How To Get: Free 18650 Lithium Cells From Dead Laptop Batteries 

Good video for starters. The only warning I'd throw in is to limit your discharge rate to .4A to .5A max. Anything higher and you are shortening the lifespan of the battery. Yes, the discharge goes slower but you will have batteries that last longer. When you get into measuring the capacity of thousands of batteries you will want an Opus BT-C3100 v2.2. This device looks like a standard four battery charger but it will allow you to measure the capacity of four batteries at once. I own five. The fastest way is to have another four battery charger on either end of the process; one to charge them to capacity, the C-3100 to measure capacity and a third to charge them after the capacity test. This lets me test about 100 18650 batteries per day. I use the large capacity batteries in my E-bike. The smaller ones I use in cell phone chargers. I get the empty boxes from China for about $2.00 and simply add the batteries. I also use the lower capacity batteries in LED flashlights that take 18650s. Both the cellphone chargers and flashlights are used as promotional items for my wife's business. But using them for these purposes lets me write off my project on my taxes. Hope this helps. Rocket

This is very illuminating - i didnt know laptop batteries used 18650's so i opened up a duff DELL D630 and I now have 6 new batteries for my new project! Good idea using the magnets to hold the crocodile clips onto the batteries!

I think that magnet idea was the best part of the whole vid and your info is so spot on

TIPS : If you're planning to reuse it as a power tool battery and you don't have a spot welder, just leave the old nickel strip on the battery so you can solder it correctly and securely.

Good advice. In my experience, most lithium battery packs fail when ONE cell (or maybe two) die. If you disassemble the pack usually the majority of the cells are still good. I put them in a box and next time I have a battery fail, I check if I have anything that fits. Before I store them I use a 3 volt flashlight bulb and a couple of wires to drain the cell completely. That doesn't seem to hurt a lithium cell and it insures that any new battery assembled starts out with even charges in all the cells. I've also used lithium cells to convert old NiCad batteries to lithium. In most cases there is more than enough room in the old NiCad case to fit new batteries.

yes you can get them a lot. but: if u took it from laptop batteries dont expect to use in high amp required aplications such as electric tools in house building, drones, viping and more. they are good for powerbanks, flashlights, toys, diy things. if someone could say that earlier to me, i would be very thankfull for information. you can find spec about the battery from numbers on it, and google it. most are 3-5 amp, some 1amp.

Good shit. I took apart some power tool batteries that refuse to charge and now I have more than a dozen fully functional 18650 cells

This guy has more free time than an inmate. This guy busts his ass for those 1 amp cells

I don't plan on breaking down laptop batteries but I did learn from you how to check my batteries better. Now I can test to see if ones I buy are as good as advertised. Thank you. Putting an imax b6 on my future amazon order list.

I got many of these batteries the same way and use them for many diffrent projects.They make great back up power supplys

For the most part an useful 'Tip', but from time-mark 1:30->2:30sec this Tip is an excellent demo' of what NOT to do! FYI - All these type of multi cell 'packs' are Arc or 'spot-welded' together (don't ask how!) because the metal terminals & cell-to-next-cell links are Nickel coated, so cannot be ('tinned') soldered together [YES, Nickel is 'magnetic', but cannot BE magnetised i.e. made into permanent magnets - weird I know]. Ripping them apart as shown will damage the internal Anode & Cathode connections of the cell. It will also start highly TOXIC electrolyte leaks that WILL do CORROSIVE damage to you & any way the cells are used, especially when charging. As demonstrated, this is the very best way to kill cells, or at the least reduce their capacity. SO GREAT CARE IS NEEDED NOT TO DAMAGE ANODE & CATHODE TERMINALS WHEN SEPARATING CELL TO CELL LINKS, as was done here.

18650 voltage between 2.75V and 4.2V. You discharged them to 3V only, however real capacity discharge is 2.75V. Then re-charge and measure the difference in mAh (Discharge vs re-charge mAh).

First, your home made charger is brilliant! But I am curious, why did you not use your sky charger to charge the batteries?

No, the main thing is getting the battery packs themselves. They don't just grow on trees by me.

you should discharge cells at 0.25c since thats what manufactures use, that 1000mah cell might have 1250 if you discharge it at slower rate

are those plastic boxes available on aliexpress?

And you can use your batteries for anything you want? Nice project.

I've yet to do this without stabbing myself with the sharp soldered tabs. Interestingly - those snot brown ones are the best I've had out of Dell packs - around 2.8Ah each.

you could use the lower capacity cells for a battery bank project for say a car or a house, something where space isnt too much of an issue

Nice idea mate, but if you have a so improved charger, you can set it to "cycle" , and you don't need to the charge step.

You can sometimes revive dead batteries on the charger by just letting them charge and testing the voltage and capacity a couple weeks later.

Great help for me. Currently in a similar project & got some useful tips. Thx a lot!!!

i own the same charger and its a top 10 must have item for the DIY. You can charge any type of battery with it and also has variables you can set for each battery function (lead acid, nimh, lipo, etc...) Have even used it to charge my car battery after i left interior lights on... but 1 trick i just learned from this video thats simple yet genius... magnets to hold the leads on! woohoo... the charger in this video comes with 5-6 different type plug adapters but you would not believe the many 100's of types that you dont have handy. So, im always rigging something up... usually with alligator clips but those dont work every time.... magnets. if anyone has any other of ingenious ways of making these connections (Ex. small connectors where the pins are surrounded by a cover that doesnt leave enough space to get clips on the pins. Nice vid... i do something similiar with lipo cells. many multi cell lipos 2s-6s are common but can have more cells... usually have 1 or 2 bad cells. so you can remove these bad cells... replace them with good cells OR just lower the cells for that pack. Ex. 4s lipo with 2 bad cells will make a good 2s battery. Try swaping pb (lead acid) type batteries for lipos in your kids ride on toys. lasts longer and will make them much faster depending on volts which is determined by the number of cells. the crappy 6v battery powered ride ons suck. drop a 2s or 4s lipo and be sure to test it out with your kids first. they can flip over easier, pop wheelies, etc so use common sense dads... dont blame me if you put a 6s in Little Wilbur's ATV and he slams into the tree doing 20mph. Google this type of DIY projects, you will be amazed at some of the custom rides Dads do for their kids? or for themselves

Another good Idea is to mark set/pair numbers and date. I do that for my cells and try to use pairs of similar calibration for same device

Step 1: short the batteries by putting aluminum foil across all of the terminals That charger has magnet ends? That is so awesome. I didn't know that existed.

I did this from an old laptop for a Chinese clock I couldn't get any because they were "vaping" batteries and I was underage. I get they're batteries but why would they restrict them where I tried to buy it. Thanks for sharing!

Managed to get 6 lg hg2's doing this that's £60 worth of battery's nice video very useful

u are awsom, I didnt know I have 3 old laptop batteries and have no use of them

This is very neat but remember to stay safe and stay hydrated. Thanks for sharing this video. Carl C.

Very Good Sir, I learned much. Blessings, pierre from New Mexico

never fuck with battery safety when it comes to vaping.

For flash light the cells seem good

Great video!

congrats on the excellent work. question, if there are 18650 that are to low volt, maybe 2 - 2.5, to start charging can a little voltage be applied while in charger (TP4056) so that it starts charging them?

The initial voltage depends on how far they were charged up at the time. Why do you write them on the cells?

Thank you so much. You answered all the questions that I had. +1 subscriber.

At 1:45 "with the pliers, remove the lefted wire pieces"😂😂😂😂

Very impressive...but I've been reading some comments below will not use for vaping but really fucking impressive dude👍👍👍

So how did you acquire the dead laptop batteries? Are they just lying around somewhere for the taking?

very good video Thank you

Great video, great channel. WOuld you be able to link me or tell me what to search for the connecter that bridges your power supply to your imax b6 please?

if you use that charger on nickel setting you can bring at least some of the dead cells back to life but only for a couple minutes don't let them get hot

Nice idea with those magnets!

i use the exact same charger as you.. Imax b6.. BTW... you read the Capacity/Mah reading wrong. The charger is giving you the capacity readings from a half charged battery.. Do a capacity test from a freshly charged battery, for accurate results

You cannot determine the capacity by discharging it from some random point! You need to either completely discharge/charge it to a know minimum/maximum and then you work from there to determine the capacity....

i've got 1000's this way :)

Hi your video is very informative, can I ask you something?, if my chargeable battery went to 78.6 mV what does that mean and would it still be usable?...

where do I find those Magnetic Alligator Clips?

are these useful for toys?

I make the same and used the lipos for RC Modells

Thank you. I want to search now free dead laptop bateries. But I dont know where to find some...

You should to discharge after charge, and work whit charged mAh, because, if battery was half charged (full capaticy 2000mAh) you will measure 1000mAh by discharging.

Can you use them for flashlights

when i destroyed my sister's laptop i accidentally broke the laptop's battery in half and i've found something weird, 6 18650 batteries inside! they were the light blue 2200mah ones. I've put it inside my mod box and it read "battery unsafe". I was proud of my modbox.

Now we know how to get free cells .where do we get the laptop batteries

Very impressive video. Thanks.

cells with zero voltage may be repaired with the awl... simple do bend membrane under plus connector!

where to buy these old laptop batteries?

when you make a module using this cells, what should be your tolerance on capacity to mix them together

Great...but where to find Dead Laptop Batteries??

is soldering to end of battery ok? not done commercially always spot welded. how about a small spot welder project just for things like this? in the '60s my uncle designed and made the worlds first spot welder that was for very small electronics and measured the resistance before it would do the weld. i still have one and am going to try it on some 18650

Make a Diy power bank

the mate, now I got 12 batteries more 😁...just saved 120 pounds. you made my day 🖒

Thats a lot of batteries you have there! Waht do you do with those batteries?

I'm wondering if there would be a market out there for people who wanted to rent an array of Foxnovo F-4S to test/charge 40 batteries at a time. I'm thinking about making a house battery and would rent out the equipment once i'm done.

Really awesome idea! I am in the process of building the 18650 charger from your previous video. one question I do have is the iMAX B6 Charger show in this video. there are a variety of them on ebay from $7.00 USD - $50.00 USD, what one do you use? I rather not waste my money on junk. thanks in advance.

test the voltage before you spend all the time making them look nice by tearing off metal lol

Hi, If I set the charge at 0.5a but the charging doesn't go uppen than 0.2a, this means the cell is gone?

much quicker way to open is to get pliers and pull on the corners, comes right off

so you're saying those kinds of batterues are in old laptop batteries?

Nice! But where do you find dead laptop batteries?

What these can be used to? They have more volts that 'casual' AA-batteries so I suppose these cannos serve as AA?

I guess this is worth it (and the injuries)?

Are they rechargeble and do they fit in lazers

Can i get the full amper of the li ion batterys

Hello where can i so many liion 18650 battery get or from where you get so many Li-Ion 18650 battery thank you in advance

Are the Samsung ones better than the Sanyo ones?

Oh fuck, i have a huge stash of unsellable Panasonic Laptop batteries in my basement

Be cautious charging cells of differing internal resistance and condition. Li-ion cells are very dangerous if mischarged.

Tell me all battery in laptop battery pack all are 3.6 volts? only mean 3 cell are in series 1.2x 3 = 3.6 volts

I just tried to open my old laptop batterys and cut my finger pretty bad thanks for the 'great' Idea

Can you use those premade reusable battery chargers to charge them?

please tell me i am in india and using hcl L1114 laptop ...battery is not working

Thank you so much!!! Now i have infinity battery for my ecig!!!

Isnt a full 1S lipo 4,2v And an empty one 3,7V?

Where can I get two 26650 Battery Holder like shown at 3:34?

Good info...Thanks.

Is it safe to use the battery

what makes 18650 battry cell easy to get overheating, when we connect to rotor, actually that's not short current!

Where do you get the labtop batteries

Dead 18650 batteries seem kinda useless to me...

how long u took to measure them all? :D capacity only measured by discrarging? cant you charge and then measure? i got acucell 6

how do you know you Max discharge rate you can safely run?

Is there an easy way to get scrap laptop batteries? Ebay they are quite expensive and have huge postage costs, when you ask local recycling centres they just reply 'we only sell to licenced authorized recycling companies'

Ok. Here is a question. Why check the charges on a battery before attempting a recharge? The 18650s are designed to be recharged. I explain. I have a buggy old laptop that I am ready to trash. I have 18650 flashlights for use in the house. Every few months, I check the charges anyway. If I charged up the old lap top batteries (assuming that each would hold a charge) and used them instead of what I am currently using, why bother evaluating them in advance.

i found one laptop and dell battery module got 9x battery and 6x battery look like Zippo Lighters just waiting for my multimeter from ebay i want to make a cheap power bank found one it can holde 8x 18650 battery for 5$ i try find one is bigger but only one found can holde 8x battery

Please give the link of battery

What are you using the cells for?

I charge my 3.7v 18650 batteries with a 3.7v charger and they take a full day to charge why is this? (they are brand new)

Am I right if an impulse charger can recover dead 18650?