Kodak vs Rayovac (Low self discharge) NiMH

[MrAl]

Hello,

I was at a WalMart yesterday and checked out their NiMH cells, and
they had two 'low self discharge' brands: Rayovac and Kodak.
They both claim "4x longer than regular NiMH cells" but only
Kodak claims a minimum rating of 2000mAh.
Both claim a rating of 2100mAh.
Rayovacs sold for $9, Kodak for $8 (USD).

Anyone ever compare these two brands?

They dont seem to sell Eneloop there.

 

[macdude22]

I needed a pack of batteries this weekend to charge my blackberry and I saw them at Wal-mart. I ended up going with the Hybrids (I've had excelent luck with them). The Kodak ones looked similar (from the same factory perhaps), but they appeared visually fatter and the wrapper on them didn't look as high quality as the wrapper on the Hybrids. For a buck extra I was willing to go with what I knew worked well for me. I'd be interested to see anyone's reports on these batteries.

On another note, our Wal-mart just started carrying a 4 pack of eneloops with charger for 20 bucks. No standalone packs as far as I've seen.

 

[n3eg]

They seem to do about 100 mAH better than the Ray-o-Vacs, but they are visibly fatter.

 

[MrAl]

Hello again,

What do you mean by visibly fatter? Mine are about the same as other
AAs i have.

 

[macdude22]

The ones I looked at (though having not bought them I can't verifiy) looked to be a mm or two larger than my hybrids or Tenergy 2300s. They looked to be about as fat as my Duracell 2650s or Tenergy 2600s which are too fat to fit in certain devices I have such as my MiniMags and Xbox 360 controllers. There tends to be a little play in the diameter of the AA spec, and some of the higher capacity and/or cheaper NiMH batteries tend to be on the large size. I have some Digital Concepts that barely fit in anything they are so fat.

I've found the Hybrids to fit in everything I have, work well under load, have a reasonable capacity, and they are low-self discharge. All at a dern reasonable price.

 

[thezman]

To echo what macdude22 said, I bought some of these at Wallyworld and they are indeed porky, and the wrappers are weak. I have a bored 2D Mag that has no problem fitting Energizer 2500's or Eneloops four across, but when I tried the Kodaks it was an uncomfortably tight squeeze to get them into the Mag. Upon removing the battery carrier and examining the cells, 4 of the 8 had torn wrappers. And the inside of my Mag is very smooth. After boring, I polished it the whole way down to 600 grit paper.

Nothing but Eneloops for me from now on.

 

[MrAl]

Hi again,

Ok i had to break out the Brown and Sharp to see what this was all about.
Here are the measurements for several brands including Kodak:

For each cell the positive end is the widest, so
the cell is rotated while measuring the positive
end until a max reading is obtained. The max
reading occurs where the label wrap overlaps at
the seam.

Diameters in inches and in millimeters...

RS 1800:           0.560 in.  14.2240 mm
Empire 2000:       0.562 in.  14.2748 mm
Energizer 2500:    0.562 in.  14.2748 mm
Kodak PreCharged:  0.569 in.  14.4526 mm

The Kodaks are a tiny bit wider, 0.007 inches
or about 0.2 millimeters wider.
As noted above, the label overlap causes a slight
increase in diameter with the cell rotated to a given
angle. This means in some cases rotating the cell
in the flashlight could make the difference between
the cell fitting and not fitting if it is in a group of
cells that form a bunch across the width of the
light, or if there are any valleys along the flashlight
body that might accomodate the overlap width
better when the cell is rotated to a certain angle.
This is also true if the flashlight body is partly
oblongated...rotating the cell might make it fit
better.

 

[pae77]

I got some of the Kodak pre charged AA's at Walmart. They do seem a little fatter than my other cells but they still fit in my L1D CE just fine.

 

[MrAl]

Hi there,

Yes, from my measurements they are a little tiny bit fatter. This is only from
a sample of four however, so i guess other cells on the market could be a little
fatter yet.
From my measurements, they are on average about 1.2 percent fatter, which
is not that much but might make a difference in tight fitting flashlights.

 

[LEDninja]

Hi MrAl
Do you have any primary batteries you can measure? I noticed all my NiMHs with the exception of some old 1300mAH are fatter than primary lithiums, alkalines, carbon zinc. Some of my devices (electric toothbrush, side by side 2AA flashlight, personal fan) simply will not accept NiMH 1500mAH and above because the battery compartment is too narrow. All the primary batteries I tried will slip right in.
LEDninj

 

[MrAl]

Hi there,

Oh yeah. I measured the following:

Rayovac AA alkie: 0.555 inches
Energizer "Industrial" AA alkie: 0.555 inches

so they are all smaller than the NiMH. This is interesting.

 

[LEDninja]

Thanks

In summary
Standard alkaline
0.555 in. 14.097 mm Rayovac AA alkie
0.555 in. 14.097 mm Energizer "Industrial" AA alkie
NiMH
0.560 in. 14.2240 mm +0.005 in. +0.1270 mm RS 1800
0.562 in. 14.2748 mm +0.007 in. +0.1778 mm Empire 2000
0.562 in. 14.2748 mm +0.007 in. +0.1778 mm Energizer 2500
0.569 in. 14.4526 mm +0.014 in. +0..3556 mm Kodak PreCharged