$15 15000mah/Solar Portable Cellphone Charger

[Toad]

Charge is good as long as you don't use it. In my case I got an early I6 and beat on it for work. The battery is shot. I can get 3+ in and evening +second device. For BOB usage and conservative use of a good phone, in adventurs in reality use, it appears the device is awesom.

[J]

I'll add a little more to this.
We can assume that the Chinese manufacturer has included an adequate protective circuit inside this device.  Right at the Li-ion cell interface.... 

Being that my girl got me a cool little rc car for christmas that can take LiPo batteries and my cheapish drone(yeah, I'm 40 going on 14 - can finally afford the toys I couldn't have as a kid) also runs on them, this is good info.

Wouldn't a half decent balance charger be able to restore half dead LiPo's though? I've been looking for a sub $100 charger and I was reading that decent one's run some level of current through the battery that breaks down the crystallization that causes the batteries to lose their quality.

[projo198]

I bought something similar to this at Walmart a few years ago because it was in the discount aisle, shortly after buying it I knew why. I don't know if it wasn't taking a charge itself is wasn't sending a charge to the phone, but it just wasn't working.

I'd be interested to try again if you say you've had luck with this one though.

[Rocketvapor]

J,
Often a balance charger for a "Battery of Cells" will cut off when one cell drops to the cutoff voltage or hits the upper cut off voltage.  Charging and discharging stops there even if the remaining cells are somewhere in the middle. 

Some balance chargers attempt to discharge the highest cells mode a little during balanceso the battery can be charged a little more.  The reason one cell bottoms out or tops off first is reduced capacity of that cell. 

While some magic method of chemical refinement can recover some of the lost charge it's likely just hype. 
The foils in the Li-ion cell are either plated over or eaten away by high current discharge of 'recreational products'

projo,
I'll defer to Toad on the phone charger.  Walmart, clearance aisle, didn't work. Go figure

[Toad]

I just bought two more.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01IN18QM6?th=1

I could not find the "Coolbuys" add for $14.99. The above was the cheapest available at this time. Like anything Chinese import...the same product is sold under different brand names within a 10% price differentiation.

[Rocketvapor]

I can see it now.
Toad will have enough of these he can head down to the shelter set up a table and sell cell phone charges.

Get your Bush  Obama  Trumphone charged here.
Very rapid, and Fullness of Charge,
25 cents

[Toad]

...monopolizing the 5vDC solar power grid. 

[Toad]

I got the second pair in. They are marked ToHLo brand. The solar panel works, as the charging indicator starts flashing as soon as you put it near any light. There was a small surface charge to begin with. Identical units to the other. But...seemed to charge a little quicker than the last. I put both new units on the scale. They weighed within 20 grams of one another, I put the earlier unit on the scale and it weighed a solid 60 grams more than the newer units. So, faster recharge times, lighter weight, same specs....something tells me that there is a difference in battery capacity here.

[Toad]

RV, you owe me a nickle.  I gotta get something out of giving into your OCD.



Survey says....Ta-dah! 7500mah, on 15000 advertised unit. Yup, fraudulent numbers. Still, 7500mah ain't bad.



...and the solar cell.


I'll open up the ToHLo brand unit later. I'm cooking dinner.

[Rocketvapor]

Them laser dot labels never lie

[Toad]

I opened up the ToHLo. No markings on battery. Same solar panel. Appears to be same charging board. The battery in this unit was thinner than the first.

If you were to take both batteries and lie them flat on a table, the length and width would be identical. The cool buys would stack about a 1/4 " higher off the table. It appears that the battery pack is parallel flat cells. Two cells in the ToHLo, Three in the Coolbuys.

[panoz77]

RV, you owe me a nickle.  I gotta get something out of giving into your OCD.



Survey says....Ta-dah! 7500mah, on 15000 advertised unit. Yup, fraudulent numbers. Still, 7500mah ain't bad.



...and the solar cell.


I'll open up the ToHLo brand unit later. I'm cooking dinner.

Just an FYI.  Amazon will give you a refund if you complain and you probably won't even need to send them the pics as proof, although it's good you have them in case they want some proof, but I don't even think they will ask for pics.  They probably won't even make you ship it back to the seller, just an FYI.  What's good for the goose is good for the gander and all.

[Toad]

...done!

[panoz77]

...done!

Did Amazon issue you a refund?

Just an informational thing, I used my Suoki jump starter as a power source while traveling to texas, one 2.5 hr flight and one 1.5 hour flight each way, it powered and charged my phone on both ways and was down to two out of four lights, some I'm guessing still close to 50% juice left.  Worked really well.

[jbshuff]

Toad,

Thanks for the tip on the charger!  I took the plunge and got one of the ToHlo units.

Great battery pack for sure.  Still just using it as battery pack (charge from mains), but it did Solar charge some at the March Shoot.  Now that I am back I will try some solar only charge/discharge cycles to see how it does. 

Actually for camping this thing is great as a backup light in addition to the cell charging.  My tent has a loop to hang lantern that fit the clip just right.

John