18650 vs other cells?

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Palamedes

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A buddy of mine that I work with Vapes. *sigh* Anyway, when I mentioned the whole 18650 power wall thing he actually knew a lot about the batteries from his vaping. I had no idea. It kinda clicked with me at that point that the 18650 is really prolific and in every darn thing..

He asked about the 26650 battery or the 20700 battery which I guess are used a lot in vaping? (I dunno) ...and if they would also work or be more appropriate due to being more powerful than the 18650.. He kinda implied the 18650 was old crap technology and not worth the investment.

I disagreed because unless my basic search was wrong, 18650's are in every darn thing and easy to come by. 26650's and 20700's seem to be about $10 each!!

So now to my question; Are there other cells that would be just as good and are just as readily available?

I mean if we could get bulk 10440's by the truck load cheaply they would work and be just as viable..etc..

Thoughts?
 
18650 is just a form factor. same as 26650 or 2700 are... So the technology as such is kind of the same inside. You need to base youre price to what capacity you get to what space it takes. If you can get any of the other sizes then go with it. 18650 is one of the most common as of today.
 
It's all about discharge rate. Regular 18650's won't discharge as much as Vape batteries, and that's actually a good thing.

When you have 100 cells in parallel, you can easily hit 100A with 'old crap' @1A each.

With Vape batteries, that could be 2000A which is overkill and I'm guessing that Vape batteries don't last as long as 18650's but I could be wrong.
 
Oderus420 said:
It's all about discharge rate.
Click to expand...

Oh thats interesting, I had no idea the discharge rate was different. What causes different discharge rates in the battery and how do I check what that discharge rate is via the stats? (Please forgive my ignorance)
 
It's not that Vape cells are different than regular 18650's. There are two different variants; well, 3, kind of.

1) High capacity, Low drain: These are the cells found in laptops and most gadgets that use this form factor
2) Low Capacity, High drain: These are the cells found in power tools, medical equipment (think portable crash cart), vape devices, etc
3) Medium Capacity, Medium drain: This would be a type of hybrid between the other two. Not sure what you'd find these in, to be honest. I'm sure they are fairly rare

Same company, same form factor: 2 cells look the same. But one is a #1, the other a #2. The #1 cell could have 3000mAh but a discharge rate of 2A max. Whereas the #2 cell would have a capacity of about 1800mAh with a discharge rate of 30A. It all depends on what the cells are designed to do.
It's just like vehicle batteries. There are some lead acids that will last a short while capacity wise but can do one heck of a amperage kick (most car batteries), then there's the kind that have a looong run time, but are usually connected in parallel because of their low amperage output (think marine batteries)
 
All batteries have that types. Ie capacity vs max current. Nothing regarding Vape... Vape is just something that need high drain cells same as drills and others. Meanwhile laptop doesnt need it.

Vape batteries exist in 18650 form factor as in others. Laptop batteries have 18650 but also others and so forth :)
 
Korishan said:
It's not that Vape cells are different than regular 18650's. There are two different variants; well, 3, kind of.

1) High capacity, Low drain: These are the cells found in laptops and most gadgets that use this form factor
2) Low Capacity, High drain: These are the cells found in power tools, medical equipment (think portable crash cart), vape devices, etc
3) Medium Capacity, Medium drain: This would be a type of hybrid between the other two. Not sure what you'd find these in, to be honest. I'm sure they are fairly rare

Same company, same form factor: 2 cells look the same. But one is a #1, the other a #2. The #1 cell could have 3000mAh but a discharge rate of 2A max. Whereas the #2 cell would have a capacity of about 1800mAh with a discharge rate of 30A. It all depends on what the cells are designed to do.
It's just like vehicle batteries. There are some lead acids that will last a short while capacity wise but can do one heck of a amperage kick (most car batteries), then there's the kind that have a looong run time, but are usually connected in parallel because of their low amperage output (think marine batteries)
Click to expand...
I would add a 4th type to that.High capacity High drain:Eg Samsung 30Q, which I'll be using for my PW.
3000mah 15 amp.
Or the LG HG2 3000 mah 20 amp
Usually found in power tools and popular with vapers
 
Or these...


image_nqqpuw.jpg


Expensive!
 
No, it is just three types, Samsung INR18650-30Q and LG HG2 belong to the third type.

Imagine it like this:
1. Highest capacity
2. Highest drain
3. Everything in between, bit of both but never as high

Palamedes said:
He kinda implied the 18650 was old crap technology and not worth the investment.
Click to expand...

Not true at all. While it is an older form factor the technology in it is the same as for 20700 and 26650, they are just bigger. As soon as you scale a certain type of battery/chemistry you get more capacity and higher discharge rates, that is nothing new. But because of the size it is unlikely that everyone will change their products to other formats. Power tool companies are adopting 20700 now, it is beneficial and the size difference isn't an issue. Tesla swapped/will swap from 18650 to their 21700 cells to reduce the number of cells per car and make building the batteries more efficient. 26650 is mostly used in flashlights.

Palamedes said:
26650's and 20700's seem to be about $10 each!!
Click to expand...

You shouldn't judge by prices for a single cell, especially as it was probably a protected cell you have seen, these are much more expensive. Also it is a matter of scale, these aren't as popular as 18650s which means the prices won't be as low. Volume of production is much lower.
You can get unprotected 26650s in both flavors (high capacity/low drain and low capacity/high drain) for 6 to 7 EUR and the amazing A123 LiFePo4 26650 for 8 to 9 EUR.
Sanyos NCR20700B high capacity/low drain 20700 costs between 5 and 6 EUR.
 
This is great information guys. I really appreciate it. Do the cell wrappers usually have if its high-capacity low drain or high drain low-capacity written on it somehow?
 
No, they don't. There is no definitive border and these aren't terms that have been standardized in any way. High and low only refers to the highest and lowest rating within the given form factor. What high and low means for you depends on what you are doing with the cells. For a laptop battery a 10A continuous 18650 is a high drain cell, for a power tool this is a low drain cell. And absolutely it is a low drain cell as well because 18650s go as high as 35A.

For 20700 it is about 3000/35 to 4250/15 at the moment, for 26650 it is about 4000-5000/15-20 to the rather extreme A123 26650 with 2500/70 although that one is a LiFe cell as I mentioned.
Efest is offering 26650s with 3500/64, 4200/35 and 5000/45, I'm not sure if these figures stand up to a test, especially 5000/45.

The hybrid chemistries that try to offer both are actually the ones with the most progress in recent years because it looks just very promising. This is why we see more and more cells like the LG HG2 emerging.
 
Sony VTC 6s aren't really 30A drain, nor 3120mAh nominal capacity.

They only handle 30A with active cooling, and they have 3000mAh at a 20A drain.
 
BlueSwordM said:
Sony VTC 6s aren't really 30A drain, nor 3120mAh nominal capacity.

They only handle 30A with active cooling, and they have 3000mAh at a 20A drain.
Click to expand...

Still pretty high capacity and drain, is it not ?

But you got me a bit worried there... i am not using thes cell's but i got the info from my supplier....
So to check if they are not lying to me i did some googeling... :D

Official they have a typicalcapacity of 3120mAh, and they can handle a 30A drain, but you are right they do not deliver those 3120mAh at 30A becourse they heat up, normal for a "standard" 18650 cell at 30A i believe.
Even i will heat up at 30A and loose some energy :)

ihave founda test
http://www.google.be/url?sa=t&rct=j...29%20UK.html&usg=AOvVaw1ng2IIhWVzFEmGZo8fllsc


image_yjidhb.jpg
 
DarkRaven said:
No, it is just three types, Samsung INR18650-30Q and LG HG2 belong to the third type.

Imagine it like this:
1. Highest capacity
2. Highest drain
3. Everything in between, bit of both but never as high

Palamedes said:
He kinda implied the 18650 was old crap technology and not worth the investment.
Click to expand...

Not true at all. While it is an older form factor the technology in it is the same as for 20700 and 26650, they are just bigger. As soon as you scale a certain type of battery/chemistry you get more capacity and higher discharge rates, that is nothing new. But because of the size it is unlikely that everyone will change their products to other formats. Power tool companies are adopting 20700 now, it is beneficial and the size difference isn't an issue. Tesla swapped/will swap from 18650 to their 21700 cells to reduce the number of cells per car and make building the batteries more efficient. 26650 is mostly used in flashlights.

Palamedes said:
26650's and 20700's seem to be about $10 each!!
Click to expand...

You shouldn't judge by prices for a single cell, especially as it was probably a protected cell you have seen, these are much more expensive. Also it is a matter of scale, these aren't as popular as 18650s which means the prices won't be as low. Volume of production is much lower.
You can get unprotected 26650s in both flavors (high capacity/low drain and low capacity/high drain) for 6 to 7 EUR and the amazing A123 LiFePo4 26650 for 8 to 9 EUR.
Sanyos NCR20700B high capacity/low drain 20700 costs between 5 and 6 EUR.
Click to expand...
imlooking at some a123 lifepo4 here:https://www.ebay.ca/itm/273070697161?ul_noapp=true&rmvSB=true

Can i get your thoughts on them? It would be my first battery purchase so I'm trying to make sure I get cells that still have some life in them. They are said to have 90% capacity left in them. How many more cycles is that? Does the price make sense?
 
Dougrowe1 said:
They are said to have 90% capacity left in them. How many more cycles is that?
Click to expand...

Please refer to my answer in the other post where you asked the same questions.
 
Not sure Korishans answer was, but my would be that you need to consider if you need high drain cells with lower capacity. And I don't see where they state that they have 90% capacity left. If this is true they have done several hundred high drain cycles or thousand(s) of low drain cycles. The price seems reasonable for used cells, new ones are three to four times more expensive.
 
There's another angle to this too: availability/cost - ie cheap in used laptop packs vs paying for new.
 
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