Do you prefer regular Batteries or rechargeable?

Do you prefer regular Batteries or rechargeable?

Consider the pluses and minuses.

Rechargeables (like AA) have a fast drain when they sit for months.
Instead of 1.5v, you get 1.2v, thus lowering the starting voltage.

Alkalines have a shelf life up to 5-7 years of dependable stanby power.
Not so good in "cold storage" such as your car for the winter.

AA lithiums have a 10 year shelf life. Stand up great to temperature extremes.

Was at Walmart yesterday. They had an 8 pack of AA Lithiums for like 16 bucks. When you consider they last as much as 7x as regular alkalines, I think they are a better deal than the alkaline 8 pack for 5 bucks.

$5 * 7 (lithum life) = $35 for 7 alkaline packs vs 1 pack of $16 lithiums. Unless I find great rechargeables, I'm getting Lithium from now on. You "dollar store" battery guys can do your own math.

Mostly I go with nimh rechargables, although I recognise the need for alkalines/lithiums for long shelf life and storage. I don't mind frequently recharging - peaking nimh cells as I do it all the time anyway for my electric model planes.

For high drain applications nimh are great where alkaline drop their voltage.

Right now I'm really getting alot of use out of my NiMHs. Then the Lithiums followed by Alkalines. So just like Learjet mentioned above—except for the RC planes which I don't have. Next door neighbor has RC Jet planes which I didn't know existed!<—Sorry for the off topic there. . .

Lithiums fit my needs best. Cold temperatures, more reliable under extreme conditions.. and I dont use my lights that often, in fact all of them are still on their original set of batteries. :O

You can get Batterystation primary Lithium AA's for a $1.25 each when you buy in lots of 20 - he's out till mid Jan but that is a great price.

As is so often offered...it depends upon the specific application. I use about an equal number of both primary & secondary cells.

I believe lithiums will double or better the performance of alkies but certainly not a seven times improvement. Unless at sub zero temps they have that improvement.

Prefer NiMH in high drain devices like my Sony short wave radio, alkline in low drain devices like clocks, remote controls. I use NiMH in my fenix not only to get guilt-free lumens but also for better dicharge curve.

For lights, I use rechargables only.

For control remotes, I use Alkalines or Lithiums for their super long life

Will

Throw away batteries are obsolete like 8 tracks and vinyl records. Thats it. THROW your money in a trash can.

They got no place in 2006. OBSOLETE JUNK.

We use NiMH more than anything else. We use NiCad for the 2way radios.

We have a stash of primaries that only come out well into an emergency. In the days before a hurricane I try to charge up all of the NiMHs and NiCads I have. After Katrina the rechargeables enabled us to keep from breaking into the primarys for weeks. (We never left.) I am considering buying more NiCads for the emergency kit because of the low self discharge rate. I have a hidiously cheap solar charger I bought from CCrane years ago. It was so cheap ($15) I never even tried it out -- I just threw it into the storm kit. Much to my pleasure it actually works! It's not great but it's better than nothing.

Rechargeables save us a lot of money all year long. It would be worthwhile for us even if we only got 1/10th advertized charge cycles.

I will stick with Lithiums batteries for all my devices, except radio clock which feed on Alkalines cells.

Had enough of batteries that leak and ruin my Mag lights, other stuff, etc. Any saving from the use of alkalines or rechargeable cells are wipe out after counting the cost to replace faulty devices with toxic mess.

I guess it basically comes down to how frequently you use your lights. If you use your lights very frequently, rechargeables will be a logical money saver over time. Charging becomes a standard routine and you're good to go. If you use your lights infrequently or store them for long periods, then lithiums or alkalines are in play.

NikolaTesla said:

Throw away batteries are obsolete like 8 tracks and vinyl records. Thats it. THROW your money in a trash can.

They got no place in 2006. OBSOLETE JUNK.

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I agree completely, as far as alkalines are concerned. Lithiums have a few places in clocks, remotes, and maybe 1 emergency light. Otherwise, yeah, you are just throwing money directly in the toilet. NiMh are often available for almost the same price as name brand, retail alkalines. I just can't stand using throw away batteries for anything, knowing that it cost me $$$$ for every minute I use it.

Rechargables, my mother has a habit of thinking discharged batterys still "can be used a lititle more..." *Battery on shelf for 5 months*
"Mooom, its already dead."

tron3 said:

Rechargeables (like AA) have a fast drain when they sit for months.

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That depends on the battery. Regular NiMH cells self-discharge at about 50% per 3 months. Lithium ion cells and the new Sanyo 'eneloop' NiMH cells self discharge at ~15% per year or less.

Instead of 1.5v, you get 1.2v, thus lowering the starting voltage.

Click to expand...

Alkaline cells start at a higher voltage than NiMH cells, but the voltage quickly falls. NiMH cells spend most of their time at a higher voltage than alkaline cells. An alkaline cell drops slowly to 0.8 V before it's dead, and an NiMH cell dies at about 1.2 or 1.1 V.

Definately rechargeable as I use my lights all the time

For things I use a lot, say my work flashlights, only rechargeables. For my backup lights, emergency lights, lithiums or for some incandescants. When someplace that I can't charge my rechargeables, then it has to be primarys, mostly in the field, and at some stages when I was deployed. Also for things that are low drain as has been mentioned, clock backup, remotes, and smoke detectors either lithium or alkaline. Rechargeables don't make much sense there, even lithium ion has too much of a self discharge rate, and if you are only replacing them once a year there isn't much if any cost savings.

I have a rechargable kit ordered for my SF U2, and I am sort-of regretting it. It's costing around $30; for that I could have got 15 pairs of primary cells, which at current usage rates would probably last me over 10 years.

I have found that I wasn't much using the U2 on its brightest setting. That's partly because it has more light than I need, but I think some of it may have been because the battery life on high is quite short. I hope that with rechargables I'll use the brightest setting more and so get more pleasure from the torch.

My other reason for using rechargables is the thought that in a long-term powercut I can rechrage them by other means indefinitely. However, in practice I now think that it is better to stockpile primary cells. Then you don't need to bother with solar panels etc. I have found there's not much point in trying to keep rechargables fully charged because they self-discharge so quickly.

Does anybody know what is the cost of the electricity to recharge batteries vs. purchasing new alkaline cells?

My point is that although rechargeables don't "cost" you a replacement value, they are usually more expensive to purchase up front and then there is a cost to recharge them but it's hidden in your electricity bill, so it's not "free" to recharge them.

I don't buy lights these days unless they can run on both primaries and rechargeables. Most of my current lights run on rechargeables. Like Unicorn and others have said, I keep primaries for emergencies, glovebox, when I might be in survival situations, etc; but for frequently used items, rechargeable is the way to go.