For the last couple years I’ve been using cheap/inexpensive (Chinese-made) Ebay batteries in 18650 and 14500. After joining the board I ordered (from recommendations of members here) an NiteCore IntelliCharger i2 Charger. I had been using the cheap Ebay chargers that came with the batteries. I also ordered a couple of Sanyo 18650 batteries (again from a recommendation here) that were $6 each as opposed to the $1.30 each on the cheap Ebay batteries.
Now I have no doubt that the charger is better than what I have now. And I have no doubt that the $6 18650 batteries that are on the way will be better than the $1.30 Chinese batteries I’ve been using for a couple of years. But here is my question so that I have a better overall understanding; are the $6 batteries 6X better than the cheap ones? Are they much safer? Will they last 6X longer both in run time as well as the amount of recharges I’ll get. Up until taking a closer look at them, I’ve been very satisfied with them, perhaps I’ve been fortunate to get good batteries. They seem to last in the lights I have for many months and seem to have a pretty good burn time when using in venues like work or out camping.
It all depends. Some *fire batteries can have 2ah, some can have 1ah. The cell tracking (using them in serial) is NOT good in most of these *fire batteries (some discharge before others), and there is little to no quality control. These cheap cells are also on average very bad performers at higher discharge rates. if you look at lygte-info.dk, (run by user HKJ), he has a few very thouogh tests of a few of these batteries. You can also get a counterfeit, where they put a smaller lithium cell inside the 18650 shell, and pass it off as higher than it is.
Are the good batteries 6x better than the $1.30 batteries? YES!! Will you see a 6x runtime boost? Almost guaranteed not, but you will probably see a better runtime on high.
Much safer. 10x better IMO.
No way of knowing the the capacity (under load) of cheap ebay batteries without a testing setup. 6x more capacity is actually possible, there are some real worthless li-ions on ebay, but 3x capacity is more likely.
You know li-ions are fond of blowing up like a bomb, right? Or venting flames & toxic gas. I don’t mind risk as long as the risk itself is fun. Skydiving, racing whatever. Junk li-ions, no thanks. ultrafire that nearly took a finger off.
Of course they won’t last 6 times longer in run time, or be 6 times better (whatever that means) but you can be sure they’re definitely $4.70 better! At least you know what you’re getting, rather than buying a $1.30 lottery ticket.
Edit: You may get a lot more than 6x the runtime after all, see below!!
Make no mistake: You never want to compromise on batteries. As someone who once bought many of those, I can tell you that maybe 1 out of every 6 or 7 can hold a charge for longer than 15 minutes. Plus, your lights will be brighter and stay that way longer when using good cells. When in a series, the crappier cells discharge too quickly, causing a drop in output, not to mention it stresses the good cells. I’ve gotten lucky with a few cheapies, but I have maybe 1 remaining since even the ones that charged didn’t last long.
Will a bad battery explode due to a bad protection circuit or other issue? Probably not, but do you want to take that chance?
First hand experience, I see between 2mAh to circa 1 Ah for blue Ultrafires that I have, when discharged at 1A.
So yes, that is what you get for your dollar, extreme uncertainty. Like a box of choc’lit, never know what yer gonna get. And at best it’s not even that good.
And sure you can get 6x more runtime. In fact, 3400 / 2 = 1700x better.
Haha, good point! I’ve got a few cheapies purchased in 2008, and got lucky with them (Trustfire 2400, all four give greater than 2250mAh @ 1A). I did get some alleged 2500 mAh *fires a bit after that, which turned out to be salvaged laptop pulls, they only gave about 400mAh from memory! Got a refund on those.
Since then, nothing but Panasonic and Sanyo for me, no reason to get any less, since Fasttech has been around!
First, read the following thread, which will show why we should only buy batteries from websites with a reputation for supplying the real thing, as otherwise we don't know what we are getting -
Not to mention that if we dont support the sites known to sell genuine items fairly represented in the descriptions, these better stores also have incentive to change tack and stock fakes or cheapie Chinese variants, or go out of business all so we can save $0.80 or some such silliness.
PLEASE EVERYONE DON’T JUMP MY TAIL, BUT………
When I first got into flashlights about 5 years ago I bought 10 18650 Trustfire Flames 2400mah, had 8 18650 LG laptop pulls, and about 40 of those cheap baby blue Trustfire 18650 batteries that came free with UF139 chargers. Ninety percent of the time I used the TF baby blue batteries because I was “saving” my good batteries. The only better batteries I knew about were Redilast and AW and they were going for around $18-$20 each and I was too cheap to buy any. As far as I know the reasonably priced Panasonic, Sanyo, LG, and Samsing batteries were not available at that time. Just recently got rid of my last baby blues and to this day I only know of 3 or 4 from 40 that have gone bad and 1 or 2 that were DOA. None have vented or gotten warm during charging, sure the capacity wasn’t the greatest but they did fine. All those baby blues are now owned by three of four friends who I see regularly and only in the last 3 or 4 months have the 3 or 4 batteries starting going bad.
IMPORTANT NOTE**I never used the baby blues in a flashlight where the batteries were in series.
Now all I have are premium batteries but I wouldn’t hesitate to use cheaper batteries if I had to, now ya’ll can start attacking me, LOL.
What I plan on doing is using the good $6 batteries as my primary and the cheap ones as back up. As I mentioned, maybe I’ve just been lucky so far with the cheap ones. Note that I have nothing to compare them to, but they do seem to last in the flashlight for months before needing a recharge and when out in the deep woods they’ve seemed to have a good burn time. So perhaps they’ll be a good back up, at least this is the hopeful plan. I always have spare batteries available in the packs.
I think part of the blanket ‘baulking’ is due to other factors like fake fakes. Cheap is generally a lucky dip. Sometimes they come up diamonds, but generally its just coal. Even if the blue ones are as good as say a Sony v5, it wouldnt be long before the 1200mAh flat battery inside the 18650 shell, is wrapped in the same blue.
What voltage are they dropping to before needing a charge? Not lower than 2.5v I hope?
With out any means of testing other than the seat of your pants you might not see much except a little longer run time .Some of it depends on the light you have ....When I had 150 lumen xre and xpe 18650 lights I never really noticed that my 18650s were as lame as they were ...at one point the whole forum jumped on an ebay trustfire fake battery deal and lots of members were mad and wanted their money back because of how lame the fake flames were . I never really understood all their belly aching and honestly was happy with what I got for the price , Fast -forward a bit in time and the xml emitter lights are out running direct drive on high . lots of which would pull almost 3.5 to 4 amps ...When I put these batteries up against the brand new old stock Reverend Jim Panasonic cells I was shocked .. it was obvious on a multi meter when testing amperage how little amps could be drawn from them. Their weakness became very apparent as you watched the numbers freefall when driving an xml light on high .
After having lots and lots of 18650's My suggestions to people are always quantity of quality lower mah cells vs the newest highest model with the biggest capacity . i have zero 3400mah batteries /no 3100's / half a dozen 2900's /a ton of 2800's /bunches of 2600/and lots of everything else .
I think you will notice a big difference if you run them side by side and harder .
For me backups are just as important, if not more so, than the primary ones. If you’re down to using your backup then you have nothing to turn to if the backup fails. I understand the point about spares in packs, but how readily available are they?
For a difference of $5 (lunch money) I don’t see any reason to ever buy anything other than decent batteries. Skipping a dinner out will probably buy you all the batteries you need for several years
(I have a family of 5 and a dinner out usually runs more than $100….YMMV)
I have been researching alternatives to the expensive Sanyo UR14500P and here are other brands that will be just as good and usually less expensive. This will provide an option on choices when you are buying online.
Most of those may actually be sanyos! :bigsmile: None of those companies manufacture li-ions. They just take quality cells like sanyo, add a protection pcb then put their name on it.
Evva seems to be the best price, next in price is keeppower (both use best quality cells with quality seiko protection). The rest are quality too but mostly higher prices for the same thing under the wrapper.
To get KeepPower Sanyos be sure to buy their 840 mAh 14500. The keeppower 800 mAh 14500 is a chinese cell.
I bought an AW 14500 2 years ago and it tested out at 560 mAh. My NiteCore came out at 750mAh and 3 Trustfire Flames at 761mAh, 763mAh, and 679mAh. The first 2 Flames were purchased from Manafont in 2012 and the last one from BG in 2013. They were all tested on an Accucel 6 with a 1A discharge rate.
Have to say that I was extremely disappointed in the AW.
cheap ebay batteries from china sellers are mostly junk.
better performing 18650 can be had from laptop packs with just a bit of work.
you will be doing just what all the whateverfire makers do but to a higher standard.
them: “its a 18x65mm cylinder label and ship”
me: it at 0v toss.its at 3.x keep for next step.
esr 150 mohms or less lets charge and test.most of these are very good.
let sit a day and see if voltage drops much.
you can do this too.and the packs may be free if you can access the recycling bins at work or in some stores.
another advantage is these original packs are built with major mfrs cells.
this is the only “cheap” way to obtain these cells.
cheap on ebay means junk and possibly danger.
unless you are buying nos laptop packs that are oem.these can be a steal!
