Battery/Charger recommendations UK

Good day to you all. I am what you would call a newbie with lasers and although I have owned a few <5mw green laser pointers from ebay, I have gone and treated myself to a 50mw laser from Lazerer.

LZCS - 532nm 50mW Focusable Green Laser Pointer

to be precise.

My friend has a decent telescope so I'm often out with my 5mw and impressed with the beam, so I am really excited to see what the 50mw looks like.

Anyway, getting back on subject, I did order the 18650 battery and charger. I'm hoping it comes with some kind of adapter to charge it from a UK 3 pin outlet.

From what I've read on here the quality of the battery and charger aren't the best and I really want to get the best out of my new laser.

In the UK I have grown up with AAA, AA, C, D and 9volt battery's so this 18650 battery is new to me. I have a pretty decent flash light and I use energizer lithium ultra's to get the best out of it however I'm really struggling with this 18650's.

Can you buy decent 18650 disposable's or are rechargeable's the way to go?

Would anyone recommend the top rated 18650 battery's to go for and a decent charger to go with it? Preferably from the UK but I don't mind importing as I have the laser.

I hear Sanyo Eneloop's are great but again they just don't seem to advertised at all in the UK, but upon a a quick google search I couldn't find eneloop 18650's anyway.

One last thing, what sort of life should I be getting from 18650's in a 50mw laser pointer? As in minutes/hours of use.

Thanks for taking the time to read and please forgive my ignorance.

Hope to hear some sound advice.

Quick edit, I have been researching and it appears any battery that has fire in the name appear to be getting bad reviews.

I came across these on Amazon, what do you think?

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Double-Pack...VJ1I/ref=sr_1_4?ie=UTF8&qid=1339520935&sr=8-4

Thanks

rivageeza;

Those Panasonic CGR18650CG cells are only 2250mah capacity.

I would look for a "Brand Name" 18650 with more capacity (3100mah or so).

Panasonic, Sanyo and LG are quality cells that would give you long runtimes.

Chargers with the UK plug may a little harder to find.

LarryDFW

I'm in the same position as you, looking for batteries to use in mine, also from UK.

I've found that maplin has a mains charger for the batteries, so you can check there for that, but the batteries themselves are proving more problematic. If you find somewhere then let me know.


Update: just found some "Eagletac 18650 3100mAh" batteries, I checked on google and they seem to be getting fairly good reviews so I purchased them from http://www.flashaholics.co.uk as they can provide next day delivery if ordered before 3pm. I'll let you know how they are when I receive mine.

Aedus said:

I'm in the same position as you, looking for batteries to use in mine, also from UK.

I've found that maplin has a mains charger for the batteries, so you can check there for that, but the batteries themselves are proving more problematic. If you find somewhere then let me know.


Update: just found some "Eagletac 18650 3100mAh" batteries, I checked on google and they seem to be getting fairly good reviews so I purchased them from LED Torches, Head Torches Batteries and Flashlights | Flashaholics as they can provide next day delivery if ordered before 3pm. I'll let you know how they are when I receive mine.

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I can't comment on Eagletec, but having bought a few batteries from Flashaholics myself, they are probably the best site to buy from in the UK. (cheapest and quickest). There's also 'cloud 9 vaping'.
Of course, if you don't mind a little wait, that Larry fella sells some decent batts and charger too

Im really struggling to find branded 18650's in the UK, can anyone suggest another site I can get branded one's from and import in?

From the UK i've spotted AW 18650 3100 MAh Rechargeable Lithium Battery's, they're priced at £18 each and seem to get fairly positive reviews, can anyone comment on this?

Thanks for help so far, lazerer took my payment 3 days ago and it's stuck on processing

Have emailed but no response as of yet

rivageeza said:

Im really struggling to find branded 18650's in the UK, can anyone suggest another site I can get branded one's from and import in?

From the UK i've spotted AW 18650 3100 MAh Rechargeable Lithium Battery's, they're priced at £18 each and seem to get fairly positive reviews, can anyone comment on this?

...

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Lighthound (dot com) gets mentioned/recommended a lot round these parts. Their prices are a damn site better than any UK sites (approx 65-70% of UK best price) but if I read it right, you're looking at $15 shipping for packages weighing under 1lb.
So, buy 2 or more batteries and that pays for itself


Yep, AW IC 18650 3100 mAh ARE good batteries. AW IMR are supposed to be able to provide more current, but I've used the IC to power a 500mW+ greenie drawing 2.2A without a problem.