A lot of my more powerful flashlights use CR123A lithiums so I've been shopping around. Looking through Amazon I see mixed reviews even on brands like Energizer and Streamlight. There are a lot of reports of a high percentage of dead batteries and even explosions regardless of brand. Are there any brands and retailers that have given you good results?
genuine surefire batteries made in the US should perform and be safer than other brands, in theory, although there is always some risk with Lithium batteries amazon used to carry them, if they still do
The newer ION batteries are supposed to be safe(er) and have better life! I run EarthX battries that are Li-Ion and are explosion proof, though VERY expensive, life, charge cycle times, and stability are all top shelf!
I ordered a few of these Fenix ARB-L16-700U Li-Ions off eBay to try - they have built in USB charging jacks
never had eneloop DOAs [ AAAs or AAs NiMH ] though 3M was referring to CR123s and CR123As genuine items made in Japan tend to be top quality and they do make real gud Lithium batteries and other types like the NiMH eneloops Tesla batteries have had issues and the Boeing 787 Dreamliner had Lithium battery issues too, which have now been mostly addressed although nothing is 100% perfect 100% of the time
Yep, the nature of the beast. It seems that there is some relation between cost and quality, have to be charged and discharged right, and unlike most batteries, they have a failure mode where they can melt down and catch fire. If they do, it can be nasty as if you do succeed in putting the fire out, if shorted, it will re ignite and you can get some nasty chemical burns. Had a local crash where the Tesla broke in two and a 19 year old girl was trapped and while a neighbor was able to put the fire out, it kept restarting and she died a day or so later of both heat and chemical burns. The local fire department used a lot of water and it took a long time before the batteries quit exploding. It is not one huge cell, but hundreds? of smaller cells.
ya aint supposed to use water on that kind of fire yer supposed to use foam extinguishers, CO2, ABC dry chemical, powdered graphite, copper powder or soda (sodium carbonate) for Lithium battery fires and Class D for Lithium metal fires
The local fire department used foam, didn't seem to do anything, heat and smoke continued and more cells kept cooking off. Water might be bad for cells that are breached, but foam didn't seem to cool the battery cells enough to keep it from continuing to spread and then there was a 19 year old trapped in the fire, not really a time to see if it will work in 10 minutes. Needless to say, sitting in your living room the day after Christmas at 8 PM, being a volunteer, putting on your equipment and arriving at a expected routine car crash and then find out it is a Tesla on fire, in two pieces, and that the neighbors fire extinguisher had no real effect and now what do you do doesn't give you a lot of time to seek answers. I think that given the circumstances their equipment and training, they did a very good job
I have run these in 14500 and 18650 with 14500 and 16340 in TRUSTFIRE 16340 UNPROTECTED RECHARGEABLE BATTERY CR123A 3.7v (no PCB) trustfire have been ok , i get the odd weak ones , but they are unprotected Sloth
I use Fenix as well. If your application calls for 2 cr123s .. ya might want to look at a single 18650. In my light the single battery lasts way longer than the 2.
yep high capacity 18650s are real gud but ya still have to recharge em fairly frequently problem is some 18650s will not fit in a few devices that take 2 CR123s, the diameter is off enuff that they simply will not werk [ some devices werk and some do not ]
I use a BT-c3100 charger , rates the cells 1.5Volt to 4.2 volt Li-ion , Ni-cad,NiMh, all types , 16340 need a spacer to fit Sloth
