Now, battery safety:
The "standard" 18650 are a bit of odd man out, as you need to know that there's so many variants.
First: never buy the crappy re-wrapped third party brands, only go with the manufacturers, such as LG, Sony, Samsung, Panasonic/Sanyo.
ALL other brands are getting the rejected but still useable batteries that they re-brand under their name and then make insane claims about the capacity.
Second: be aware that the 18650 are not all made the same. There is low drain and high drain types. For mods, we HAVE to use HIGH drain (high A power, limited life). The low drain ones are for low power devices (low A power, long life) such as flashlights.
There is no high drain 18650 that is over 25-30A capable, nor has over 3,000mAh of capacity.
Some low drain have a safety cap that would make them a bit longer.
Third: the way these (and just about all cylinder batteries) are built is that they are a closed cylinder that's filled from the top, and sealed by a very thin insulator.
This means that the whole of the battery's walls is all negative until you get to the top where the positive pin is. The positive/negative is separated by this very thin insulator, which should you cause a contact between them, you would short out the battery.
So for safety, this area where this insulator/separation is, is covered by a insulation ring, either thick paper or plastic. The wrap is what holds it in place and protects the battery.
Should the wrap be damaged, especially at the top where this ring is, the battery should be set aside until the wrap is replaced with a new one. Same goes even more for the ring.
(links provided for examples again)
Replacement rings are like this:
$1.35 Paper Insulation Gasket for Pointed 18650 Battery (100-Pack) 100-pack - 17mm diameter at FastTech - Worldwide Free Shipping
And wraps can be obtained as such:
$1.34 18650 Battery Sleeve PVC Heat Shrinkable Tube Wrap (50-Pack) 50-pack - 72*30*0.08mm / blue at FastTech - Worldwide Free Shipping
Should you made contact and short the battery, do NOT hold on to it, you must throw it or put it down somewhere safe, a metal sink, in the grass, or anywhere should it go into thermal overload (or runaway) that no one gets armed or damage done. I've read about people throwing their batteries out the window into their backyard (and such).
Battery being shorted can do two things, the lesser is called "venting" where it overloads and heats up enough to cause a release valve built-into it to break (as a safety breaker) and the overheated chemicals will "steam" out of the battery.... it's not good, but it's the safety feature to prevent....
Thermal runaway... which is the full firecracker and "boom" effect...
On the news, you've probably heard or seen videos about this. The reason (EVERY TIME) is someone that either 1) carried a battery in their pockets with change or other metallic items and caused a contact between the poles, shorting the battery; 2) someone using a mech mod which they did not obey Om's law and overloaded the battery with a bad resistance range that pushed the battery beyond it's capacity, plus that once the battery went thermal, the mod did not have proper venting holes (to let the gases from escaping), literary turning their mods into pipe bombs (in their faces).
So if you plan to ever carry ANY batteries around, you should ALWAYS have them in a protective container or anything to insulate them from anything that may come in contact with them, such as silicone sleeves like these:
$6.05 18650 Battery Protective Silicone Sleeve Case (10 Pieces) 10-pack - random colors at FastTech - Worldwide Free Shipping
For charging, having a good charger is best, but with a decent mod that has a good charging circuit, it would be fine... I charge just about all of mine via the mod and it's never been an issue, when I tested the batteries "in case" due to all the paranoia that so many have about it, I found that the batteries were just fine.
The "standard" 18650 are a bit of odd man out, as you need to know that there's so many variants.
First: never buy the crappy re-wrapped third party brands, only go with the manufacturers, such as LG, Sony, Samsung, Panasonic/Sanyo.
ALL other brands are getting the rejected but still useable batteries that they re-brand under their name and then make insane claims about the capacity.
Second: be aware that the 18650 are not all made the same. There is low drain and high drain types. For mods, we HAVE to use HIGH drain (high A power, limited life). The low drain ones are for low power devices (low A power, long life) such as flashlights.
There is no high drain 18650 that is over 25-30A capable, nor has over 3,000mAh of capacity.
Some low drain have a safety cap that would make them a bit longer.
Third: the way these (and just about all cylinder batteries) are built is that they are a closed cylinder that's filled from the top, and sealed by a very thin insulator.
This means that the whole of the battery's walls is all negative until you get to the top where the positive pin is. The positive/negative is separated by this very thin insulator, which should you cause a contact between them, you would short out the battery.
So for safety, this area where this insulator/separation is, is covered by a insulation ring, either thick paper or plastic. The wrap is what holds it in place and protects the battery.
Should the wrap be damaged, especially at the top where this ring is, the battery should be set aside until the wrap is replaced with a new one. Same goes even more for the ring.
(links provided for examples again)
Replacement rings are like this:
$1.35 Paper Insulation Gasket for Pointed 18650 Battery (100-Pack) 100-pack - 17mm diameter at FastTech - Worldwide Free Shipping
And wraps can be obtained as such:
$1.34 18650 Battery Sleeve PVC Heat Shrinkable Tube Wrap (50-Pack) 50-pack - 72*30*0.08mm / blue at FastTech - Worldwide Free Shipping
Should you made contact and short the battery, do NOT hold on to it, you must throw it or put it down somewhere safe, a metal sink, in the grass, or anywhere should it go into thermal overload (or runaway) that no one gets armed or damage done. I've read about people throwing their batteries out the window into their backyard (and such).
Battery being shorted can do two things, the lesser is called "venting" where it overloads and heats up enough to cause a release valve built-into it to break (as a safety breaker) and the overheated chemicals will "steam" out of the battery.... it's not good, but it's the safety feature to prevent....
Thermal runaway... which is the full firecracker and "boom" effect...
On the news, you've probably heard or seen videos about this. The reason (EVERY TIME) is someone that either 1) carried a battery in their pockets with change or other metallic items and caused a contact between the poles, shorting the battery; 2) someone using a mech mod which they did not obey Om's law and overloaded the battery with a bad resistance range that pushed the battery beyond it's capacity, plus that once the battery went thermal, the mod did not have proper venting holes (to let the gases from escaping), literary turning their mods into pipe bombs (in their faces).
So if you plan to ever carry ANY batteries around, you should ALWAYS have them in a protective container or anything to insulate them from anything that may come in contact with them, such as silicone sleeves like these:
$6.05 18650 Battery Protective Silicone Sleeve Case (10 Pieces) 10-pack - random colors at FastTech - Worldwide Free Shipping
For charging, having a good charger is best, but with a decent mod that has a good charging circuit, it would be fine... I charge just about all of mine via the mod and it's never been an issue, when I tested the batteries "in case" due to all the paranoia that so many have about it, I found that the batteries were just fine.
