Li-Ion/Polymer 3.6v batteries... your experiences?

[Master Dru-Er]

I've been. Made my own trustfire 7.2 1800 mah pack. And have an 18650 pack that was for one project but is being conserved for another. All have worked great. Really needed that voltage to power those lux 5's. It's a no-brainer if your build requires brightness and you don't want an extremely long hilt.

[DragonStar]

I used a single Trustfire 18650 to power my first saber, which included:

Cree XR-E LED
2 3.6v accent LEDs
Hasbro board

So far so good. I haven't recharged it yet.

[xeno]

has any one use the 26500 li-ion?

[xwingband]

Yes, that's "C" size. I use them if they fit. Not very often it does... :/

[Novastar]

Okey dokey, I'm somewhat "necro-posting" with this, but I thought I'd share an experience regarding Li-Ions vs. Alkalines that really reminded me that using these in my sabers... has saved me TONS of $$$.

Grayven made a curved hilt, RGB, MR-board driven, 7-color changer saber for me some time ago. Awesome! The thing has always been a lot of fun, and the kids @ parties/events love the way it can be red, blue, purple, pink, sky blue, and green.

But that isn't the point. The point is... it ran on 4AAA cells...

Now at first, this didn't seem like a big deal... but over time--buying AAA cells for that thing has cost me quite a bit of coin! It sounds surprising, but when I've now bought 2 or 3 "Costco" packs of AAA cells (it's the only AAA saber I own, and I don't use AAA for anything else)... I've spent essentially--I don't know--$20 or $30?? Maybe less, but... here's where we're going...

First off--when the AAA cells start to lose power... the RGB mixtures start to get "wonky" (as X-Wing would say). Yellow begins to look orange... which is NICE... but... the other colors completely flip out, lol. The sound also (of course) starts to sound "sick", heheh...

Secondly--since I've only had the saber for... what... a year? I've now spent $20-$30 in batteries... and the time invested to keep changing them out--often which occurs during an event. I never know when they're going to give out, naturally.

Now...

I recently changed the 4AAA to a single 3.7v Li-Ion 2600mAh 18650 cell. It looks great--the voltage difference isn't really affecting the colors--because the CURRENT is flowing just fine... and so it appears to be a good change.

But here are the real advantages:

* More space in the hilt now--the single Li-Ion takes less overall space than the AAA spring pack... even with the 2.1mm charge port added!!
* "Flatter" discharge curve... meaning we won't be seeing a "color shift" until the cell has about 10 minutes of runtime left
* Longer runtime overall vs. the little 4AAA cells
* Ability to spit out well over 1A of current... instead of the AAA cells barely being able to provide what was needed
* The Li-Ion cell cost only $8.00. When you couple that with the FACT that I have other sabers made in 2005 that have NEVER had their Li-Ion cell replaced (and still aren't showing signs of decreased runtimes)... you have a no-brainer solution here!
* PCB protects from shorts and other problems
* I can charge the saber before every event--always knowing the general runtime I'll be getting
* Better for the environment because I won't be disposing of nasty alkaline cells all the time... and Li-Ion is "greener" overall for disposal!
* I don't have to fidget around trying to find or pack extra AAA cells in my saber bags... nor do I have to stop everything to swap them out.

And if all THAT wasn't convincing enough... just focus on:

$8.00 for one cell... which lasts >4 years it seems... + longer runtime
vs.
$20-$30 for TONS of cells... over a period of 1 year... replacing cells all the time, tossing the bad ones back into the earth.

There ya go. I'll get off the soap-box, but... really. I'm beginning to be of the opinion that NO ONE should be using alkalines for sabers unless the things are just super super basic, used very rarely, and used for short periods of time...

[Rhyen Skytracker]

OUCH!!! Quit twisting my arm already!!! LOL Sold! I am going to try using some Li-Ions in my next few sabers. Thanks Nova.

[cardcollector]

$8.00 for one cell... which lasts >4 years it seems... + longer runtime
vs.
$20-$30 for TONS of cells... over a period of 1 year... replacing cells all the time, tossing the bad ones back into the earth.

You also have to inlcude the one-time cost of the charger which is around, what? $30

And the recharge port, and the adapter...

I haven't done a recharge system yet just because it will cost around $60 by the time it is over and done with....

But it seems like the way to go!

[Novastar]

Good point, Collector... let's see...

* Chargers I bought were multi-chargers, ~$20.
* I like these because they handle 4 voltages, and you can create quick-disconnects for many types of plugs/ports... and leave them be until they are done... no risk of fire/problems in general
* You don't have to have fancy chargers... you can do it for less $$ if you know what you're doing with a dedicated, adjustable power supply.

* Charge port is like ~$2.00. Literally. I just bought some.
* Charge jack is like ~$0.50. Literally. I just bought some.

Every time you want to add a port/jack to a saber... yup... that's added cost of ~$3.00 let's say. So we're still talking ~$12 for "forever" vs. $20 to $30 every few months.

Now it's true that once you have one charger... and you build more Li-Ion sabers... you tend to need/want more chargers (depending on your usage). I, for example, often need to charge my sabers the night before an event...

And thus, I need several chargers. That *IS* a downfall of rechargeables... duuuuhhhh, they need to RECHARGE, and this takes a good amount of time. With Alkalines, you can swap them as often as you need.

Word to the wise: Do Not Fall for those "quick chargers". They will save you time, but they tend to feed TOO much current and voltage back into the cell... and this wrecks the battery life over time.

Most Li-Ion cells I use (18650) take at least 4 hours to recharge when they are very low. That may sound bad... but no--it's a good thing.

In general, Li-Ion cells are all about CCCV (Constant Current, Constant Voltage). I may be wrong, but I think they charge @1A pretty well, and of course the voltage is a "bit more" than their rated voltage. So 3.7v cell charges @ 4.2v.

You can use a dedicated power supply to do this if you like... or just spend a whopping $20 and have a charger.

[cardcollector]

Ok, another Question...

I've read a lot about Nimh and Li-on's, but Which is really better?

Is it a personal opinion thing??

Because I'd really like to buy all the recharge stuff from Tim...

[obi-one]

I don't understand, how can Li-ion batts outrun NiMH if they are rated practically both the same, 900mAH and 1000mAH respectively (even a bit more for NiMH)

Anyway, where do you get those thousands-mAH Li-ion batteries??? I can only see in the store 900mAH AA

Regards