18650 batteries in NZ

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xpd

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#319116 23-Mar-2025 21:38

Friend reqs a bunch of these

But he's been told they're almost illegal in NZ, and can't be imported.

I've only been able to find up to 4000mAh in the country.

Its for a powerful headlamp he uses when fishing.

Is it possible to obtain these, or will he have to put up with the 4000 model ?

Gavin / xpd / FastRaccoon / Geek of Coastguard New Zealand

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#3356757 23-Mar-2025 22:26

Watch out for fakes.

https://www.mrpositive.co.nz/buying/knowledge-base/18650-battery-must-know/

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#3356786 24-Mar-2025 06:19

xpd:

Friend reqs a bunch of these

But he's been told they're almost illegal in NZ, and can't be imported.

I've only been able to find up to 4000mAh in the country.

Its for a powerful headlamp he uses when fishing.

Is it possible to obtain these, or will he have to put up with the 4000 model ?

The capacity on those is basically fake. Buy 2 sets of panasonics of whatever capacity you can find and your friend is done.

rp1790

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#3356807 24-Mar-2025 08:56

xpd:

Friend reqs a bunch of these

But he's been told they're almost illegal in NZ, and can't be imported.

I've only been able to find up to 4000mAh in the country.

Its for a powerful headlamp he uses when fishing.

Is it possible to obtain these, or will he have to put up with the 4000 model ?

The highest capacity 18650 thats real you'll find is about 3500 mah, any higher than that is a bit suspect. Check out these guys, have bought some 21700's from him and they are excellent, NZ based. https://cell-supply.co.nz/

richms

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#3356812 24-Mar-2025 09:01

To get up and running immediately there are 18650s at Bunnings and mitre 10 in the solar light area. Not huge capacity but at least you know it's not a complete lie like that 6300 which is probably really 1300

Richard rich.ms

nitro

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#3356821 24-Mar-2025 09:27

xxFire have been avoided by enthusiasts due to the inaccurate labels and overall quality. also, at least for some time, safety was an issue - particularly those charging them with dumb chargers that don't terminate when they should.

i'd be surprised you actually get more than 2000 mAh out of those.

i'd advise to stick with panasonic, samsung, lg, sanyo and sony brands. back when laptops used those (current thinner models no longer do), samsung, sanyo and lg were the ones i normally pulled. do note that going down this route strongly suggests having a (cylindrical) battery analyzer.

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#3356822 24-Mar-2025 09:29

In my experience a tested name brand second hand battery from a battery recycler on trademe will be way better than anything off aliexpress.

Senecio

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#3356831 24-Mar-2025 09:59

Its not physically/chemically possible to get anything more than 3600 mAh from an 18650 cell so those claims are fake.

My advice, if its for a high powered head lamp (I have one that puts out 1,400 Lumens) then he will want a cell that can put out a reasonably high current. It will also need to be a protected cell for that use case. If you want piece of mind then either Fenix or Nitecore but they will be expensive.

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#3356885 24-Mar-2025 13:44

I'm familiar with lithium cells of most shapes and sizes - And can say wiithout any doubt that those are utterly rubbish. Do yourself a favour and chuck 'em into the nearest appropriate recycling box!

For consumer 18650s, there are 2 distinct flavours -

1 - High capacity, lower discharge rate.

2 - Lower capacity, max discharge rate.

Of the sensible former camp there are:

Vapcel N40, 4000mAh

Vapcel F38, 3800mAh

Molicel M35a, 3500mAh

All of these are high capacity and max 10A continuous discharge.

If his headlight just dumps the power from the battery into the LED (FET driver) these will help regulate the output and burn not as bright as possible, but brighter for longer and with less heat.

Now on the other hand if your friend wants to strap the power of the sun to his forehead you cannot go past the venerable Molicel P30 and P28, which hold a mere 3000mAh and 2800mAh respectively but are capable of 100W discharge.

Of the latter camp, other honourable mentions are:

Samsung 25R, 2500mAh and 20a discharge.

LG HE2, 2500mAh and 20a discharge.

muppet

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#3356891 24-Mar-2025 14:03

Buy some quality cells from MrBattery or similar. And then buy a proper charger for them as well.

I didn't think the batteries that @tehgerbil posted were legit, I thought ~3700 was about the max you could go as posted by Senecio, but proper battery nerds (like myself) have reviewed them and they're legit

But yea, please make sure you friend gets a decent charger for them or you'll damage the cells and they'll last 20 minutes instead of the time needed.

Gordy7

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#3356893 24-Mar-2025 14:17

Check out Jaycar - lower mAh

https://www.jaycar.co.nz/search?q=li-ion%20batteries

Gordy

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neb

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#3356960 24-Mar-2025 18:33

xpd:

Friend reqs a bunch of these

Since they're fakes you can print up a label with any capacity you want and stick them onto a generic 3200mAh or similar.

tehgerbil

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#3357100 25-Mar-2025 08:39

muppet:

Buy some quality cells from MrBattery or similar. And then buy a proper charger for them as well.

I didn't think the batteries that @tehgerbil posted were legit, I thought ~3700 was about the max you could go as posted by Senecio, but proper battery nerds (like myself) have reviewed them and they're legit

But yea, please make sure you friend gets a decent charger for them or you'll damage the cells and they'll last 20 minutes instead of the time needed.

Ay? Your statement is confusing. Maybe I haven't had my coffee this morning, but did you mean to imply my info was bad and I don't know what I'm talking about?

nitro

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#3357110 25-Mar-2025 09:04

tehgerbil:

Ay? Your statement is confusing. Maybe I haven't had my coffee this morning, but did you mean to imply my info was bad and I don't know what I'm talking about?

i think he said, he thought it was impossible to have 4000 mAh 18650 batteries until he tested them and found them legit with the N40 hitting well above 4000 mAh, per the link he added.

now i have to try some of these. vapcell is a brand i trust for chargers, and it looks like cells are of the same level of quality.

contrast this with tests on a couple of ultrafire batteries:

muppet

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#3357164 25-Mar-2025 10:05

tehgerbil:
Ay? Your statement is confusing. Maybe I haven't had my coffee this morning, but did you mean to imply my info was bad and I don't know what I'm talking about?

I meant at first I didn't think the batteries you'd posted were legit, as they were above the "3700mAh" ceiling that I knew about.

But then I did some searching and realised that ceiling has been broken, and that your batteries were fully legit.

So no, not trying to claim you were wrong at all. Only that I thought you were initially, then realised what I "knew" about 18650's was wrong.

neb

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#3357619 26-Mar-2025 21:24

nitro:

contrast this with tests on a couple of ultrafire batteries:

Rule of thumb, if the name ends in -fire, it's fake junk.

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