Thanks for taking apart this item. I was recommended it by a friend and had the "too good to be true" impression. I bought the 50,000mAh model, which is around 50,000 units of BS. The thing won't store energy in the Australian sun after leaving it out for several days. The energy input is barely enough to break even.
I love how much smaller and lightweight this is than my older power banks th-cam.com/users/postUgkxU45wIUiiQjrUWgrFNORkYxVlmCsYWENJ and yet it charges even more. Bought one a couple months ago and loved it so much I purchased a second one and gave it to my granddaughter as a gift. We're avid campers so power banks are an absolute must have. I also like to keep these charged for when the power at home goes out which has happened a couple times this year. They are so convenient and easy to use. You can charge multiple devices at the same time. The compass is a nice added bonus. I appreciate how quickly this arrived. I am curious to see how long these take to charge in the sun.
I remember seeing on a local forum a 24,000mAh power bank that got depleted after only a charge despite its heavy weight and bulk size. When cracked open, guess what... a 18650 cell and two bags of sand!
If the solar panel is decent you should get a modest voltage and current from it in direct sunlight. Perhaps use it to make a solar powered lighting feature?
Yeah, the solar panel is too nice to throw away, but I can't think what to do with it. There are some nice tiny water pumps on eBay - maybe I could build a teeny tiny water feature.
Julian Ilett the slight downside to that being that the solar panels only put out decent current on truly sunny days. My own temptation would be to hack it onto an existing solar lighting module (like a string of lights?) so that it performed better even on heavily overcast days.
just by inspection this is a 10v/50(100mA if VERY generous) module so if IT TRACKED the sun on clear sky it would produce0.5-1w which is nothing really to charge a battery of 3.7v*4.8Ah=17.8Wh.
Thanks Julian. I was about to purchase a few of them and sell them locally, but after this video I would definitly have to reconsider my idea. You have a great knowledge of electronics. Ones again - thanks for taking this crap apart and sharing with us!
2 x 2400 mah instead 30 000 mah ? i think some of the cheap products are fake like this ... here in german we have a institution called "verbraucherschutz" (customer protect) where you can send information about those things - they make it public and do something against scam / fake products ....
You're right that it would heat up the panel quite a bit, however, it is designed to be exposed to direct sunlight, so it should be able to take the heat from sunlight.
It still doesn't matter, if you watch GreatScott's video about two solar power banks he explains that with solar panels this small it would take weeks to charge those batteries up. Weeks. There's just not enough power. To get enough power you would need a big 12V solar panel array and that is definitely not portable and will be very expensive as those cost hundreds of dollars.
I bought one from eBay that I had to assemble myself. No big problem. Just a little soldering. It claims to hold five 18650 batteries. Good luck getting them inside the box without screwing up something. The solar panel is more trouble than it's worth. My suggestion is to either purchase something better or to disconnect the solar panel and connect about ten batteries external of the box and use it to charge devices when no other power is available.
+Alba Albion Its not a waste of money. As far as I'm concerned, its the best power bank under 20 dollars I ever had. I have purchased some 8 or more power banks over the last 10 years for my job to have Bluetooth radio connection at work. This 30k solar one is pretty good. If you have the money, by all means get the "yoobao long march", but this one is plenty good. I look forward to buying the 50k mAh one.
Thanks for the review. I wanted to buy one. But the seller on some auction told it's really capacity 5,000-8,000 mah. Its way much less than 30,000 his one was even marked as 50,000. I thought its something really strange and decided to find a review. You brought all the light to this.
Excellent review. I have owned a dozen or so power banks and only about 10% of what I have owned had honestly advertised capacity. I would rather just buy kits and install my own batteries so I could be certain of capacities. Great video, please continue to expose fraudulent products and shady marketing.
I've used one of these for a long time and they worked really well. the LED flashing (when the sun) means it's charging via the sun. The solar charging doesn't really charge the bank to store it but it will charge a phone or similar device without using your charge. If you are charging a larger device such as a tablet it will slowly deplete if it is also being charged by the sun. Now a big problem I've had was charging two devices at once (when a buddy of mine wants to use it too) it will deplete very fast. But I still enjoy it for what I paid for.
Mine is physically identical to yours - except for having a specification of 10,000 mAh. Inside there are also two 4,800 mAh lithium cells, so pretty close to the printed spec'. It charges fully in about 12 hours of good sunlight and works faultlessly. For what I paid for it, I'm more than happy. Perhaps you need to change location to a country with more sunshine. LOL
Keep it for parts. The solar panel and batteries can be used elsewhere and the blue LEDs can be used in other projects. I have a 5600mAh power bank by soundlogic and it worked for awhile then it started to malfunction. I did nothing to it, just used as intended. It had a flashlight on it which still works and it charges fine but the USB out no longer works and the 4 lights on top which are to show the power level are all lit up and will not turn off.
Thanks to this video, I've torn mine apart and desoldered those blue LEDs. Currently testing whether the solar panel is effective at charging the thing in this condition.
If you check eBay, there is a guy selling the exact design and now claiming they are 80000 mAh. That's what drew my attention in the first place, 80 Ah in a tiny box.
I agree with you entirely, Julian. In my time I've seen many electrical items of similarly abysmal design and quality. One thing I've happened to noticed is that they all tend to use a similar font for labelling the various ports and connections. As soon as I saw the labels above the USB connectors etc. I could tell exactly what it was going to be like. Beware of anything pictured with that sort of font on places such as eBay. Just a word of caution about reusing the LiPo battery packs; if the batteries are of similar grade to the overall product, I'd send them to the recycle centre along with the rest of it. Low quality LiPo can be very, very dangerous.
LEDs can be made to light very bright with very little power if you pulse them instead of STEADY on. You can pulse them at very high frequencies, which to the eye, looks like they are solid on. This is often done with the Jewel Thief circuit.
If it sounds too good to be true, and looks too small to be true, it's not true! I just hope the price was right, so you could re-purpose the parts. I wonder if you can find cells that are the right dimensions, to completely fill the pack, no dead space, and get it close to 1/10th of it's rated capacity. The thing that concerns me about the solar panel, is the heat. To put the unit in direct sunlight, so it will charge properly will just heat the unit up, perhaps, enough to be unsafe for the LiPo cells. I don't recommend using it until it cools down, to protect the semiconductors on the circuit board. The solar panel looks like it would work well for out door LED solar lighting.
The panel on them is usually described as an " emergency " charging option and can take days to fully charge but.....if you really were stuck with flat everything you can wait a few hours and maybe get enough charge to send a message or quick call and save your life. I also wanted to say that the way panel was mounted wasn't such a silly idea as what doesn't bend will break. Glued at one end and sitting on foam on the other gives it a little bit of shock protection.
What did you want for your 10 guineas? Seems pretty good to me. Not everyone wants to carry around a 'big solar array and battery'. The cells are good and the panel provides more charge than no panel at all.
Good the button is recessed so it doesn't get bumped.. I have had mine for about 2 years we use it often & it holds a charge..but the solar panel is a bit small by the time it's run the LEDs. It actually feels cheap but it wasn't expensive & it's doing it's job I face it down so the solar panel doesn't activate & thus the LEDs don't eat anything unless it's really sunny... Just don't forget it won't charge anything until you push the little button..I'm very happy & mine is only 10,000ah
🔴 🔴 🔴 Hi, I bought one like this but it is 10000 mah. The problem is that the solar energy does not charge when I put it in the sun. It does not charge and the LED does not light like what happens when I charge it with electricity. It lights up for one LED only. Please answer me, where is the problem? 🔴 🔴 🔴
I would be interested to know if you reassembled the 30,000 mAh solar power bank; did you reassemble it? I would also be interested to know who manufactured that low quality solar power bank. Thank you for both your informative and enjoyable video content.
Doesn't stop them, they're selling 200,000mah now :) Also I note on the one you're testing that there is no balance charging circuit for the two cells, that really is a fire waiting to happen
What did you expect when you purchased it? i just saw one on eBay for $19.27 free shipping. Most solar panels only work good in direct sunlight. My outside solar lighting during the summer will charge enough to stay on all night. This time of year I get maybe a couple hours at most. Your indoor test of the solar panel is almost a joke. Also I believe AH ratings procedures are not cast in stone. It's an average at best and manufactures can use really low amp draws to get a better AH number. I will say I do enjoy your videos. So who makes a better power bank for $20? Thanks for the video :) PS the $20 one also comes with a USB cable and adapters
I read/viewed somewhere that a blinking LED is 200 times more efficient to a solid lit one. 4 lit is a total waste compared to ea cycling through the blink cycle.
thanks for the handy review, i did glance at these and considered their apparent handiness, save me a few quid now! , theres certainly been a rash of fake lion batteries, on replacement phone battery i bought was far worse than the 4 year old battery it was replacing, and was very hard to source one that was as good as the real one used to be . Well at least its RoHS compliant so we can all not pollute with lead, just entire junk electronics instead. Oh well off to buy a 256gb memory stick for £10 from ebay !
you cant be sure that its RoHS compliant tho :) i was making a design for the package of Chinese electronic cigarette and they just said in the end when i was done "put all the compliant signs you know on the package" :)
Hobypyrocom really? thats soo awful! ive bought a few broken bricks from china, but its 5$ here and 5$ there, because everything from china is so cheap! Buying from china is always a gamble- shipping takes forever, cheap packaging, and pray it wasnt dropped or smashed somewhere along the way. And then if it works, its not any better quality than bargain bin stuff anywhere else.
guy true if your country is different than mine. here everything is imported from China and its the lowest of lowest quality but anyway the few owners here (which own whole country because they have tons of money) want big profit so the lowest quality stuff here costs as much as the highest quality stuff on internet. they make like 500% profit or more. example they buy the man underpants from China for 0.5euros ($0.7US) per peace and they sell it for 5-8euros ($7-10US) per peace.
I have a slightly older version of this without the light. It's thinner. I popped it open a few days ago and the batteries are thinner but fill the whole space front to back and left to right with a bit of a gap on the top also filled with the sponge. I wonder if they got a cheaper deal on those batteries or if they increased the thickness to add the possibility of 18650s. The solar panel does kind-of work. I let it discharge to 2 LEDs then threw it on the parcel shelf of my car and some days later, it was up to 4 LEDs. How useful that is will depend on your use case. I had to go out of my way to test it so not so much for me. Also I live in the southern US so plenty of bright sunlight a lot of the time. I just watched the MichaelsWorldTV video and mine is the same as his, 2x4000mAh. Interesting that this newer incarnation is thicker but has a lot less capacity. Just checked the ebay listing. It was advertised at 10000mAh which was a lot more honest than we're seeing now.
At least yours came assembled, when I bought mine, besides the fact that it took almost 6 months to arrive here in Brazil, turns out that they sent me a DIY project but without the instructions, and now here i am searching for someone that has been through the same thing. It almost feels like a joke, I have to solder it and all.. But good video by the way, it made me feel unwilling to assemble it anyway hahahah
Great video post. Thanks for all the detail. I was almost dissuaded by a negative comment but I was glad I stuck with it. I looked at these on eBay and saw that some sellers actually rated the solar input at 200 milliamps and the micro USB input at 1amp max. So I was thinking the case was just ambiguous until I saw you examine the Li-poly cells to show that the 30,000 amp hours claim was just a lie. Looks like a run of the mill power bank with a solar power gimic added to it to help its eBay sales. I thought it might charge up given a few days on a car dashboard, but with all the other lies, it would probably be a bad idea to leave it unattended.
From a the negative reviews on this channel of the power bank. Yes it is a cheap buy so you get a cheap product. I bought this to test it out and so far after 3 years of this I still use it. I take it camping and No real issues for just using it for phone or some light at night hooked up to a small usb light. Other then that if you use it for long extensive time you better off getting a really big bank. Happy charging :)! Julian, I have a question, can you put better lithium batteries that last longer on it with a protection for the batteries. I am new to learning all the solar business.
I've got one that looks identical, but is a different colour and has different writing on the back. It's claimed to be 10,000 mAh, which seems fairly accurate in practice. It's good as a rechargeable light and an emergency battery pack. But I had to permanently cover the solar panel as no matter how bright, whenever enough light hit it, it would quickly drain the battery instead of charging it.
I have 2 of these. They are good for lighting only. Put a cell in and discard the solar panel and use as a light. Long press small button light comes on. press it again and it dims. Press it again and it flashes SOS. Good Camping lights.
I would be interested in the full sun, open circuit voltage of the panel, and the short circuit current. The maximum output power should be about half of the product of those two measurenents.
I bought one of these from eBay for $14, and when it arrived, I messaged the seller about the capacity. Not wanting negative feedback, they gave me a full refund! I then proceeded to mod the thing (put 3 more 5v solar panels in parallel with the existing one, and made a 50ah battery from 18650 cells.) and it works like a charm now! It just doesn't charge at the full 2.1 amps.
Macbook battery cells are the same voltage and are square, flat packs. Had a PSP-1001 with the UMD drive removed and one of those batteries in it's place. Hours of fun man.
lol really like your reviews and am subscribed for a long time, brought the bank from ebay and did not know how to turn the light on, looked on TH-cam and you came up telling me its a pile of junk, but thank you anyhow its a very logical and good review :) oh I have the one with LEDs on the underside still don't know how to turn them on :(, is there a way of swapping out the leds? what power bank would you recommend?
I have 3 of these and I love them. One of them keeps my Garmin Edge Touring from timing out and going dim. It kept my GPS up and running for 18hours (longest time i tried) I love it. Not sure why you don't like it. These are only $12 USD. I thought it preformed beautifully
Thanks for sharing the video, I was about to order one exactly the same from eBay, an by shear luck I came across your video, thanks again for saving me money. Regards ricky from Northern Ireland.
Fun thing, because of the over-inflated rating you can't take that on a plane because it's too high Wh capacity...if they were honest it would be more useful!
for some reason they list estimated total life capacity (100's of thousands mAh) instead of actual battery capacity on most, if not all, power banks. also, solar versions provide trickle charge in case of emergency, not to actually charge up the power bank. i do agree though that this one in particular has too many flaws to get genuine use while out and about and would probably crap out after a couple uses.
I found a "600,000 mAh" power bank lol m.ebay.com/itm/600000mAh-Solar-Power-Bank-Charger-Battery-Backup-Galaxy-Iphone-Portable-Mobile-/221887185824?nav=SEARCH At 3.7V that's 2.22 kWh, or just under 8 megajoules! Given the typical energy density of Li-ion batteries, if that thing really had its rated capacity, it would weigh around 15 kg! How's that for portability? By the way, with that amount of energy you could charge your mobile devices virtually infinitely many times. Or heat up 19.1 liters of water from freezing to boiling. Or run a 3 HP electric motor for an hour (assuming no power loss and 1 HP = 746 W). Charging would take several days, even if you wire it to an ATX power supply. I wonder how long it would take to charge using its built-in solar panel though.
well said, but is it not simply a typo?, maybe an extra 0, perhaps just 60,000 - i have a 200,000 model, and i have not opened it up, but i notice it charges my iphone 5s from dead to 100% so far 4 times, i know its not 200,000 mah, and my usb tester says so far its transfered only 6000mah's - +fede142857
I would do, but my channel is all roulette, but yeah, I may make an exception - you know it still usefull, I have got 4 of them :) +theBIGreekgeek [Paul]
great review! i've been burned by a couple of ebay battery sellers... claiming high capacity. a good portion of them are just junk. better to buy from a reputable company. i hope you forwarded this video to ebay!
They have redesigned the PCB. It now has surface mount LED's that don't come on when it is charging from the solar panel. Granted the solar panel is still lame, so I plan on installing a more powerful panel. The unit I purchased has a lantern on the other side and came in kit form. I can say they lie about 50,000 MAH. Mine is a true 15,000 MAH, but that is at 3.7 volts not at 5 volts at the output. The kit is a good way to go, because you can install higher output 18650 batteries, but you do have to solder the batteries together. I have a battery spot welder that makes it much easier.
Good review I have two renagy 24000mah porteble solar chargers and it says they can only be fully charged by plugging them into 120ac I used one all last summer at my cabbin using only the sun to charge my cell phone and worked well
Is the below calculation correct ? Energy of 2x LiPo cells = 2 x 3.7 V x 2400 mAh = 17,760 mWh Energy of solar panel (max) = 6V x 100 mA = 600 mW Time needed to full-charge = 17,760/600 = 29.6 hours or 2.5 days !!! (disregarding the losses and assuming 12 hours sunlight per day)
+hemanth kumar The charge time probably be even worse -- due to energy losses and those stupid blue leds. That said, I'd rather have one of those than none at all if I were heading somewhere off grid.
Charge in direct sunlight only.. when the sun cant be seen by it, turn it over to stop all light getting to solar panel. You will have to track sun manually, but the panel seems ok.. If the batteries or battery inside are bloody used 18650, remove and replace them.. lithium packs or 18650 batteries are fine I found. Packs perhaps a better option . When it has finally charged , the 4th led stops flashing, and all lights stay on.. Its then fully charged.
I agree, the solar panels are just a sales gimmick as is the rated mAh capacity. All the power banks I've tested end up at between 10% and 20% of their lable rated capacity.
They say leave in direct sunlight yet last I checked batteries especially lithium batteries don't enjoy working in heat. One of those left in sun on hot day must get up around 40-50 degrees easy. The panel really should be detachable from bank to last any lenght of time.
I've got a possibly newer version of this power bank. Looks identical apart from the writing on the back. Mines rated at 20000mAh. Doesn't feel heavy enough for that but it does *work*. The LED's aren't always on when its charging - they come on when you press the button. If you leave it, the LED go out and it still keeps charging. I've yet to give it a good workout (or take the back off to check the batteries - I'll get back to you) so time will tell...
On that note: How hard would it be to fit new batteries with higher capacity? New to this, do you just connect them in series and solder the black and red wires to the board?
I've got a couple with 4 2600mAh 18650 lithium cells, so it actually 10,000mAh. the leds don't run steadily, they flicker on/off in rapid succession, a cell phone camera can usually reveal this.
im having trouble charging a 12volt battery with a large 100watt panel in a shaded part of the building so I can agree with you a tiny panel like that can take ages to charge up a 4.8amp battery even in hot direct sun!
I have designed my own 5 watt solar panel charging cells that will be used to charge a 7.2 aH 12 v gel cell. The panels cost ~ $24 do not need regulation save for a schottky diode in series with the output. Should take about 6 hours to charge the battery in full sun which is ok for me since I intend to use the battery to charge my phone and tablet during a power outage. I could design a smart charger but SLAs are pretty forgiving as to charge rate. At least they won't explode.
You missed the flashlight feature. Turning the charger on/off is done by tapping the button. But if you hold the on/off button, the flashlight LED will switch on.
He doesn't actually admit this unlike a lot of others actually does the job it does charge my phone twice & years later it still works & doesn't go flat by itself.. It's not super advanced but what do u want it has the components relative to the job...the solar panel helps hold the charge it only puts them on if the input exceeds the output during charge so it's not draining..turn it upside down to turn them off if you think it's eating batteries..I agree the solar panel is not really much use for charging it but it's a trickle charge to keep it full.. Months later mine stays full..
Dan Servante Even mid range AAs don't lose charge on their own and therefore don't require a trickle to keep them full (which is supposedly quite bad for the lifespan of the batteries)
Re: 02:30 comment on 50mA LED current requirements: With LED multiplexing and modern low current LEDs, all 4 LEDs *appearing* to be "on" together could take even LESS than 2mA on average...nowhere near 50mA. If you wave the powerbank around while the LEDs are on and you see multiple images of them then it's using a circuit that does not drive each LED all the time. Thus, even 4x 2mA LEDs can require an average current of *less* than 2mA to shine brightly as far as the human eye is concerned. Virtually every powerbank I've seen DOES multiplex these "battery level" indicator LEDs. Edit to add: I'd also call into question the "2400mAh" cells. Even now in 2020, many lithium cells sold on the internet either make fake claims or are counterfeit...some even contain sand or metal scrap to make them weigh as much as the higher capacity cells. So even if they claim 2400mAh, I would be very hesitant to believe it. Given their willingness to make that outrageous "30,000mAh" claim I'd be surprised if the lithium cells themselves could even supply 1000mAh per cell.
I got this one, was thinking of cracking it open because the one of the leds doesn't work. Maybe I'll put a resistor in between the leds and power so it doesn't consume as much power anymore.
Funny. I just bought this excactly same powerbank from a china shop from Crete island in Greece. It's totally the same but it said 10000mah. Solar panel didn't charge at all even it was 2 days in bright summer sunlight :) Paid 20€ but I returned it and got my money back. Thank god :)
Yeah, there is not ONE of these that actually meets it's mAH rating nor will any of these with small solar panels actually give you a useful charge. Even with a 5V 3A solar panel it would be hard to charge a 4800mAH battery to full capacity. Solar panels only give out full rated power when in direct sun. Cloudy days, morning, evening, and nights of course are not going to charge much, if at all. Manufacturers selling this shit should be held accountable. The outrageous over stated specifications alone should be enough to get them banned from Amazon, leaving maybe ebay for them to take advantage of people. Sorry about writing a book here... This kind of thing just pisses me off. Taking advantage of the public. Cool review! You expose it for what it is!
Good video, thanks for sharing.. Luckily I bought a diy case which arrived buckled and no screws... That was a few months ago.. Now I've bought 3 4900mah batteries and a holder so I don't have to muck around with tape and heat sinc. Just gotta get screws and a soldering iron an work out how to do it myself... :)
im sure the LED's are not burning the power, its probably got its own capacitor that is charged with the light level, when the capacitor runs out it turns off.
@Julian Ilett Are there any standalone circuits, that would implement lion charging, solar support and 5V out ? Sorta like this power bank, just without the casing.
I order one and then came across you review,when i got it i opened and mine has i think 5 x 18650 batteries inside which they are better batteries ,i'm happy about that because if i need more power i can replace them for others with up to 6800 mah , although i agree with you about inefficient harvest of energy with so many leds lit up while charging so i removed the first 3 and now the one left just blinks 1 time every 4 seconds and flashes when i power it on so that's all i need for mode indicator ,hope this helps any one , they're not that bad for the price
The maximum capacity of the best 18650's is 2600mah. My tests show Sanyo and so called 4000man trustfires to be between 1500 and 2600mah. My 4200 mah ultrafires test at just under 600mah. the trustfire 7800mah also test at 600mah. 2600mah Sanyo and trustfire weigh 40 gms while trustfires way 30 grams
I bought a 15600mAh Yoobao YB-665 about two years ago on a trip in Asia and it has held up fine until recently, was looking for a replacement, thus ending up here. They are not as cheap, but they hold up fine.
Hi mate! Thanks for the review! Can I modify the internal batteries with some with extra capacity? What sort of them do You suggest me? Can I use some mobile phone batteries? Cheers
I think what's happening with their advertising is that they THINK they're getting away with claiming a 30 Ah capacity because of the whole element of the renewable energy component. They factored in a certain (what they thought) was an average amount of sunlight (and unrealistic) and they took the 4800mAh capacity of the batteries and assumed they'd be charging at the same time you're using the unit. In a good amount of sunlight, their experiment possibly finally ended after drawing an equivalent of 30000 mAh of power! It's a down-right lie, like you said, but I'm sure their explanation would be similar to this.
*I love my new solar **Generater.Systems** . It has the right amount of charging power for my needs and the light weight makes the portability idea.*
Thanks for taking apart this item. I was recommended it by a friend and had the "too good to be true" impression. I bought the 50,000mAh model, which is around 50,000 units of BS. The thing won't store energy in the Australian sun after leaving it out for several days. The energy input is barely enough to break even.
Lithium's really need to see a current between C/10 and C/5 to charge.
I love how much smaller and lightweight this is than my older power banks th-cam.com/users/postUgkxU45wIUiiQjrUWgrFNORkYxVlmCsYWENJ and yet it charges even more. Bought one a couple months ago and loved it so much I purchased a second one and gave it to my granddaughter as a gift. We're avid campers so power banks are an absolute must have. I also like to keep these charged for when the power at home goes out which has happened a couple times this year. They are so convenient and easy to use. You can charge multiple devices at the same time. The compass is a nice added bonus. I appreciate how quickly this arrived. I am curious to see how long these take to charge in the sun.
I remember seeing on a local forum a 24,000mAh power bank that got depleted after only a charge despite its heavy weight and bulk size. When cracked open, guess what... a 18650 cell and two bags of sand!
burjoks That's naughty!
That sand was from Columbia
+jonnywaselectric Then, that's a bargain.
+jonnywaselectric buhahahbaa
+burjoks :D
I wish I had read your reviews before purchasing that one. Great video!
same here
If the solar panel is decent you should get a modest voltage and current from it in direct sunlight. Perhaps use it to make a solar powered lighting feature?
Yeah, the solar panel is too nice to throw away, but I can't think what to do with it. There are some nice tiny water pumps on eBay - maybe I could build a teeny tiny water feature.
Julian Ilett the slight downside to that being that the solar panels only put out decent current on truly sunny days. My own temptation would be to hack it onto an existing solar lighting module (like a string of lights?) so that it performed better even on heavily overcast days.
just by inspection this is a 10v/50(100mA if VERY generous) module so if IT TRACKED the sun on clear sky it would produce0.5-1w which is nothing really to charge a battery of 3.7v*4.8Ah=17.8Wh.
They accidentally added an extra zero to the capacity rating.
Ryan Toomey No they didn't.
I got one on eBay that is EXACTLY the same as this.
But the one I got is rated 50.000 mA/h .. lol
Mikael Wingaa Ohh they must have corrected to 2 batteries and forgot to take that 0 out xD
...or two.
@@mwingaa hi how is the quality of this powerbank
@@mwingaa and I got this same one rated at 90000 yesterday. Not kidding
Thanks Julian. I was about to purchase a few of them and sell them locally, but after this video I would definitly have to reconsider my idea. You have a great knowledge of electronics. Ones again - thanks for taking this crap apart and sharing with us!
2 x 2400 mah instead 30 000 mah ? i think some of the cheap products are fake like this ... here in german we have a institution called "verbraucherschutz" (customer protect) where you can send information about those things - they make it public and do something against scam / fake products ....
Benjamin Bode then damn send it to them
Der Verbraucherschutz und EBay...
China doesn't give a damn. It will just rebrand.
I do not know if anyone will read this, but this guy saved my money, I almost bellieved that there are 30A power banks they "offer".
A 30ah battery would be bigger than a lantern battery or a small deep cycle/agm.
Your window filters out a lot of the incident light rays. It needs to actually be outside exposed to direct sunlight for full effect.
could it over heat and damage the battery charging process?
You're right that it would heat up the panel quite a bit, however, it is designed to be exposed to direct sunlight, so it should be able to take the heat from sunlight.
+The Minister of Baked Goods do uk if there's a piece of plastic I'm suppose to peel off the panel
It still doesn't matter, if you watch GreatScott's video about two solar power banks he explains that with solar panels this small it would take weeks to charge those batteries up. Weeks. There's just not enough power. To get enough power you would need a big 12V solar panel array and that is definitely not portable and will be very expensive as those cost hundreds of dollars.
it still sucks dick so...
thank you for this, I was very sceptical about the claims of 30000 mAh
I bought one from eBay that I had to assemble myself. No big problem. Just a little soldering. It claims to hold five 18650 batteries. Good luck getting them inside the box without screwing up something. The solar panel is more trouble than it's worth. My suggestion is to either purchase something better or to disconnect the solar panel and connect about ten batteries external of the box and use it to charge devices when no other power is available.
Thank you so much for that. I was tempted to get one but you've exposed it as a con and waist of money.
+Alba Albion Its not a waste of money. As far as I'm concerned, its the best power bank under 20 dollars I ever had. I have purchased some 8 or more power banks over the last 10 years for my job to have Bluetooth radio connection at work. This 30k solar one is pretty good. If you have the money, by all means get the "yoobao long march", but this one is plenty good. I look forward to buying the 50k mAh one.
+glaucus78 or you can buy a $17 elivebuy imix gen 2.
+Littlefear it has 10,000 mAH
Yeah, It's a total waist
Thanks for the review. I wanted to buy one. But the seller on some auction told it's really capacity 5,000-8,000 mah. Its way much less than 30,000 his one was even marked as 50,000. I thought its something really strange and decided to find a review. You brought all the light to this.
Excellent review. I have owned a dozen or so power banks and only about 10% of what I have owned had honestly advertised capacity. I would rather just buy kits and install my own batteries so I could be certain of capacities. Great video, please continue to expose fraudulent products and shady marketing.
I've used one of these for a long time and they worked really well. the LED flashing (when the sun) means it's charging via the sun. The solar charging doesn't really charge the bank to store it but it will charge a phone or similar device without using your charge. If you are charging a larger device such as a tablet it will slowly deplete if it is also being charged by the sun. Now a big problem I've had was charging two devices at once (when a buddy of mine wants to use it too) it will deplete very fast. But I still enjoy it for what I paid for.
Me too its 5yrs old and still going strong
Great review and vital teardown, thoroughly useful & enjoyable. I'd love to see you review the 20000mah waterproof battery banks now available!
Mine is physically identical to yours - except for having a specification of 10,000 mAh. Inside there are also two 4,800 mAh lithium cells, so pretty close to the printed spec'. It charges fully in about 12 hours of good sunlight and works faultlessly. For what I paid for it, I'm more than happy. Perhaps you need to change location to a country with more sunshine. LOL
Keep it for parts. The solar panel and batteries can be used elsewhere and the blue LEDs can be used in other projects. I have a 5600mAh power bank by soundlogic and it worked for awhile then it started to malfunction. I did nothing to it, just used as intended. It had a flashlight on it which still works and it charges fine but the USB out no longer works and the 4 lights on top which are to show the power level are all lit up and will not turn off.
thank you for doing this deep inside review of this device, it is really helpful!
you just saved me money, thanks
im so glad i watched this i was about to buy one on ebay for $32.99!! And they are saying its 50,000mAh so im very happy i didnt waste my money!
Thanks to this video, I've torn mine apart and desoldered those blue LEDs. Currently testing whether the solar panel is effective at charging the thing in this condition.
If you check eBay, there is a guy selling the exact design and now claiming they are 80000 mAh. That's what drew my attention in the first place, 80 Ah in a tiny box.
Yeah... Chinese think we're stupid enough to believe that shit. They're just fucking liers.
This is what I expect from a product review. Thanks so much.
I agree with you entirely, Julian. In my time I've seen many electrical items of similarly abysmal design and quality. One thing I've happened to noticed is that they all tend to use a similar font for labelling the various ports and connections. As soon as I saw the labels above the USB connectors etc. I could tell exactly what it was going to be like. Beware of anything pictured with that sort of font on places such as eBay.
Just a word of caution about reusing the LiPo battery packs; if the batteries are of similar grade to the overall product, I'd send them to the recycle centre along with the rest of it. Low quality LiPo can be very, very dangerous.
LEDs can be made to light very bright with very little power if you pulse them instead of STEADY on. You can pulse them at very high frequencies, which to the eye, looks like they are solid on. This is often done with the Jewel Thief circuit.
If it sounds too good to be true, and looks too small to be true, it's not true! I just hope the price was right, so you could re-purpose the parts. I wonder if you can find cells that are the right dimensions, to completely fill the pack, no dead space, and get it close to 1/10th of it's rated capacity.
The thing that concerns me about the solar panel, is the heat. To put the unit in direct sunlight, so it will charge properly will just heat the unit up, perhaps, enough to be unsafe for the LiPo cells. I don't recommend using it until it cools down, to protect the semiconductors on the circuit board. The solar panel looks like it would work well for out door LED solar lighting.
The panel on them is usually described as an " emergency " charging option and can take days to fully charge but.....if you really were stuck with flat everything you can wait a few hours and maybe get enough charge to send a message or quick call and save your life. I also wanted to say that the way panel was mounted wasn't such a silly idea as what doesn't bend will break. Glued at one end and sitting on foam on the other gives it a little bit of shock protection.
What did you want for your 10 guineas? Seems pretty good to me. Not everyone wants to carry around a 'big solar array and battery'. The cells are good and the panel provides more charge than no panel at all.
Good the button is recessed so it doesn't get bumped..
I have had mine for about 2 years we use it often & it holds a charge..but the solar panel is a bit small by the time it's run the LEDs.
It actually feels cheap but it wasn't expensive & it's doing it's job I face it down so the solar panel doesn't activate & thus the LEDs don't eat anything unless it's really sunny...
Just don't forget it won't charge anything until you push the little button..I'm very happy & mine is only 10,000ah
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Hi, I bought one like this but it is 10000 mah. The problem is that the solar energy does not charge when I put it in the sun. It does not charge and the LED does not light like what happens when I charge it with electricity. It lights up for one LED only. Please answer me, where is the problem?
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Try opening the batteries, some of them are fake with sand in
TruthersUnite2 yeah that happened to me, that's what we get for buying cheap shit from eBay
TruthersUnite2 I picked one up for 30 dollars and it will charge my phone 8 times over with 4 USB ports and a torch. That was a bargain
TruthersUnite2 it's called the powakit 20000 mah. Can't remember what site I bought it from but there's a few places that sell it similar prices.
First Name Surname eBay is better for purchasing these banks
Sir Majesty it's better for your pocket. Not for much else. There is good things on eBay but to many scammers
I would be interested to know if you reassembled the 30,000 mAh solar power bank; did you reassemble it? I would also be interested to know who manufactured that low quality solar power bank.
Thank you for both your informative and enjoyable video content.
Doesn't stop them, they're selling 200,000mah now :)
Also I note on the one you're testing that there is no balance charging circuit for the two cells, that really is a fire waiting to happen
What did you expect when you purchased it? i just saw one on eBay for $19.27 free shipping. Most solar panels only work good in direct sunlight. My outside solar lighting during the summer will charge enough to stay on all night. This time of year I get maybe a couple hours at most. Your indoor test of the solar panel is almost a joke. Also I believe AH ratings procedures are not cast in stone. It's an average at best and manufactures can use really low amp draws to get a better AH number. I will say I do enjoy your videos. So who makes a better power bank for $20? Thanks for the video :) PS the $20 one also comes with a USB cable and adapters
What if I keep it charged after each use? Would it be worth it?
I read/viewed somewhere that a blinking LED is 200 times more efficient to a solid lit one. 4 lit is a total waste compared to ea cycling through the blink cycle.
The LED problem could be fixed by just splicing a high ohm resistor in for each of them, LEDs are still visible with a surprisingly low current.
That would certainly help, but it's such a crap product in so many different ways, I'm not sure I can be bothered.
thanks for the handy review, i did glance at these and considered their apparent handiness, save me a few quid now!
, theres certainly been a rash of fake lion batteries, on replacement phone battery i bought was far worse than the 4 year old battery it was replacing, and was very hard to source one that was as good as the real one used to be
. Well at least its RoHS compliant so we can all not pollute with lead, just entire junk electronics instead. Oh well off to buy a 256gb memory stick for £10 from ebay !
You're welcome. This was an impulse purchase - I paid £11 then found them on sale at £9. Some you lose!
you cant be sure that its RoHS compliant tho :) i was making a design for the package of Chinese electronic cigarette and they just said in the end when i was done "put all the compliant signs you know on the package" :)
Hobypyrocom really? thats soo awful! ive bought a few broken bricks from china, but its 5$ here and 5$ there, because everything from china is so cheap! Buying from china is always a gamble- shipping takes forever, cheap packaging, and pray it wasnt dropped or smashed somewhere along the way. And then if it works, its not any better quality than bargain bin stuff anywhere else.
guy
true if your country is different than mine. here everything is imported from China and its the lowest of lowest quality but anyway the few owners here (which own whole country because they have tons of money) want big profit so the lowest quality stuff here costs as much as the highest quality stuff on internet. they make like 500% profit or more. example they buy the man underpants from China for 0.5euros ($0.7US) per peace and they sell it for 5-8euros ($7-10US) per peace.
guy everything is so cheap cause they use low quality labor and components. Quality output is equal.
I have a slightly older version of this without the light. It's thinner. I popped it open a few days ago and the batteries are thinner but fill the whole space front to back and left to right with a bit of a gap on the top also filled with the sponge. I wonder if they got a cheaper deal on those batteries or if they increased the thickness to add the possibility of 18650s.
The solar panel does kind-of work. I let it discharge to 2 LEDs then threw it on the parcel shelf of my car and some days later, it was up to 4 LEDs. How useful that is will depend on your use case. I had to go out of my way to test it so not so much for me. Also I live in the southern US so plenty of bright sunlight a lot of the time.
I just watched the MichaelsWorldTV video and mine is the same as his, 2x4000mAh. Interesting that this newer incarnation is thicker but has a lot less capacity.
Just checked the ebay listing. It was advertised at 10000mAh which was a lot more honest than we're seeing now.
At least yours came assembled, when I bought mine, besides the fact that it took almost 6 months to arrive here in Brazil, turns out that they sent me a DIY project but without the instructions, and now here i am searching for someone that has been through the same thing. It almost feels like a joke, I have to solder it and all..
But good video by the way, it made me feel unwilling to assemble it anyway hahahah
Great video post. Thanks for all the detail.
I was almost dissuaded by a negative comment but I was glad I stuck with it.
I looked at these on eBay and saw that some sellers actually rated the solar input at 200 milliamps and the micro USB input at 1amp max.
So I was thinking the case was just ambiguous until I saw you examine the Li-poly cells to show that the 30,000 amp hours claim was just a lie.
Looks like a run of the mill power bank with a solar power gimic added to it to help its eBay sales.
I thought it might charge up given a few days on a car dashboard, but with all the other lies, it would probably be a bad idea to leave it unattended.
Thank you for showing us the inside of this battery. Save my RM105 from buying the 80000 mAh one. Lucky that it didn't explode
Did you test the outputs to see if they can supply the rated current? They often dont. Looks like it was designed with larger batteries in mind.
From a the negative reviews on this channel of the power bank. Yes it is a cheap buy so you get a cheap product. I bought this to test it out and so far after 3 years of this I still use it. I take it camping and No real issues for just using it for phone or some light at night hooked up to a small usb light. Other then that if you use it for long extensive time you better off getting a really big bank. Happy charging :)! Julian, I have a question, can you put better lithium batteries that last longer on it with a protection for the batteries. I am new to learning all the solar business.
I've got one that looks identical, but is a different colour and has different writing on the back. It's claimed to be 10,000 mAh, which seems fairly accurate in practice. It's good as a rechargeable light and an emergency battery pack. But I had to permanently cover the solar panel as no matter how bright, whenever enough light hit it, it would quickly drain the battery instead of charging it.
I have 2 of these. They are good for lighting only. Put a cell in and discard the solar panel and use as a light. Long press small button light comes on. press it again and it dims. Press it again and it flashes SOS. Good Camping lights.
I would be interested in the full sun, open circuit voltage of the panel, and the short circuit current. The maximum output power should be about half of the product of those two measurenents.
thanks brother. you did a great job revealing truth. can you suggest a right solar power bank for my smart phone?
I think the 2 batteries are wired in series and then dropped down to 5V through the resistors.
Maybe dropping the led indicators may slightly improve it enough to run some led fairy lights in the evening time.
I bought one of these from eBay for $14, and when it arrived, I messaged the seller about the capacity. Not wanting negative feedback, they gave me a full refund! I then proceeded to mod the thing (put 3 more 5v solar panels in parallel with the existing one, and made a 50ah battery from 18650 cells.) and it works like a charm now! It just doesn't charge at the full 2.1 amps.
Macbook battery cells are the same voltage and are square, flat packs. Had a PSP-1001 with the UMD drive removed and one of those batteries in it's place. Hours of fun man.
I saw 100,000 - 200,000 mAh versions on Ebay in May 2014, but all those listings got removed. No wonder why!
lol really like your reviews and am subscribed for a long time, brought the bank from ebay and did not know how to turn the light on, looked on TH-cam and you came up telling me its a pile of junk, but thank you anyhow its a very logical and good review :) oh I have the one with LEDs on the underside still don't know how to turn them on :(, is there a way of swapping out the leds? what power bank would you recommend?
I have 3 of these and I love them. One of them keeps my Garmin Edge Touring from timing out and going dim. It kept my GPS up and running for 18hours (longest time i tried) I love it. Not sure why you don't like it.
These are only $12 USD. I thought it preformed beautifully
Couldnt agree with you more. I had an identical unit that was a total waste of money. Great Vid, Keep em coming mate.
Thanks for sharing the video, I was about to order one exactly the same from eBay, an by shear luck I came across your video, thanks again for saving me money.
Regards ricky from Northern Ireland.
The Chinese are now apparently working on a solar-powered underground train LOL
Fun thing, because of the over-inflated rating you can't take that on a plane because it's too high Wh capacity...if they were honest it would be more useful!
for some reason they list estimated total life capacity (100's of thousands mAh) instead of actual battery capacity on most, if not all, power banks. also, solar versions provide trickle charge in case of emergency, not to actually charge up the power bank. i do agree though that this one in particular has too many flaws to get genuine use while out and about and would probably crap out after a couple uses.
It's cheap, it works. Had mine for over a year and it still does the job. OK it's not the latest spec, but what do you expect for the price?
I found a "600,000 mAh" power bank lol
m.ebay.com/itm/600000mAh-Solar-Power-Bank-Charger-Battery-Backup-Galaxy-Iphone-Portable-Mobile-/221887185824?nav=SEARCH
At 3.7V that's 2.22 kWh, or just under 8 megajoules!
Given the typical energy density of Li-ion batteries, if that thing really had its rated capacity, it would weigh around 15 kg! How's that for portability?
By the way, with that amount of energy you could charge your mobile devices virtually infinitely many times. Or heat up 19.1 liters of water from freezing to boiling. Or run a 3 HP electric motor for an hour (assuming no power loss and 1 HP = 746 W).
Charging would take several days, even if you wire it to an ATX power supply. I wonder how long it would take to charge using its built-in solar panel though.
well said, but is it not simply a typo?, maybe an extra 0, perhaps just 60,000 - i have a 200,000 model, and i have not opened it up, but i notice it charges my iphone 5s from dead to 100% so far 4 times, i know its not 200,000 mah, and my usb tester says so far its transfered only 6000mah's - +fede142857
+fede142857 It's also on amazon with no ratings
www.amazon.co.uk/Capacity-600000mAh-External-Emergency-Universal/dp/B00VJSM3T8
+theBIGreekgeek
I opened my 200,000 mAh today... It is 2x 4500mah
RRSYS.info - Roulette Prediction
hah you should post a vid
I would do, but my channel is all roulette, but yeah, I may make an exception - you know it still usefull, I have got 4 of them :)
+theBIGreekgeek
[Paul]
great review! i've been burned by a couple of ebay battery sellers... claiming high capacity. a good portion of them are just junk. better to buy from a reputable company. i hope you forwarded this video to ebay!
They have redesigned the PCB. It now has surface mount LED's that don't come on when it is charging from the solar panel. Granted the solar panel is still lame, so I plan on installing a more powerful panel. The unit I purchased has a lantern on the other side and came in kit form. I can say they lie about 50,000 MAH. Mine is a true 15,000 MAH, but that is at 3.7 volts not at 5 volts at the output. The kit is a good way to go, because you can install higher output 18650 batteries, but you do have to solder the batteries together. I have a battery spot welder that makes it much easier.
Good review I have two renagy 24000mah porteble solar chargers and it says they can only be fully charged by plugging them into 120ac I used one all last summer at my cabbin using only the sun to charge my cell phone and worked well
Is the below calculation correct ?
Energy of 2x LiPo cells = 2 x 3.7 V x 2400 mAh = 17,760 mWh
Energy of solar panel (max) = 6V x 100 mA = 600 mW
Time needed to full-charge = 17,760/600 = 29.6 hours or 2.5 days !!!
(disregarding the losses and assuming 12 hours sunlight per day)
+hemanth kumar The charge time probably be even worse -- due to energy losses and those stupid blue leds.
That said, I'd rather have one of those than none at all if I were heading somewhere off grid.
+Mora Fermi i hate the leds too...at less with a switch will be better
Charge in direct sunlight only.. when the sun cant be seen by it, turn it over to stop all light getting to solar panel. You will have to track sun manually, but the panel seems ok..
If the batteries or battery inside are bloody used 18650, remove and replace them.. lithium packs or 18650 batteries are fine I found. Packs perhaps a better option . When it has finally charged , the 4th led stops flashing, and all lights stay on.. Its then fully charged.
I agree, the solar panels are just a sales gimmick as is the rated mAh capacity. All the power banks I've tested end up at between 10% and 20% of their lable rated capacity.
really liked your review!! Do you have any experience with the PowerAdd products? They seem to have better quality.
They say leave in direct sunlight yet last I checked batteries especially lithium batteries don't enjoy working in heat. One of those left in sun on hot day must get up around 40-50 degrees easy. The panel really should be detachable from bank to last any lenght of time.
I've got a possibly newer version of this power bank. Looks identical apart from the writing on the back. Mines rated at 20000mAh. Doesn't feel heavy enough for that but it does *work*. The LED's aren't always on when its charging - they come on when you press the button. If you leave it, the LED go out and it still keeps charging.
I've yet to give it a good workout (or take the back off to check the batteries - I'll get back to you) so time will tell...
On that note: How hard would it be to fit new batteries with higher capacity? New to this, do you just connect them in series and solder the black and red wires to the board?
thanks mr., for your indeed reviewing especially inside a junk of solar power bank :) great reviewing
very good review..most of them dont know whats actually inside in these items.
Great video Julian. Keep them coming.
I've got a couple with 4 2600mAh 18650 lithium cells, so it actually 10,000mAh. the leds don't run steadily, they flicker on/off in rapid succession, a cell phone camera can usually reveal this.
Good info thanks? Are there any solar battery banks actually worth buying? .
Shake my head at this too, just looking on the legs from the white led?! was that so tough to cut in the right length? :)
im having trouble charging a 12volt battery with a large 100watt panel in a shaded part of the building so I can agree with you a tiny panel like that can take ages to charge up a 4.8amp battery even in hot direct sun!
I have designed my own 5 watt solar panel charging cells that will be used to charge a 7.2 aH 12 v gel cell. The panels cost ~ $24 do not need regulation save for a schottky diode in series with the output. Should take about 6 hours to charge the battery in full sun which is ok for me since I intend to use the battery to charge my phone and tablet during a power outage. I could design a smart charger but SLAs are pretty forgiving as to charge rate. At least they won't explode.
@geoffphuket the max you can get out a good 18650 cell atm is 3200mah, those capacities you said are "misprinted"
You missed the flashlight feature. Turning the charger on/off is done by tapping the button. But if you hold the on/off button, the flashlight LED will switch on.
He doesn't actually admit this unlike a lot of others actually does the job it does charge my phone twice & years later it still works & doesn't go flat by itself..
It's not super advanced but what do u want it has the components relative to the job...the solar panel helps hold the charge it only puts them on if the input exceeds the output during charge so it's not draining..turn it upside down to turn them off if you think it's eating batteries..I agree the solar panel is not really much use for charging it but it's a trickle charge to keep it full..
Months later mine stays full..
Dan Servante
Even mid range AAs don't lose charge on their own and therefore don't require a trickle to keep them full (which is supposedly quite bad for the lifespan of the batteries)
Re: 02:30 comment on 50mA LED current requirements:
With LED multiplexing and modern low current LEDs, all 4 LEDs *appearing* to be "on" together could take even LESS than 2mA on average...nowhere near 50mA.
If you wave the powerbank around while the LEDs are on and you see multiple images of them then it's using a circuit that does not drive each LED all the time.
Thus, even 4x 2mA LEDs can require an average current of *less* than 2mA to shine brightly as far as the human eye is concerned.
Virtually every powerbank I've seen DOES multiplex these "battery level" indicator LEDs.
Edit to add:
I'd also call into question the "2400mAh" cells. Even now in 2020, many lithium cells sold on the internet either make fake claims or are counterfeit...some even contain sand or metal scrap to make them weigh as much as the higher capacity cells.
So even if they claim 2400mAh, I would be very hesitant to believe it. Given their willingness to make that outrageous "30,000mAh" claim I'd be surprised if the lithium cells themselves could even supply 1000mAh per cell.
I got this one, was thinking of cracking it open because the one of the leds doesn't work. Maybe I'll put a resistor in between the leds and power so it doesn't consume as much power anymore.
Great review is there one you would recommend
Funny. I just bought this excactly same powerbank from a china shop from Crete island in Greece. It's totally the same but it said 10000mah. Solar panel didn't charge at all even it was 2 days in bright summer sunlight :) Paid 20€ but I returned it and got my money back. Thank god :)
Yeah, there is not ONE of these that actually meets it's mAH rating nor will any of these with small solar panels actually give you a useful charge. Even with a 5V 3A solar panel it would be hard to charge a 4800mAH battery to full capacity. Solar panels only give out full rated power when in direct sun. Cloudy days, morning, evening, and nights of course are not going to charge much, if at all. Manufacturers selling this shit should be held accountable. The outrageous over stated specifications alone should be enough to get them banned from Amazon, leaving maybe ebay for them to take advantage of people. Sorry about writing a book here... This kind of thing just pisses me off. Taking advantage of the public. Cool review! You expose it for what it is!
Good video, thanks for sharing..
Luckily I bought a diy case which arrived buckled and no screws... That was a few months ago.. Now I've bought 3 4900mah batteries and a holder so I don't have to muck around with tape and heat sinc. Just gotta get screws and a soldering iron an work out how to do it myself... :)
im sure the LED's are not burning the power, its probably got its own capacitor that is charged with the light level, when the capacitor runs out it turns off.
@Julian Ilett
Are there any standalone circuits, that would implement lion charging, solar support and 5V out ? Sorta like this power bank, just without the casing.
Thanks for showing us how the manufacturer lies about their battery energy storage.
I order one and then came across you review,when i got it i opened and mine has i think 5 x 18650 batteries inside which they are better batteries ,i'm happy about that because if i need more power i can replace them for others with up to 6800 mah , although i agree with you about inefficient harvest of energy with so many leds lit up while charging so i removed the first 3 and now the one left just blinks 1 time every 4 seconds and flashes when i power it on so that's all i need for mode indicator ,hope this helps any one , they're not that bad for the price
The maximum capacity of the best 18650's is 2600mah. My tests show Sanyo and so called 4000man trustfires to be between 1500 and 2600mah. My 4200 mah ultrafires test at just under 600mah. the trustfire 7800mah also test at 600mah. 2600mah Sanyo and trustfire weigh 40 gms while trustfires way 30 grams
Ed Dantoni I meant between 2500 and 2600 mah.
I just cancelled my order before it processed. Thank you greatly.
Thanks for the review. I'm definitely not buying this. You saved me some cash. Do you by any change know what solar powerbank is worth purchasing?
I bought a 15600mAh Yoobao YB-665 about two years ago on a trip in Asia and it has held up fine until recently, was looking for a replacement, thus ending up here.
They are not as cheap, but they hold up fine.
Hi mate! Thanks for the review!
Can I modify the internal batteries with some with extra capacity? What sort of them do You suggest me? Can I use some mobile phone batteries?
Cheers
I think what's happening with their advertising is that they THINK they're getting away with claiming a 30 Ah capacity because of the whole element of the renewable energy component. They factored in a certain (what they thought) was an average amount of sunlight (and unrealistic) and they took the 4800mAh capacity of the batteries and assumed they'd be charging at the same time you're using the unit. In a good amount of sunlight, their experiment possibly finally ended after drawing an equivalent of 30000 mAh of power! It's a down-right lie, like you said, but I'm sure their explanation would be similar to this.