imax for 4.99$? where did you buy it that cheap? (and is a power supply included?)

33

All my DD TFF come with the hologram and all performed OK. They are all protected and I choose the cheapest available :) Me being cheap skate

34

my bad. i am the cheap skate impersona. and should have stayed that way with the TF’s.

whenever i try the 'pay more and you get more' thing, i fall flat on the face

with DD, it's more like 'pay less and you get the same'. sweet.

35

I got another order of the TF Flames but 18650s, not 14500. It's another SKU coz the first one is already sold out (not that one which created a big hoo-haa which all like 16 cells of mine are ok when tested randomly in discharge tests on the hobby charger).

Will test one of them and see. It's this, if you check the SKU it's different. Yes it's protected, i purposely dead shorted it and see if every cell works.

http://www.dinodirect.com/TrustFire-Rechargeable-Li-ion-Battery-Protected-2400mAh-TF18650.html

For me, i don't care where and when did i buy and in which packaging. I just test them, because in the end that is really what matters most. For multi-cell operation, the light does not care about a sticker, only matched cells. And since this is not XTAR, Redilast or AW, folks better run some tests esp if you are capable of running it down so as to prevent a major case of reverse charging (PCB may not kick in for low-voltage protection under low currents).

Sorry if i sound a bit unsympathetic and too technical and a stickler for safety in reality, but seriously that is what matters. :)

36

Kreisler@ Usually I'll go for the low dollar item and lots of hoping/praying

2100@

True that but the hologram thing is kinda emotional and I take it as a sign of quality LOL. With my limited resources in testing and with my laziness/tendencies I'd pitched them with an established benchmark to see if they OK or way off.

37

that made my day, fantastic, thanks!!

lmao

38

I have 6 of these batteries and they have been good so far. I really don't use them very much. I bought them to use in my Xeno E03 but that light has been acting up on me a little and I wasn't really happy with the 20-25 minute run time on 14500 batteries.

I bought these batteries from this guy and he is in the US. Free fast shipping. I bought this with the charger and I emailed him and bought bought some 2 extra batteries. I later emailed him and bought 2 more batteries. I think I paid $10 for the two including shipping and they arrived the next day. He is in Salt Lake City and it's only about 100 miles from me.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/2-TRUSTFIRE-14500-Li-ion-RECHARGEABLE-BATTERY-CHARGER-/370485328406?pt=US_Batteries&hash=item5642a57a16#ht_500wt_1180

39

Chidwack, i have put much effort (=time) to test the Xeno's runtimes in detail with repeated runs and 2 different cells, i.e. the cells of a 2-pack i got from DX. I documented my results in the Xeno review thread (and in order to test the quality of my fake Dinodirect cells i would repeat the tests at some later point).

If you get only 25mins on your Xeno (mine is Xeno E03 V3 XML T6 CoolWhite), then.. your cell must have a low capacity!

40

Reverse charging can happen to any cell in a multicell battery pack and also not surprisingly in flashlights using 2 or more cells. This does not only happen to Li ion. NiMH/NiCd/Pb and of course Li Co behave differently when "pushed past zero". You can google it up. The idea is to use matched cells, now if the PCB kicks in then there is no problem. In reality, it is not 100% for this kind of protection. I still remember my E03 nearly killing my TF Flames 14500 because it drained it to like 1.6V?

Short circuit protection is good though, i have never come across anything (no matter how low cost it is) that did not cut the juice when i dead short it on a DMM in current mode.