Sudden Death of SF123 cells

[jayflash]

Although I'm a newbe, I've significant experience will all type of batteries. I've never had new cells die without warning of some kind until now. Are #123 lithium cells known to work fine & be dead shortly after when flashlight is turned back on? My Scorpion had only 15 minutes of run-time on SureFire123's - then they died while unused. Quirk? Bad Batch? Already used by middleman? The light was NOT left on by mistake. Thanks.

 

[robk]

Same thing happened here, twice. 1 of the 2 SF 123's in an E2e went dead after 10 minutes, same thing (new SF 123's) in a Brinkmann LX. I used the remaining good cells in my ARC LS, sent the dead ones to Surefire and they replaced them. Kinda makes you get concerned about carrying spares - drop them in and they go dead!
Rob

 

[kev1-1]

If you run a search you will find several threads on this topic! Many people have reported this problem, while surefires test have not reproduced this type of occurence. The jury is still out on this one...

 

[Kiessling]

makes me think of an M6 with a dead cell in it while under load ... gulp ... I certainly wouldn't want THAT, makes me nervous, this light ...
bernhard

 

[James S]

I can add my voice to the choir. I've had this happen twice, and I don't have all that many lights and am only on my 3rd dozen box of sure fire batteries.

In both cases it was under heavy load, a p61 bulb. I used the flashlight quite a bit and it was operating fine though getting warm. When I put it to bed I was still getting a good amount of light out of it. It was perhaps a little more than half way through what should have been the useful life of the batteries, 10 to 15 minutes into the 20 minute runtime.

The next day I pushed the button and got nothing, nada, zip. Didn't even glow. Upon putting the cells into my ArcLS one of them was so dead it didn't even make it light up and the other one got me a good 30 or 40 minutes of LS light before entering moon mode.

So the battery didn't actually fail under use, but sometime after that as it cooled down inside the light.

I've had this exact chain of events happen twice now exactly the same.

Interesting huh?

 

[Y2Kirk1028]

Yup, I concur also! Happened a couple of times just as James S. described except it was used in a 5W LS light.

 

[hotbeam]

Ditto re above. Died on me in a SNII. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/mad.gif

 

[brightnorm]

I don't get it. I've used umpteen SF 123's and never had this happen. I wish there was some way to track this problem down to its source.

Brightnorm

 

[LEDagent]

My first Surefire came with Surefire batteries. I too had about 10-15 minutes runtime before it suddenly shut off. I thought it was the bulb, but a new pair of batteries lit it up again.

I haven't bought a Surefire cell since, but since they are relatively cheap now...i think i'll be picking up a box soon. I still have confidence in these batteries. Maybe it was just a quirk...it will take another set of batteries to "turn me off" from SF cells.

 

[LEDagent]

I had a shocking thought....

Do you think the reason for Surefire batteries being so cheap nowadays has anything to do with this problem? Out with the old and in with the new?

I don't think SF would knowingly sell a bad batch of batteries, or even the possibility of just a few bad ones (out of thouasands), but the contraversy over the B90 rechargeable problems has me thinking otherwise.

 

[jayflash]

kev1-1, thanks for the "search" suggestion. Perhaps I didn't type in the correct phrase; I tried several with no matches. Can you help this Newbie. Much appreciated.

 

[x-ray]

[ QUOTE ]
jayflash said:
Perhaps I didn't type in the correct phrase; I tried several with no matches. Can you help this Newbie. Much appreciated.

[/ QUOTE ]

Try Here and Here