The SPYONG "HLAND" AA Li batteries only deliver about 50% of their claimed power. They're RF noisy and unusable in AM/FM & Ham radios but okay for flashlights & remotes. Tests confirmed voltage stability, low power, and radio interference.This article was written after I received 10 of these batteries as a gift and I noticed that they did not seem to be working as I expected. As soon as I got home I started these tests to determine the real characteristics of these batteries. |
I was given these batteries by my daughter since she knows I like
rechargeable AA batteries for my ham radio HTs (Walkie-Talkies). The link to
this product is on Amazon at:
This means that for $22.79 plus sales tax each battery costs about $2.42 each with my 6% sales tax. Short & Sweet Findings: 1. These batteries are only about half as good as they claim so about 950 mWh not the 1900 mWh they claim. (mWh = milliwatt hour, mAh = milliamp hour) 2. These batteries can't be used in an AM/FM radio because the RF (Radio Frequency) noise of the voltage converter circuit (to change the 3.7 volts of a Li battery to the 1.5 Volts of an AA battery) blanks out all radio stations unless they are very strong. 3. These batteries can't be used in a Ham Radio HT because of 2 problems, a: same as above in #2, & b: These batteries manage to also block the HT from transmitting, at least they blocked the transmitting of my Baofeng HT on 2 meters simplex. Bottom line: They can be used in things like flashlights and remote controls. But NOT in any kind of AM or FM radio, and also for not as long as they claim. Note: I don't yet know if the interference from these batteries is in the internediate frequency used to beat with the AM or FM RF signal when trying to decode the signals or it interferes with the actual RF frequencies being receivede. For more information see: Intermediate frequency, Wikipedia Last: As mentioned above in #3: I also tested these in a Ham Radio VHF/UHF hand-held radio to see if I could receive anything. I could not receive a local repeater, 15 miles away. I also tried to transmit on 146.520 simplex to another radio in the same room and it did not transmit, at least NOT at 146.520 simplex. Using the NiMH battery pack or the radio's battery pack the radio was able to hear the repeater & it was able to transmit as well. In Depth Explanation: - Going back to the beginning... The first thing I noticed was that these are rated in mWh not the normal mAh of the NiMH AA rechargeable batteries I normally buy. So to convert mWh to mAh we have to divide by the voltage, in this case they claim 1.5 Volts so 1900 mWh/1.5V = 1.667 mAh. (W = V*I) The problem with this type of rating is that it depends on the voltage and normally for batteries the voltage decreases until the battery is considered dead or depleted. Using the mAh rating only depends on the amps being used and my CBA (Computer Battery Analyzer) software can set the current (mA) to a constant rate, independent of the voltage,I selected 200 mA for all of these tests. And this is why most NiMH and other batteries we buy are rated in mAh and NOT in mWh. I admit, I don't know why they decided to use mWh but I can think of two reasons, 1. They are trying to fool people who don't know the difference between mAh & mWh. 2. It is assumed that all the batteries' output voltages are 1.50 V so using mWh is as valid as mA. But I found that this is not valid because of the 10 batteries I tested most were running at 1.44V after the initial settling time but the range varied from 1.40 to 1.48, Absolutely none of the batteries actually ran at 5.00 V for more than a few seconds for the battery to settle. Next let me quickly say that I'm a ham radio operator and an MA Physicist and that I have worked for two companies measuring, testing, and selecting rechargeable batteries for the products we were manufacturing as well as selecting batteries for my ham radio hobby. I tested all 10 batteries because when I tried to use them in a simple home built LED Dead-battery night light two of these didn't even last through two full nights of about 8 hours. Why was this when dead Alkaline batteries (measuring 1.00 Volts) will last for weeks and my fully charged NIMH battery lasted a full 7 nights and was still measuring 1.23 Volts? (Measured while in the LED Night Light while it was turned on.) To get a good idea of exactly what these batteries can do I use my CBA-IV Computer Battery Analyzer (CBA) version 4 (IV) and I decided to run them at 200mA. So, for a battery claiming 1900 mWh or about 1667 mAh they should last about 1667 mAh/200mA = 6.335 hrs. This tester is available at West Mountain Radio: though they are now selling the CBA V As expected from my crude dead-battery LED Night light tests, none of the batteries even came close to that. The worst measured 34.01% mAh of the 1667 mAh and the best made it to 47.99% of the 1667 mAh calculated rating. The mWh ratings were a bit better, the worst was 44.37% & the best was 60.95%. This is probably why they prefer to give their ratings in mWh instead of the NiMH battery standard of rating by mAh. None of the batteries remained at 1.500 Volts but they all maintained a voltage of between the lowest of 1.40 up to the highest at 1.48V with the average coming in at 1.44V. Let me explain a bit about these batteries for those who don't understand how these are made. I do not know how these are manufactured but I do know enough to make a good educated guess about what is inside these cells. A Li battery measures between 3.7 - 4.2 Volts after being charged. In operation it will decrease quickly to the 3.7 V and then the voltage decreases more slowly to the cut-off voltage of about 2.5 - 2.8 Volts. I don't know what the internal Li battery low voltage cut-off voltage is in their protection circuit is. So how do they get a Li battery to be 1.5 Volts? They have to use a circuit that cuts the voltage and tries to maintain a voltage of 1.5 V but the circuits obviously vary quite a bit because the 10 cells I have ranged from 1.40 to 1.48 running voltage for the majority of time of the tests and none of them remained at 1.50V for more than a few seconds. Another thing about switching circuits which can do this kind of voltage changing is that they can be very RF noisy. Meaning they will create radio frequency noise. Being so small they probably won't interfere with anything further than a few feet away but if you use these you do need to know about the possibility of possible/probable RF interference. As stated in the quick review I tested these cells in a hand held AM/FM radio and all I heard most of the time was simply static even on the FM band. Replacing these batteries with my standard NiMH (Nickel Metal-Hydride) rechargeable batteries the radio was able to bring in DC, Frederick & Washing to DC AM & FM stations clearly. The results of using these batteries in a ham radio walkie-talkie (HT) was even worse. Not only couldn't the HT recieve a signal from a repeater only 15 miles away but it couldn't even transmit to a radio only ten feet away! So, these cells are only about half as powerful as they claim and they are RF noisy and are definitely not recommended for use in portable battery operated radios. At least I would not recommend you use them those devices. So where can they be used, even if they don't last as long as the seller and/or the manufacturer claims? I'd say in LED flashlights and in remote controls which use AA batteries. As long as the shelf life hold up to that of most Li type batteries this should be a good fit. These batteries claim to have a shelf life of 20 yrs, and I assume that means about 75% of full charge after 20 years. I don't know if they will make that and I have no way of actually testing for shelf life other than charging them, putting them on a shelf for at least a year and then measuring the mAh & mWh in another test and then extrapolating to the time it will take them to degrade to about 75% of the full charge values. Nothing about shelf life can be inferred from the tests I've already done. & is approximately the average for all the batteries: |
|
| Batt # Whr Ahr Test I mA End V Run V Test T % Whr % Ahr |
| 01 0.843 0.576 200 mA 1.05 1.48 172.50 44.37 - 34.01 |
| 02 1.009 0.709 200 mA 1.05 1.43 212.40 53.10 - 42.53 |
| 03 0.985 0.699 200 mA 1.05 1.40 209.37 51.84 - 41.93 |
| 04 1.036 0.728 200 mA 1.05 1.43 218.10 54.53 - 43.67 |
| 05 1.158 0.800 200 mA 1.05 1.45 240.11 60.95 - 47.99 * |
| 06 1.061 0.736 200 mA 1.05 1.44 220.59 55.84 - 44.15 |
| 07 1.053 0.722 200 mA 1.05 1.43 216.36 55.42 - 43.31 |
| 08 0.930 0.650 200 mA 1.05 1.43 195.04 48.95 - 38.99 |
| 09 1.093 0.754 200 mA 1.05 1.45 226.12 57.52 - 45.23 |
| 10 0.969 0.666 200 mA 1.05 1.46 199.56 51.00 - 39.95 |
| ----------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| Totals: |
| Avgs: 1.014 0.704 Avgs: 53.35 42.18 |
| Lowest: 0.843 0.576 Lowest: 44.37 34.01 |
| Highest: 1.158 0.800 Highest: 60.95 47.99 |
Phil Karras / KE3FL -