I was playing around with some suff I had laying around and turned a $10 battery powered spotlight into a 35w hid spotlight but I have very little space left and I would like it to be self contained. What kind of discharge rates will the Li-ion 18650 batteries take safely? The ballast says a 3.2A nominal rate. I am thinking that would be pushing the cells?
safe Li-ion discharge rates?
- Thread starter damon20r
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Torque1st
Enlightened
If you use cells harvested from a tool battery pack like Milwaukee or makita you can discharge them at a rate of somewhere in the neighborhood of 15C. I use the sanyo VT cells from a makita li-ion "safe chemistry" pack in a 100wat m*g and they do quite well.
precisionworks
Flashaholic
DM51
Flashaholic
Welcome to CPF, damon20r.
I'm moving your thread to the Batteries section, where it belongs.
I'm moving your thread to the Batteries section, where it belongs.
SilverFox
Flashaholic
Hello Damon,
Welcome to CPF.
Ordinary Li-Ion cells are supposed to be good for a 2C maximum discharge. You can expect reduced cycle life at this rate.
In momentary use they are capable of much higher than that, but most of our uses is more constant than momentary.
If the capacity of your 18650 cells is 2000 mAh, a 2C rate would be [edit] oops this is wrong 40000 mA. should be 4000 mA as pointed out by Luke. [end edit]
Tom
Welcome to CPF.
Ordinary Li-Ion cells are supposed to be good for a 2C maximum discharge. You can expect reduced cycle life at this rate.
In momentary use they are capable of much higher than that, but most of our uses is more constant than momentary.
If the capacity of your 18650 cells is 2000 mAh, a 2C rate would be [edit] oops this is wrong 40000 mA. should be 4000 mA as pointed out by Luke. [end edit]
Tom
Last edited:
LukeA
Flashlight Enthusiast
SilverFox
Flashaholic
Hello Luke,
Oops, thanks for catching that. I have edited it.
Tom
Oops, thanks for catching that. I have edited it.
Tom
