VTC5 Charge rate question

[wrice4]

So I have owned VTC5 batteries for about a year now and I keep getting in this debate, and didn't know if anyone had actual proof of the correct solution:

I have always read, and been told that the slower you charge the battery, the longer the life is has, so I charge all my VTC5 batteries at .5 amps. The arguement is that the VTC5 battery can handle a huge charge rate so charging at 1 amps is no big deal.

I was recently told that there have been studies that the vtc5 charging between .5 and 1 amp will only prelong your battery life, if using the .5amp, by only 5 charging cycles. If this is that small then I might as well save half the time charging and start charging at 1 amp.


So my question is, can anyone link me to actual scientific proof how how much the battery is prolonged by using a .5amp charger rather than a 1 amp charge? Because if its not by much, like stated above, its not worth charging at .5 amps.

 

[Thrasher]

Mmmm, its really getting harder to tell whats a perfect charge anymore with all the diff chemestries. I cant remember which one but one of the new cells recommends no lower then .8 ma and can accept up to a 4 amp charge.


in some cases you can prolong life a bit but any day past the rating is borrowed time really.

For what they cost and how long they already last a few dozen extra charges isnt a big deal to me.

, I dont abuse them but I quit babying them long ago and I really dont see much difference in how long they last.

I use a .5 in the car and 1.0 at home and some of my cells are almost 2 years old.


You can check battery university but it not on top of all the new chemestries.

The very best thing to do is just go by the manufacturers recommendation and stay between the min and max

 

[Ryedan]

I know of no hard data on how much different charge rates affect the life of a battery.

Here is what I consider the best VTC5 datasheet I know of. It lists no minimum or maximum charge rate, just a 'charge rate' of 2.5A. In slide #8 it shows a cycle life performance at 10A discharge (I assume that to be continuous) of about 2100 mAh after 300 cycles. I assume the batteries were charged at 2.5A for these cycles.

Interestingly, that datasheet also does not show any data over 20A discharge, nor does it list a 30A max discharge rating.

That's all I've got. If anyone else has any hard data on this stuff I would also love to see it