Batteries and Safety

[Phil_L]

Dear fellow vapers,

I am a relatively new vaper that begun with an Ego-T and your forum has helped me tremendously with dealing with every single one of the everyday problems I have experienced with my device. I recently decided to purchase a Silver Bullet - a decision which was, indeed, influenced largely by the generally positive feedback on the said device by members of this forum.

The sole concern which has, lately, bothered me is the safety of the batteries. The website from which I purchased the device + batteries had caps-lock warnings (e.g.: Do NOT leave batteries charging unattended/overnight!

Make sure the user has enough knowledge of Li-Ion rechargeable batteries in charging, discharging and assembly before use, etc etc)​

and my search throughout the forum has not dispelled all of my fears. I personally do not have 'enough knowledge' of such batteries - in fact, I have close to none at all.

To be more specific and to the point, I have purchased:
2 x UltraFire 18650 3.7v 2400mAh Protected Batteries (grey)
1 x 3.7v Dual Battery Charger (10430/10440/14500/16340/17670/18650)
and ofcourse 1x Silver Bullet

My concern is:
Are the batteries already fully charged? I plugged them in and the sign is 'red'. I left them for 2-3 hours but it is still red. I am concerned whether I should leave them any longer, so I plugged them out until further notice.
Can I leave them to charge unattended?
Are there any other risks/concerns which one should be aware of, with respect to this device and/or batteries?


PS: I do not intend to do any 'stacking' or any other personal modification (at least at this early stage), so my question is a simple newbie 'from-the-box' question.

Thank you very much in advance for your helpful forum!

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[tj99959]

The gray Ultrafire is not the best battery ever made, but they are OK. It is best to never charge overnight or leave a charger unattended, but if you read the warnings that came with your cordless electric razer it says the same thing.

New batteries normally have about a 60% charge when you get them, and that first charge can take a while.
There is also a new product out that I highly suggest for PV's like the silver bullet.
Vape Safe Mod Battery Fuse

 

[DaveP]

You can check the progress of a battery charge if you aren't sure what's going on. Using a cheap multimeter that you can pick up at Walmart for $10, check the voltage on the battery. When fully charged, you should read 4.1v - 4.2v. When the voltage reaches about 3.2v during vaping, your mod should cut off if it has electronic control circuits. If it's a mechanical mod, you will just begin to sense a drop off in flavor and vapor. 3.2v is the recommended re-charge level. Don't let them discharge past that point. Somewhere in between 3.2v and 4.2v is the safe range for Li-ion and IMR batteries.

If it's taking forever and you start to worry, pop the battery out and check it. If it's under 4.1v, put it back in and let it charge some more. My Trustfire TR-001 charger puts out 4.2v at 500ma. If my AW 18650 IMR 2000mah battery is dead, it will take about 4 hours to fully charge it. 2000mah/500mah= 4 hours.

I like to charge my batteries when they reach 3.5v or so. It cuts the charging time a little and the batteries don't get stressed as much as vaping them until cutoff.

 

[Vapoor eyes er]

Hi Phil and welcome to ECF. I also have 18650 batts and they do take a long time to charge. I was using the T-001 charger but upgraded to an X-Star. The warnings about rechargeable batts extends to ALL batts and chargers- not just PV related. There is a cut off chip in the charger. When batt is fully charged this chip stops the charging. If charger was left unattended and the chip failed the batts could become overcharged will the "possibility" of melting and/ or exploding batts could occur. I NEVER leave my batts charging unattended. And if anyone reading says the chance of the chip failing is remote I'll tell you it happened to me last month. Batt charger stayed in charge mode- took batt off and it was fully charged and WARM- a sure sign somethings not right. As Dave has stated a great idea to have a DIGITAL Multimeter on hand. Here's one on sale:
http://www.sweet-vapes.com/shop?pag..._color_plus.tpl&product_id=237&category_id=37

Good Luck.