GTL 5kMah china battery review (horrible)

I use my middle of the month check to do some exploration into how bad the super cheap china batteries are on ebay. I sifted through reviews and tried to find the highest claimed capacity rating.

I settled on a red GTL 5kMah Li-Ion cell. 24x cost me $18

Immediately upon holding one of the cells, it was apparent there was a LOT of material missing. They weighed 27.3 grams, while a good samsung cell weighs 47 grams. After cutting the cell open, it was a little over half full of actual battery roll??? if thats the correct wording. Not packed nearly as tight and CLEARLY missing the over/under charge protection it was ranting about on the side.

I think the best part about these batteries is the broken english on the side XD (I typed exactly what was on the cell)

"low reoccurring operation cist"
"Sheif-lief around 10 Years:"
"Discharge rate, no "memory effect""
"DO NOT puncture, damage, and disassembie."

When I put these in my zebralight headlamp on the max power (1100cp) it runs for about 2 minutes until the voltage sags below the dimming low battery function. Im currently discharging it to a safe voltage and will recharge and report back with the numbers.

I was going to post pictures, except tinypic is down atm.
-HV

sites back up
for your viewing pleasure:

Life's too short to fiddle with crappy batteries/cells, is my opinion.

However, thanks for taking the bullet for all of us.

Chris

ChrisGarrett said:

Life's too short to fiddle with crappy batteries/cells, is my opinion.

However, thanks for taking the bullet for all of us.

Chris

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No worries lol, it was all in good fun. Since the item was not as described, im sure ill get my pennies back


Charged the battery from 3v to 4.2 shutoff, and it took 389Mah. I was hoping for anything more than 1200.

I would be afraid to take that piece of C... apart! Probably more like 1200 to 1500mAh like the ones HKJ tested.

.......Thanks for taking the risk on those prime .72 cent batteries!

I see now why they say DO NOT DISASSEMBLE. You might see that its EMPTY. Yikes.

nbp said:

I see now why they say DO NOT DISASSEMBLE. You might see that its EMPTY. Yikes.

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To be fair, I didnt see the warning until after it went through surgery.

hvguy said:

I sifted through reviews and tried to find the highest claimed capacity rating.

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You where a bit below the maximum, here is 12000mAh: http://lygte-info.dk/review/batteries2012/GIF ICR18650 12000mAh (Yellow) UK.html

More batteries with ridiculous ratings: http://lygte-info.dk/info/BatteriesRidiculousRatings UK.html

HKJ said:

You where a bit below the maximum, here is 12000mAh: http://lygte-info.dk/review/batteries2012/GIF ICR18650 12000mAh (Yellow) UK.html

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A few of those I found had bad reviews. This particular one had a single good and they had sold a dump truck load of them. I messaged them, awaiting a reply.

And given that they are terrible batteries, they are the same size as a 12 gauge shotgun shell... I guess I could use them as slugs for hog hunting.

It gets better lol

I messaged them:
The batteries I received are only 380mah, nowhere near useful. I discharged them to 3v then charged them. Upon further inspection, they only weigh half as much as a quality samsung cell.

They replied:

They just offered a $13 refund and keep the batteries lol. Works for me. The laugh and documentation was well worth the $5 expense.

hvguy said:

They just offered a $13 refund and keep the batteries lol. Works for me. The laugh and documentation was well worth the $5 expense.

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That is great that you got a refund.

I could not imagine using them. I would recycle them and not risk the potential of something happening which is certainly a possibility.

IlluminationDomination said:

That is great that you got a refund.

I could not imagine using them. I would recycle them and not risk the potential of something happening which is certainly a possibility.

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They would make great shotgun slugs