Greenbatteries.com - Responsible Renewable Energy

RE: battery cycles

2008-03-25T11:02:00.000-07:00

Hi Dave,

It is hard to calculate the recharge cycles on a NiMH battery because there are so many variables. You can count on many hundreds if you use the battery regularly. The worst thing that folks do as far as battery life is concerned is to either grossly overcharge them with a dumb charger that cannot tell when the battery is full and just “cooks” the battery or to not use it at all and store it long term.

Rechargeable batteries will not last forever but you will rarely if ever find an actual expiration date. That is why we only carry batteries from suppliers that we know have a fast turnaround time and are certain that their batteries have not been sitting on a warehouse for a long time.

All our products are fully guaranteed for 30 days and if you are not satisfied for any reason you can return them for a refund or exchange. In addition we have a year performance warranty on all our products.

Thanks for shopping at greenbatteries.com!

Sincerely,

Curtis

Responsible Energy Corporation
Curtis Randolph - CEO
16157 Galena Meadows Drive

Reno, NV 89511

direct 775-852-3883

toll free 800-790-7866

fax 815-301-3958
cell 775-722-9901
www.greenbatteries.com

www.portablebatteries.com

From: Dave
Sent: Tuesday, March 25, 2008 10:56 AM
To: curtis@greenbatteries.com
Subject: battery cycles

Hello Curtis,

I am looking to purchase your Greenbatteries brand batteries in aa, aaa, and d cell sizes. How many recharge cycles will these batteries withstand?

Thanks,
Dave.

RE: Availability of ULSD AAA? (and some questions about their use in flashlights)

2008-02-11T12:11:00.000-08:00

Hi Ed,

What a good idea to add this to our blog. Consider it done. Your responses are below. The ULSD batteries are expected to be back in stock in the next 7-10 days. Sorry, I did not order enough last time.

Sincerely,

Curtis

Responsible Energy Corporation
Curtis Randolph - CEO
16157 Galena Meadows Drive

Reno, NV 89511

direct 775-852-3883

toll free 800-790-7866

fax 815-301-3958
cell 775-722-9901
www.greenbatteries.com

www.portablebatteries.com

From: Ed
Sent: Monday, February 11, 2008 11:19 AM
To: curtis@greenbatteries.com
Subject: Availability of ULSD AAA? (and some questions about their use in flashlights)

Hi Curtis,

I am trying to order some of the GreenBatteries brand Ultra Low Self Discharge AAA NiMH 800mAh units, but it won't let me add them to the cart, claiming that "The item is not currently available. Please check back later." Can you please tell me when you expect to have these batteries available?[Curtis Randolph] approx. 7-10 days

While I'm at it, I wouldn't mind a little advice if you have the time. I'm looking to purchase these batteries for use in a 4-bulb LED headlamp from Petzl. Each headlamp uses 3 AAA batteries. I saw one post in your blog that talks about rechargeable batteries often having a hard time fitting into flashlights due to the tight fit, but that this can be remedied by removing the PVC casing. I am willing to do that in order to use rechargeables in these headlamps, but I'm curious if there are any safety issues in doing so.[Curtis Randolph] no this is perfectly safe

Also, I have noticed that the headlamps (obviously) have a much brighter output when the alkaline batteries are brand new. I assume I should expect to see a slightly lower light initial output from the headlamps when using the recharbeables, but the light output should be more consistent over the life of the batteries (or battery charge to be more accurate), due to the more constant drain rate. Is this a correct understanding/assumption?[Curtis Randolph] yes this is right on target

Finally, I use these headlamps infrequently (often-times it's months between uses), but when I do use them, I use them a lot (heavily, every night, for a week or two straight). I would prefer to leave a set of batteries in the headlamps at all times for emergency use, so I assume this is a good application for using the ULSD batteries. Again, does this seem like a good choice?[Curtis Randolph] yes this is a great application for this type of battery

Thanks for putting together such a great site with clear, concise information. Perhaps you could add an entry to your blog dealing specifically with the use of rechargeables in flashlights?[Curtis Randolph] oh OK if you insist. ;-)

Sincerely,

- Ed Ditlefsen -

RE: Charging Batteries

2008-01-23T13:04:00.000-08:00

Hi Bob,

You can almost always do that because chargers typically will either charge the batteries individually or in pairs. Charging one battery at a time is only possible if your charger handles the batteries individually. Look at how many LED’s are on the charger – normally there is one LED for each charge circuit.

Hope that helps.

Sincerely,

Curtis

From: Bob
Sent: Monday, January 21, 2008 12:52 PM
To: curtis@greenbatteries.com
Subject: Charging Batteries

Most, if not all AA chargers provide space to charge 4 batteries at a time. My camera only uses 2 batteries. My question: Can I charge just 2 batteries in a 4 battery position charger?

Thanks,

Bob

RE: trickle charging

2008-01-23T12:42:00.000-08:00

Hi Joshua,

Thanks for the updated information from Duracell. I’ll change the verbiage to my site to reflect that generally manufacturers do not recommend an indefinite trickle charge. People have always done it anyway for convenience and although constant trickle wears out the batteries slightly the batteries are actually losing a little bit capacity just sitting on a shelf anyway and this way they are always ready to use when you need them.

Sincerely,

Curtis

From: Joshua

Sent: Friday, January 18, 2008 2:05 PM
To: info@greenbatteries.com
Subject: trickle charging

On your website in the battery info section on trickle charging NiMH, you state that trickle charging is not recommended by battery manufacturers. However, duracell recommends trickle charging at a rate of C/300 on their website as seen here: http://www.duracell.com/oem/rechargeable/Nickel/methods.asp. You should update your website with correct information.

RE: Sanyo 2500 NiMH AAs shelf life

2008-01-01T17:18:00.001-08:00

Hi Orrie,

You may be having an issue with one of the batteries. If you have a tester
you can use it to see if all the batteries are experiencing the severe self
discharge issue of just one (or maybe two). Then get them replaced (if you
have any bad batteries) so the batteries are all performing within about 5%
of each other - 10% max. The battery that is the weakest will make the
camera stop working regardless of the charge state of the others.

Alternatively, if you do not use your batteries very regularly, you can
consider getting some of the ULSD NiMH batteries that are on the market.

They do not have as much capacity if used all in a day or two but maintain
their charge longer. This is my favorite NiMH AA battery because I do not
use my Kodak camera very often. They also work well for other devices that
do not have a high drain, like flashlights, etc.

Hope that helps.

Sincerely,

Curtis

P.S.- I add your email to the blog by bccing the blog email address (I don't
publish the address so I can moderate the content)

-----Original Message-----
From: Orrie Frutkin
Sent: Saturday, December 22, 2007 10:19 PM
To: curtis@greenbatteries.com
Subject: Sanyo 2500 NiMH AAs shelf life

Hi Curtis,

I bought some Sanyo 2500 NiMH AA's (model HR-3U 1.2v) batteries and a
GBTurbo 4000 charger from Green Batteries to use with my wife's Canon
PowerShot A540 camera. The batteries seem to charge normally, and can shoot
what seems like a fair number of pictures, as long as the photos are shot
within a very few days - less than a week.

If freshly charged batteries are put in the camera -- or just stored in
their little plastic case --and then not used immediately, they seem to lose

their power in about 7 to 10 days. They are either dead and will not respond

at all when the camera's on/off is pressed, or, they will only put out a
feeble amount of power to start to boot up the camera, then quit. This seems

like far faster and deeper draining than the losing "40% of their charge
within a month" mentioned in GB's NiMH FAQs. The camera and batteries are
kept on a desk at room temperature.

Since my wife does not use her camera every day, this means we have to
charge the batteries almost every time she wants to take picture. If she
shoots, say 5 to 10 shots on a weekend, and then nothing during the week,
the batteries are likely to be dead when she picks up the camera the
followeing weekend. In effect, we have to keep keep charging batteries that
have done no useful work. Is this a characteristic of the batteries or
charger? Or could there be something in the camera that causes the batteries

to drain? It seems to work properly while the batteries are recently
charged. Will this usage (or non-usage) and charging pattern harm the
batteries; for example, by not allowing them to take a full charge?

My wife now prefers using ordinary disposable alkaline AA's because they
actually take more pictures without the bother of recharging all the time.
I'm not happy about the waste and "green" and aspects of this, but it's hard

to argue that she should continue to wait for the NiMH batteries to charge
rather than just pop in a couple of alkalines.

Thanks for any help and advice you can provide.

(By the way, I visited your blog, but could not find a way to add this
question to the blog discussion. How doe it work?)

Orrie

RE: Looking for advise

2007-10-20T08:39:00.001-07:00

Hi Steve,

The best way to test rechargeable batteries is to get some and see if they perform to your expectations, but be careful about using them in flashlights. Rechargeable batteries are typically slightly larger in diameter and may not fit well (without removing the PVC wrapping) in flashlights that have very tight tolerances. The batteries that are well suited for flashlights that are used occasionally are the ULSD units that retain their charge longer for devices that are not used frequently, but are only available in AAA and AAA at this time.

The chargers are easy, we have many to choose from that will work well and charge the number of batteries that you mention.

If you are looking for a specific recommendation I would suggest that you get a ten cell charger and some AA and AAA ULSD batteries (the light green units) and a couple sets of the battery adapters to see if you like the battery performance in the devices that you mention. I think that you will. Getting D cells is not needed and is much more expensive since the batteries also need a charger that will accommodate the larger size.

Sincerely,

Curtis

From: Steve
Sent: Wednesday, October 17, 2007 2:47 AM
To: curtis@greenbatteries.com
Subject: Looking for advise

I would like to test rechargeable batteries that we use to see if we can convert over to this versus disposables

If this works for us, we would be looking for the following:

80-100 AAA, for handheld recorders, and ability to charge 8-10 at a time.

60 AA, for small flashlights, and ability to charge 6-8 at a time.

40 D for 3 cell maglites, and ability to charge 4 at a time.

Please give me your best recommendations, costs involved, and how can I go about testing them?

Thanks,

Steve McKee

ServiceMaster

RE: battery shelf life? (for never used batteries)

2007-09-03T15:57:00.000-07:00

Hi Lea,

You will not really be able to get much good information about this aspect of NiMH rechargeable batteries. They all have a finite shelf life but there is no standard of how long will they last, nor is there any standard of knowing when a battery was made and how old it is exactly.

Generally a NiMH battery will still be OK for a few years if you have it in the original packaging, but newer batteries are definitely better. The key is to get a good quality battery charger that has the ability to "rescue" a bad battery. Many NiMH batteries are just suffering from depleted voltage and can still be revived if used in a battery charger that has that ability. Many times I take a "bad battery" from one charger and try it in another charger - even one that has no smart features at all - and it gets it past the low voltage that caused the "smart charger" to say that it was "bad" and not chargeable.

Hope that helps.

Sincerely,

Curtis

From: lstone
Sent: Thursday, August 30, 2007 2:18 PM
To: info@greenbatteries.com
Subject: battery shelf life? (for never used batteries)

Hi!
We have a library customer who is trying to find out about the shelf-life of unopened, un-used NiMH batteries.
We wondered if you would know!

Her question is, can you store such batteries indefinitely, then open them up, charge them, and use,
or do NiMH batteries have a shelf-life?
Her question is not about the self-discharge aspect of storing rechargeable batteries.
Her question is about never-before-used NiMH batteries, still sealed in their package - how long can they be stored in an unopened condition and still be usable?
So, for example, can she buy a dozen of them, put them away (unopened) in the closet, and still expect to be able to use them in 5, 10, 15, or 20 years?

We are having a tough time tracking this information down!
Thanks so much for any light you can shed!!

Lea Stone
Librarian, Contra Costa County Library

RE: question about low discharge batteries

2007-08-30T16:54:00.000-07:00

Hi Michael,

I have always liked the Sanyo brand, having sold them with great success for many years. That said, I have had more battery returns from Sanyo batteries this last year and a half than all other batteries brands that we carry combined. That is why I have consciously allowed our Sanyo inventory to get really low and why I have not bothered to carry the Eneloop.

I bought Sanyo Eneloop and Hybrio and of course our greenbatteries.com brand of ULSD batteries and frankly, I have not done any really exhaustive tests. They all seem to do about the same if you charge them slowly and keep them from high ambient temperatures. They all discharge faster than "advertised" if you put them in a non air conditioned place. (that is why our GB ULSD batteries are only asserted to keep their charge for 6 months, not he year that Sanyo asserts.

Remember, any thing that you get from us, our brand or any one else's is 100 guaranteed to satisfy or your money back.

Sincerely,

Curtis

From: michael
Sent: Thursday, August 30, 2007 12:24 PM
To: curtis@greenbatteries.com
Subject: question about low discharge batteries

Hi,
How do your low discharge batteries compare with Sanyo's eneloop? Are
they essentially the same? Yours are less expensive and i like your
company motto. I'd prefer to buy from you, but wanted to be sure i get a
good product. I will respect your honest answer.
Mike

RE: Battery chargers

2007-06-13T15:10:00.001-07:00

Hi Joe,

Thanks for your email. We have several chargers that will do what you need.
First, all good quality NiMH battery chargers will charge the ULSD batteries
so that part is easy.

Next, you can consider the models that have a battery conditioning feature
and all the other features that you mention below - we have several from
which to choose.

Simple discharge/conditioning

http://www.greenbatteries.com/10celanimbat.html

http://www.greenbatteries.com/battery-charger-aa.html

http://www.greenbatteries.com/unsmbachandc.html

http://www.greenbatteries.com/ma10cechfora.html

Full featured discharge/conditioning/battery analysis

http://www.greenbatteries.com/bcalbachandr.html

http://www.greenbatteries.com/mhc9000.html

I'll use your desired feature list to update the battery charger comparison
table on our site in the next day or so - it has been a while since I
updated it with all of our newer chargers.

http://www.greenbatteries.com/batterychargercompare.html

Hope that helps.

Sincerely,

Curtis

Responsible Energy Corporation
Curtis Randolph - CEO
16157 Galena Meadows Drive
Reno, NV 89511
direct 775-852-3883
toll free 800-790-7866
fax 815-301-3958
cell 775-722-9901
www.greenbatteries.com

-----Original Message-----
From: Joseph Trubinsky
Sent: Wednesday, June 13, 2007 1:08 PM
To: curtis@greenbatteries.com
Subject: Battery chargers

Hello,

I visited your site and it looks like you have several chargers to choose
from. I wanted to buy a high quality charger that has the 5 features listed
below:

(A) Charges Nickel-Metal Hydride (NiMH) batteries, and the new Low Self
Discharge(LSD) NiMH batteries. Must be AA size (other sizes in same charger
in addition to AA would be great.)

(B) Has a discharge cycle, more commonly called a reconditioning cycle.

(D) Automatically switches from recondition mode to recharge mode, without
requiring you to go to the charger to flip a switch half-way through the
process.

(E) Switches to a trickle charge or shuts off or automatically after the
batteries are charged.

Please let me know if you have such a charger and where I can find it on
your site.

Thank you,

Joe Trubinsky

RE: low discharge battery questions

2007-05-15T12:13:00.000-07:00

Hi Sam,

Yes, they can be charged in any good quality NiMH charger. You might want to be careful using a really super fast charger though and watch them during the charge cycle - at ,least the first few times. I have noticed that the chargers that are typically included with these newer "ready to use" or ultra low self discharge (ULSD) NiMH batteries are very slow chargers. That said, these NiMH batteries are advertised by their manufacturers to be usable with any modern good quality NiMH charger.

They all seem to perform equally well in my casual tests with my Kodak camera and CD player, flashlight, etc. but I have not really done any aggressive tests. I can say that I found it odd to discover that only the Hybrio batteries were actually received 100% full of power. The Eneloop and greenbatteries.com brand batteries were received 60% full of power. Not sure what that means...

Also the Hybrio batteries have an odd discharge curve that is hard to describe in any way but erratic. Does not seem to affect the performance though...

These batteries are all so new that really serious testing is in order to see if one comes out on top but finding the time is the issue. ;-)

Remember, any batteries that you get from us are 100% guaranteed though so you are able to feel comfortable.

Sincerely,

Curtis

Responsible Energy Corporation
Curtis Randolph - CEO
16157 Galena Meadows Drive

Reno, NV 89511

direct 775-852-3883

toll free 800-790-7866

fax 815-301-3958
cell 775-722-9901
www.greenbatteries.com

From: sam h
Sent: Tuesday, May 15, 2007 11:50 AM
To: curtis@greenbatteries.com
Subject: low discharge battery questions

Can low discharge batteries be charged with any nimh charger?
Have you found differences between eneloop, hybrio, and ultra low discharge greenbatteries?

RE: Made where??

2007-05-15T11:52:00.000-07:00

Hi James,

Thanks for your email. I can certainly appreciate your desire to know the country of origin for many reasons. I have this addition to our website on our list of planned upgrades but need to get more webmaster resources to get this done for our company. My personal efforts to do this in the past have been thwarted by the way our suppliers make this info available on a very inconsistent basis.

FYI - We always try to get Japanese cells that have known brand names if the battery model is available in that battery cell type (typically the battery model is available in many different cell brands and mAh capacities if it is a popular model) but by way of example, even Sanyo - the largest brand name in batteries in the world has manufacturing facilities in China and you cannot specify them separately - the model numbers are the same as the cells made in Japan.

Keep checking with our site though and you will see your idea implemented within our website in the next few months because we are sincerely trying to find ways to accurately get this kind of information to our customers.

Sincerely,

Curtis

Responsible Energy Corporation
Curtis Randolph - CEO
16157 Galena Meadows Drive

Reno, NV 89511

direct 775-852-3883

toll free 800-790-7866

fax 815-301-3958
cell 775-722-9901
www.greenbatteries.com

From: JP and Anne Chand
Sent: Tuesday, May 15, 2007 11:13 AM
To: info@greenbatteries.com
Subject: Made where

Hello,

I enjoyed viewing your site this morning. I manage an R&D lab and I'm a father of young children, so I use a lot of rechargeable batteries. One thing I found lacking (from what I read) on the site was information about the countries of origin for your products. I know of no popular rechargeables made here in the USA, but some are made in Japan, which is better from an environmental and human rights standpoint than China (possibly than the USA too, unfortunately). Maybe I missed this info and it is on the site. I miss a lot of things! Please let me know, and consider listing the country of origin / manufacture with each of your products. It would make choosing / buying much easier for me. This info is important to many of those who really try to reduce their environmental footprint.

Thank you,

James Chand

RE: solar chargers

2007-05-11T15:11:00.001-07:00

Hi Marcie,

There are many ways to recharge batteries with solar power. They will all charge your NiMH batteries depending on how you have them set up and how fast you need the batteries to be charged.

The simplest way is to get a single unit solar charger that will charge the batteries. Unfortunately this is also the slowest way to charge the batteries because of the small size of the solar panel. We have a unit like this and you can only charge 1-2 batteries in a day of sun - if you tried to charge all four high capacity AA NiMH batteries they will take a couple of days to charge.

http://www.greenbatteries.com/batterysaveraa.html

Another way to use a solar panel to charge the batteries is to get a separate solar panel and a smart charger that has a cigarette lighter adapter (CLA) that you can plug it into and charge all your batteries in a few hours. This solution can be from 1-3 hundred dollars to get al the components. The more power that you need from the solar panel, the faster the charger will charge your batteries.

http://www.greenbatteries.com/por1rosopa.html

http://www.greenbatteries.com/feciliad.html

http://www.greenbatteries.com/echcarcp-4.html

Do you know yet what you r usage requirements/expectations will be while you are at a remote location?

Sincerely,

Curtis

Responsible Energy Corporation
Curtis Randolph - CEO
16157 Galena Meadows Drive

Reno, NV 89511

direct 775-852-3883

toll free 800-790-7866

fax 815-301-3958
cell 775-722-9901
www.greenbatteries.com

From: Marcie Neuburger
Sent: Sunday, May 06, 2007 7:50 PM
To: info@greenbatteries.com
Subject: solar chargers

Hello,
I am looking to buy a AA and AAA solar NiMH battery charger. I am going to be camping and travelling for several months and need an easy way to recharge my digital camera batteries. Which of your products would you suggest, and will they work with the NiMH batteries that I already have? Thanks a lot,

RE: amperage

2007-05-11T11:13:00.001-07:00

Hi Patti,

The mah of a battery will not "overamp" the device. The mAh ratings on a battery are more like a measure of potential, not actual current flow.

The voltage of both NiCD and NiMH batteries are identical - rated at 1.2 volts - and can commonly be used interchangeably without harm to the device BUT this is definitely in the realm of custom experimentation and all manufacturers will tell you it is not advised (this is to avoid liability more than an explanation of what can and cannot be done)

This being said, your primary concern is to make sure that your device can safely charge the battery without grossly overheating the battery and/or device. NiMH and NiCD batteries have different charging requirements and as long as your charger is not a fast charger, at or below 10% of the battery capacity is typically considered a trickle charge, you can be pretty safe with your battery experiment.

Hope that helps.

Sincerely,

Curtis

Responsible Energy Corporation
Curtis Randolph - CEO
16157 Galena Meadows Drive

Reno, NV 89511

direct 775-852-3883

toll free 800-790-7866

fax 815-301-3958
cell 775-722-9901
www.greenbatteries.com

From: pattisue432
Sent: Thursday, May 03, 2007 9:22 AM
To: info@greenbatteries.com
Subject: amperage

hi there. I know that amperage is a measure of electrical current. If my cordless phone originally used a 800mah ni-cad, will a 1500mah nimh over-amp the device and cause harm?
Thanks,
Patti

RE: Swapping NiCd and NiMh batteries in older cordless phones.

2007-04-21T11:45:00.001-07:00

Hi Lewis,

That is my opinion exactly. You sound like a real battery engineer. ;-)

Curtis

Responsible Energy Corporation
Curtis Randolph - CEO
16157 Galena Meadows Drive

Reno, NV 89511

phone 800-790-7866

fax 815-301-3958
cell 775-722-9901
www.greenbatteries.com

From: Lewis
Sent: Friday, April 20, 2007 8:01 AM
To: info@greenbatteries.com
Subject: Swapping NiCd and NiMh batteries in older cordless phones.

Hello,

I am trying to determine if a NiMh battery can be safely substituted in an 8 year old cordless phone which was only certified to support NiCd batteries.

The Energizer website proposes their 1500 mah. model ER-P730 as a substitute for my particular cordless phone model (UNIDEN) which normally takes a 600 mah. NiCd BT-905.

I have examined my phone's cradle and note it provides a charging voltage of 5.8 volts and 85 ma. when charging its NiCd 3.6 volt battery.

I assume that if I swap the 600 mah NiCd for the 1500 mah NiMh, then if the charging current remains the same, then 85 ma. of charging current (0.056C) would constitute the equivalent of a trickle charge and there would be no risk to over-charging the NiMh battery. It may nevertheless take 17 hours to charge up the NiMh battery from empty, but that in itself should not create a fire hazard.

If this makes sense to you, then this would explain why there are some many battery retailers in the world who wholely recommend the use of their NiMh batteries in cordless phones which were only certified for NiCd batteries.

The disenting opinion comes from UNIDEN who may not want to risk having a product liability problem and from experts who know that in fast charge applications, it is dangerous to use a NiMH battery in a NiCD-only charger which does not have the proper technology to detect full charge.

Any comment from you would be appreciated.

Lewis Heilig

Montreal

RE: Greenbatteries.com has Energizer NiMH Products!

2007-04-18T11:57:00.001-07:00

Hi Richard,

This charger says in the instructions to only charge NiMH batteries. I know from experience that you need to be careful not to charge batteries that are not designed to handle a fast charge rate. Your Sanyo batteries can certainly handle a fast charge rate. I have used the Energizer batteries with the 15 minute charger, Sanyo 2300 and the greenbatteries.com brand too. This charger can get the batteries VERY hot while they charge so if the battery has a fault it is likely to really push it hard. Interestingly it gets the Energizer brand of 2200 mAh batteries the hottest, but that is probably because they are brand new.

The charger also has a very sensitive "bad battery detector" I was just charging four 2300 Sanyo batteries and the Energizer charger did not like one of the Sanyo batteries (if the light blinks red, you have a bad contact or a bad battery and the charger will not charge any of the batteries, not just the one that it thinks is bad. The ten cell charger charged it up fine though, not sure what that means.

Hope that helps.

Sincerely,

Curtis

Responsible Energy Corporation
Curtis Randolph - CEO
16157 Galena Meadows Drive

Reno, NV 89511

phone 800-790-7866

fax 815-301-3958
cell 775-722-9901
www.greenbatteries.com

From: Richard Vassar [mailto:richardvassar@earthlink.net]
Sent: Monday, April 16, 2007 9:17 PM
To: Curtis Randolph
Subject: Re: Greenbatteries.com has Energizer NiMH Products!

Hi Curtis,

Do you know if the Energizer 15 minute charger compatible with the Sanyo 2300 mAh NiMH AA cells that I own?

Best Regards,
Richard

RE: One question from me and one from prospective customer.

2007-04-13T11:05:00.001-07:00

Hi Paul,

I am not familiar with the Duracell line of chargers and so cannot really comment on that specifically. Generally manufacturers state in various ways that to get the most of their units you should use their own brand of products. The problem is it is hard to know if this is designed to reduce their customer service issues or perhaps it might have some marketing intent. Who is to say? The bottom line is that it is always best to follow the instructions that came with the device.

The speed of the NiMH charger involves several interrelated issues that frankly compete with each other: safety, battery life and last but not least, consumer convenience vs. cost.

Generally, in my experience you can use any good quality NiMH changer with any good quality HIGH CAPACITY NiMH battery. Faster chargers are riskier and slower chargers are safer. Folks get into trouble if/when they do not read the packaging and see if there are warnings on the battery or the charger, or if they just do not know that the battery is designed to be charged in a fast charger - i.e.- I had a woman contact me once with a melted charger and we discovered that her husband bought batteries that had "600 mA max charge rate" on the batteries and she used one of our 1,000 ma chargers and the batteries got so hot they melted the plastic cover before the charger safety circuits kicked in and shut it down. (safety issue)

FYI - The super fast chargers available today like the Energizer 15 minute charger have a very high charge rate e.g.- 7 amps (7,000 mA) for the Energizer model and if you use an inferior quality battery or one that is not specifically designed to be used in a fast charger you might experience both some safety and battery life issues. Even with the Energizer NiMH batteries, this charger makes the batteries VERY hot - too hot to handle - and this will definitely cause the batteries to not last as long in terms of the number of charge and recharge cycles. (battery life issue)

For general users, the faster the charger, the more you need to be concerned about compatibility/safety/battery life - particularly with companies that have lots of different qualities of batteries with the same brand name. If you don't want to pay much attention to the details, then just default to a slower charger i.e.- less than 1,000 mA charge rate - and you are much less likely to ever have any safety issues. This is why I personally like chargers that are able to charge at different rates but the default charge rate is fairly slow - like the LaCrosse unit that you have purchased from us.

Sincerely,

Curtis

Responsible Energy Corporation
Curtis Randolph - CEO
16157 Galena Meadows Drive

Reno, NV 89511

phone 800-790-7866

fax 815-301-3958
cell 775-722-9901
www.greenbatteries.com

From: paul
Sent: Friday, April 13, 2007 9:51 AM
To: curtis@greenbatteries.com
Cc: Jacob
Subject: One question from me and one from prospective customer.

1. If it is better not to run a NiMh battery down to zero before recharging, what level would you recommend as a minimum - my tester measures in 20% increments.

It is not that it is better to not drain the batteries down when they are discharged.

see this page for more details

http://www.greenbatteries.com/nibafa.html#How%20many%20times

2. A buddy owns a couple of Duracell quick chargers - he wants to verify that he can charge any NiMh battery in it. (any idea whether Duracell uses smart chargers or not?)

3. Do you have a view on Green batteries vs Duracell vs the Energizers that you have on your site? He is a user like me - not super technical with cameras and things - more kids toys.

Paul

RE: NiCd Batteries

2007-02-18T20:54:00.000-08:00

Hi Stan,

I sincerely appreciate your email detailing your professional experience with NiCD vs NiMH batteries and your support of our efforts. We try hard to communicate useful information to everyone so they can get the most out of their battery investment.

The challenge is to address the concerns of each customer and give just the information that would help them in their situation and not burden them with too many facts and details about all the many variables in the battery world.

Personally though, I love the technical details because I enjoy solving problems and there are so many more battery chemistries and solutions in the commercial and industrial realm - as compared to general consumer products that we have traditionally focused on at www.greenbatteries.com.

We do have some NiCD batteries currently available on our other battery site www.portablebatteries.com and we will have other chemistries available soon on both our battery sites as Responsible Energy Corporation gets more involved in commercial battery management and battery recycling`services.

Sincerely,

Curtis

Responsible Energy Corporation
Curtis Randolph - CEO
16157 Galena Meadows Drive
Reno, NV 89511
phone 775-852-3883
fax 815-301-3958
cell 775-722-9901
www.greenbatteries.com

-----Original Message-----
From: Stan [mailto: XXXXXXXXX
Sent: Sunday, February 18, 2007 8:27 PM
To: info@greenbatteries.com
Subject: NiCd Batteries

Re FAQ: Which are better, NiCd batteries or NiMH batteries?
I admire your honesty in admitting that there are some applications where NiCd batteries are a better choice than NiMH. As a former two-way radio manager for a large public safety agency that used thousands of batteries 24 hours a day, I can testify that NiCd batteries are far superior to NiMH when used in a high current demand application in a hot climate.
We tried to use NiMH batteries in place of the NiCd several times because of the hazardous waste disposal cost and the size/weight per Amp hour advantage but it just didn’t work out in our application (5 Watt VHF conventional portable radios). The problems were primarily heat related.
When the ambient temperatures are already high and more battery heat is produced when transmitting and the radio is in a protective carrier that retains the heat, the NiMH batteries do not perform well and they self discharge at an extremely high rate. A fully charged spare NiMH battery left in the trunk of a car on a hot day would be dead by the end of a shift. If left there for a week or two, the battery would lose substantial capacity.
The users also put batteries in chargers while still hot and let them "cook" to long which didn’t help. Then there’s the charger issue. Motorola, Kenwood and others now make chargers that will accept bi or tri chemistry but many "legacy" chargers were still in use and it was impossible to make sure the correct charger was being used all the time.
Economics also came into play since we found the NiMH batteries required replacement at twice the rate of the NiCd type (80% or rated capacity). We were paying about $0.80 a pound to dispose of the NiCd’s which were then recycled so we were also "green". We collected enough batteries to fill a 55 gallon drum (about 400 pounds) every month.
I know that isn’t the case with the average user of AA or AAA cells but there are still applications where the NiCd batteries are hard to beat. They can take more abuse and misuse and are cheaper to use in some cases. Also should mention that NiCd battery technology has not stood still and today’s products use much less toxic metal and do not have the "memory" effect of earlier designs.
P.S. Just noticed that the only portable radio battery you sell (B8002 for Motorola Saber) is a NiCd.
Keep up the good work!
Stan

RE: Hybrio NiMH cells

2007-01-30T15:28:00.000-08:00

Hi Rick,

Good questions. The Hybrio cells are similar to the other NiMH brand cells that are advertising the Ultra Low Self Discharge (ULSD) or "ready to use" aspects of these "new" cells. Are they really that new or just optimized to have way less of a self discharge issue? Hard to say since they have not been on the market all that long - at least in this country. That said, the Sanyo Eneloop, the RayOVac Hybrid, the UltraLast/UniRoss Hybrio cells are all much better at retaining their charge than the current highest capacity NiMH batteries in the 2700 mAh range. Which are really new and which are the same but with another companies shrink wrap on them? Who knows for certain... We are getting some ULSD cells with our greenbatteries.com brand on them really soon too. We are not going to advertise 90% charge retention though. I have obtained test samples of the Sanyo and Hybrio cells and they both seem to be over advertising the actual charge retention feature. I'll write more on that later, but for now these cells really do retain their charge for much longer. For the casual NiMH battery user this is a good alternative. Serious battery power hounds will still want to get the most mAh from their batteries, if they use the charged cell all at once and/or in a few days.

Remember, if you compared the 1800 mAh battery of yesteryear and a 2700mAh battery from the same manufacturer, but made today, you will typically get a higher self discharge rate in the newer higher capacity battery. Lots of variables though, it is hard to really nail it down unless you do lots of battery testing and analysis. I believe that the manufacturers do not really want it to be common knowledge to the general consumer that there is no best battery for all situations and that they have always traded one battery feature/attribute for another. i.e.- less self discharge usually results in less mAh capacity.

FYI - Battery manufacturers are certainly not going to divulge the specifics of their, sometimes proprietary, chemistries. This is kind of a good thing. We really want the battery makers to make better batteries for our future. Can you say lithium ion batteries for our cars... Now that is what I am talking about!!

Hope that helps.

Sincerely,

Curtis

Responsible Energy Corporation
Curtis Randolph - CEO
16157 Galena Meadows Drive

Reno, NV 89511

phone 775-852-3883

fax 815-301-3958
cell 775-722-9901
www.greenbatteries.com

From: Rick

Sent: Tuesday, January 30, 2007 2:48 PM
To: info@greenbatteries.com
Subject: Hybrio NiMH cells

I've been doing some research on these batteries on the web. The manufacturer of these is doing a real smoke and mirrors act on their website when it comes to the chemistry.

On your website they're billed as Nickel Metal Hydride. Is there anything more to the chemistry than that? When visiting the manufacturer's website, they make these cells sound like they have the low self-discharge characteristics of LiIon and the chargability of NiMH.

What's the scopp on Hybrio cells compared to conventional NiMH cells?

Thanks for your time. Nice website, by the way.

Rick
Columbus, OH