Posts Tagged ‘AA battery’

1.2V AA 3000 mAh BTY NiMH Battery Tests

2, Dec 2013

1-2v-aa-3000-mah-bty-nimh-batteries

The 1.2V AA 3000 mAh BTY NiMH batteries are something that you may find in a lot of Chinese online stores as well as on eBay and what you will notice for sure with these batteries is that they are being sold very cheap for 3000 mAh capacity. These rechargeable AA batteries supposedly offer the very high capacity of 3000 mAh and the considering their very cheap price should raise an alarm, meaning that the capacity rating is most likely lower than advertised. It is always a wise idea to avoid getting such batteries, but we got a pack of four in order to be able to test them and see what is the actual capacity that these batteries are providing and how much it differs from the advertised 3000 mAh. We were prepared for nothing more than half the advertised capacity, but going through a Break-In mode on the MAHA C9000 Charger/Analyzer we were not prepared for such a disappointment. On the photo above you can see the minimum and maximum measured capacity of the pack of four batteries and you will get why we were so disappointed. In fact what we got as available capacity was as follows: 306 mAh, 334 mAh, 337 mAh and 373 mAh and that is from batteries that are being advertised as being able to provide 3000 mAh capacity, not worth buying these regardless of the price, hell they are not worth even if somebody gives them to you for free.

Avoid buying 1.2V AA 3000 mAh BTY NiMH batteries, they are really not worth it!!!

1.2V AA 2550 mAh Sanyo Eneloop XX NiMH Battery Tests

24, Nov 2013

1-2v-aa-2550-mah-sanyo-eneloop-xx-nimh-battery

The 1.2V AA 2550 mAh Sanyo Eneloop XX NiMH batteries are of the third generation of Eneloop batteries from Sanyo and are the model designed for powering high current consuming devices such as photo strobe flash lights, wireless keyboards, mice, game controllers, radio controlled toys and a range of household devices. Eneloop XX is the preferred battery by many photographers for powering their photo flashes and other photographic equipment and even on the batteries you can see written “High capacity eneloop for professional use”. The Eneloop XX series is also from the Low Self Discharge type NiMH batteries and can retain up to 85% percent of its capacity after an year of storage, but these batteries are designed to offer up to 500 recharge cycles mostly due to the fact that they are designed to handle higher loads managing well even uner 5A load. These Sanyo Eneloop XX batteries come with a typical capacity of 2550 mAh, but their minimum guaranteed one is 2450 mAh and on their packaging you can only see the minimum and not the typical capacity written, though they are sold as 2550 mAh. They come pre-charged with 50% of their capacity and our measurement for the initial discharge provided between 1254 and 1257 mAh which is well within the 85% for about a year for batteries made in 12-2012, and now let us see how they will perform fully charged.


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Starting the tests of the 1.2V AA 2550 mAh Sanyo Eneloop XX NiMH batteries with a low constant current discharge rate of 0.2A got us 2452 mAh as useable capacity or right within the minimum guaranteed capacity, though a bit short from the typical – probably at lower load we can get close to it. But these Sanyo Eneloop XX batteries really shine when you get the load higher, by going to 0.5A and 1.0A we barely see a drop in the capacity we get and even at 2.0A constant current discharge rate we get just about 10% less capacity as compared to the 10 times lower load at 0.2A. According to Sanyo’s datasheet these Eneloop XX batteries are supposed to handle well constant current loads of up to 5.0A without that big of a drop in useable capacity and we do plan on testing that at a later time, but for now we can say that Sanyo has done a really good job with the Eneloop XX batteries.

The performance of the 1.2V AA 2550 mAh Sanyo Eneloop XX NiMH batteries in our tests:

– 2452 mAh at 0.2A load
– 2423 mAh at 0.5A load
– 2385 mAh at 1.0A load
– 2200 mAh at 2.0A load

– 3.096 Wh at 0.2A load
– 2.999 Wh at 0.5A load
– 2.856 Wh at 1.0A load
– 2.436 Wh at 2.0A load

– Download the official 1.2V AA 2550 mAh Sanyo Eneloop NiMH battery datasheet…

1.2V AA 2000 mAh Sanyo Eneloop NiMH Battery Tests

22, Nov 2013

1-2v-aa-2000-mah-sanyo-eneloop-nimh-battery

The 1.2V AA 2000 mAh Sanyo Eneloop batteries are of the third generation of Eneloop batteries from Sanyo and offer some really impressive features making the competition seem inferior in all aspects besides the capacity, even though 2000 mAh is still a good rating for an LSD (low self discharge) NiMH battery. Sanyo claims that these Eneloop batteries are capable of being recharged up to 1800 times and that they are able to retain 90% of their capacity if only stored and not being used and up to 70% of their charge after 5 years of storage. Another interesting fact about these AA batteries is that on their package you can find only a minimum rating of 1900 mAh, but nothing about their typical capacity of 2000 mAh written, though that information is available on Sanyo’s website. These batteries are supposed to come pre-charged at 75% of their capacity and ready to be used, the ones we tested were manufactured in 11-2012 and we have measured the initial available capacity between 1410 and 1420 mAh or pretty much within the 10% (a bit less actually) discharge for about a year since they were manufactured. And now it is time to move to the other tests…


1-2v-aa-2000-mah-sanyo-eneloop-nimh-battery-capacity

Starting the tests of the 1.2V AA 2000 mAh Sanyo Eneloop batteries with a low constant current discharge rate of 0.2A got us 1927 mAh as useable capacity or withing the range between the minimum guaranteed and the typical rating of the batteries. Increasing the constant current discharge rate from that point on gives really impressive results in terms of useable capacity and even at 2.0A the result is very good, though for applications requiring such higher power requirements you might want to consider going for the Eneloop XX batteries instead as Sanyo has designed them especially for higher load applications. In overall great performance from the 1.2V AA 2000 mAh Sanyo Eneloop NiMH batteries as we expected, so next up for testing come the Eneloop XX LSD NiMH batteries.

The performance of the 1.2V AA 2000 mAh Sanyo Eneloop batteries in our tests:

– 1927 mAh at 0.2A load
– 1841 mAh at 0.5A load
– 1701 mAh at 1.0A load
– 1588 mAh at 2.0A load

– 2.423 Wh at 0.2A load
– 2.264 Wh at 0.5A load
– 2.033 Wh at 1.0A load
– 1.774 Wh at 2.0A load

– Download the official 1.2V AA 2000 mAh Sanyo Eneloop NiMH battery datasheet…


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