Ni-Cd vs Ni-Hm for solar lights

[kabu001]

Hello,
I have a question maybe someone here could help me out. I just bought some of those solar powered garden spotlights. They use 3 led lights and state that they use ni-cd batteries. It does not say what mAh but I would not expect them to be to large. I know that these lights are always disappointing and are never bright enough so here is my question. First, does anyone know if I buy a stronger/larger mAh battery would the light from the led be brighter? Second, could I switch the ni-cd battery with a ni-hm battery? Say if it comes with a 300mAh ni-cd could I switch it out with a 2600 ni-hm battery?

I got the idea from this spec that I found on another solar light.

(Spec
Highly efficient mono crystalline 1.4W solar panel
3 x AA 1500mAh NiMH batteries supplied
Black toughened plastic finish)

Thank you in advance,
Jim T.

 

[Fallingwater]

The LED will not be brighter. The light will last a lot longer, but do you really need it to?
Also, NiMH cells don't like trickle charging very much, and that's what happens in cheap solar-powered lights.

 

[core]

Just thinking out loud here...

You are limited to how much energy the solar panel can put back into the battery. If on a sunny day the panel can fully charge a 300mAh NiCd but not much more, then you might have a problem if you switched to a 2600mAh NiMH because it would always be on the tail end of the discharge curve. Right after dark (when you'd be awake and need them) they might actually be dimmer?

This is all taking into account that your battery will start from flat dead eventually. There are always cloudy days to negate any pre-charging you might do.

Might be interesting to see though.

 

[Mr Happy]

You can apparently buy brighter lights these days that use lithium phosphate batteries. For a brighter light you need a larger and more powerful solar collector, larger and more powerful battery, larger and more powerful light emitter. You could upgrade your lights by replacing all these components, or you could buy a bigger and more powerful lights in the beginning.

 

[kabu001]

Good afternoon,
Thank you for all the replies. I really don't want them to last longer just brighter. It seems like all the ones I see look like airport runway lights for planes. I did find nice ones in the Uk but they are 40 US dollars each and not to sure about shipping. But they have large solar panels, three large batteries and are made for UK's cloudy weather. Maybe I will just get wired lights. Well anyways thank you for all that have replied.

Jim