Unfortunately, this deal is no longer available
*
2079°
Posted 31 December 2011
8x AA Vapextech Ready to Go rechargeble LSD batteries for £10.50
Shared by
Orville
Joined in 2007
61
1,258
About this deal
This deal is expired. Here are some options that might interest you:
These are currently the best rechargeable Low Self Discharge (retains power for years) batteries that money can buy. You can buy 4 for £5.40 or 8 for £10.50.
Better than Sanyo Eneloop, GP Recyko, Uniross Hybrio and the extremely poor 7DayShop rebrands.
Please see my test results within post below before voting hot or cold, and please comment if you know of a better deal.
Happy New Year!
Above is my opinion based upon thorough research a testing. If there are bette batteries out there for price or performance I have yet to see them.
Better than Sanyo Eneloop, GP Recyko, Uniross Hybrio and the extremely poor 7DayShop rebrands.
Please see my test results within post below before voting hot or cold, and please comment if you know of a better deal.
Happy New Year!
Above is my opinion based upon thorough research a testing. If there are bette batteries out there for price or performance I have yet to see them.
More details at
Community Updates
727 Comments
sorted byPlease see the comparison I have made below of decent LSD AA batteries. Of them all, Vapetech are by far the best performers, offering upto 20% more capacity than Sanyo Eneloops.
The Vapextech AA batteries are labelled as 2500mAh, but in reality provide a consisten 2300mAh of usuable capacity. This is a good 300 to 400 mAh more than the competition. The graphs below list the out of packet capacity (how much charge is in the batteries straight out of the pack), and the capacity after first full charge.
Added Independent Battery Group Test incl Vapextech Instant
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and my charger below
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edit: For additional info, 7dayshop "ready 2 go" batteries are crap. I tested a pack several months ago and they only provided 1500-1600mAh capacity. I also have some Uniross Hybrios which are pretty much eqal to the GP Recyko's listed above.
In order of preference.
1). Vapextech AA 2500mAh (true 2300mAh)
2). GP Recyko and Uniross Hybrio AA 2100mAh (true 1950mAh)
3). Sanyo Eneloop AA 2000mAh (true 1865mAh)
this page does not go low enough to add 7dayflops.
If you need decent batteries, you cannot better than these Vapextech's.
edit2: Vapextech AA's are much better than their AAA's which are pretty average. If you want AAA's, I have found GP Recyko to be the best, followed by Eneloops.
ADDITIONAL INFO
*For a decent charger that includes battery capacity test, discharge, and charges individual cells I recommend the LaCrosse BL-700 (also know as TechnoLine BL-700). LaCrosse Charger £29.95
**For a very cheap basic charger that includes 4x AA batteries checkout the Uniross plugin charger. It takes 4 hours to charge AA's, which is nice, slow and safe. Uniross plugin charger + batts £7.75 UPDATE! One person has commented that the charge light fails to turn off on the £7.75 charger so try the one below instead.
This charger is probably better value @ £9.64 because it comes with 4x Hybrio LSD batteries.I have used this charger and know it works fine.
***Avoid Fast Chargers like the plague. Fast 1-hour or sub 1-hour charging will damage the cells quickly.
****For AAA LSD batteries, go to Amazon and search for "GP Recyko AAA". These offer best performance at cheapest price (from £3.75 for 4 delivered).
edit: Discharge results added after 4 weeks of testing.
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Remaining capacity comparison between Vapex and Eneloop AA's after 4 weeks. Both hold thier capacities really well, but Vapex offer better value and performance.
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Don't think so as it is useful information.. Actually I think it is you have much time on your hands writing useless comment .
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Still, nice price for 8 batteries but then again i have These
Sir I think you have too much time on your hands!
Please do not change or edit or add to my post without providing proof. I have backed up all that I say with my own tests, photos and links to independent testers. I have absolutely no affiliation with Vapextech or any other company within this area.
If I have broken any rules, please explain? I have put a fair ammount of effort into this and do not appreciate mod spoiling.
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As with previous weeks, the Vapextech AA, Eneloop AA & Eneloop AAA's continue to be excellent. The Vapex AAA returned pretty good results this time, but over the 4 week period these AAA's have been a little inconsistent.
Below is a simple graph showing a remaining capacity comparison between the Vapex and Eneloop AA's.
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I think that it is pretty clear that the Vapex offer significantly better performance and significantly better value than the Eneloops. Although the Vapex discharge slightly faster, they should retain more capacity than the Eneloops for several years due to much higher starting capacities. If you need batteries to last longer than this before charging, just buy cheap Alkalines.
I hope people find this info useful.
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Always been a fan or GP or SANYO cells.
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OP I take my hat off to you and will base my future purchases on your data!
I should also mention that whilst the charger is good, the Tronic batteries aren't so they are best avoided.
But most of all, I am grateful to the OP for providing such a detailed, well researched and informative post! There are not enough of these on HUKD.
Happy new year to you Sir.
But they were waiting for the boat/shipment to dock on the 30th dec but couldn't dock till 2nd jan due to winds
And should have orders out by Monday if it ain't been sent already
So hang on in there
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I believe that the easiest way to measure "lost capacity" is to simply apply a top-up to see how much new charge they can take before reaching full. AA's were charged at 1000mAh and AAA's at 300mAh (my usual settings).
Here is the first weeks result.
Vapex AA #1 - 63mAh lost (2.73%)
Eneloop AA #1 - 37mAh lost (1.98%)
Vapex AAA #1 - 104mAh lost (11.58%)
Eneloop AAA #1 - 10mAh lost (1.3%)
Now, given that the Eneloop and Vapex batteries hold the following average charge at full, we can assume that each battery has the remaining charge available after one week of sitting in a drawer.
Vapex AA #1 started with 2305mAh, capacity after one week 2242mAh
Eneloop AA #1 started with 1864mAh, capacity after one week 1827mAh
Vapex AAA #1 started with 898mAh, capacity after one week 794mAh
Eneloop AAA #1 started with 764mAh, capacity after one week 754mAh
Analysis
The Vapex AA and both Eneloops show extremely good LSD capabilities after one week. The Eneloop AA retains 26mAh more charge than the Vapex AA, but the Vapax started with much much higher capacity to begin with. After one week the Vapax AA contains 415mAh more capacity than the standard Eneloop. In the AAA comparison the Vapex looks very poor in comparison to the Eneloop. In the time it took the eneloop to self-discharge 10mAh, the Vapex AAA lost a massive 104mAh. Due to it's higher starting capacity, the Vapex AAA still holds more charge (794mAh vs 754mAh), but I am not sure how many weeks this overall capacity advantage will last for.
In summary, Vapex AA, Eneloop AA and Eneloop AAA can be called true-LSD's and perform excellently. The Vapex AAA appears to be a good NiMH battery, but perhaps not a true LSD. I still recomment Vapex AA's over all other AA's, but Eneloop and GP Recykos still seem the best option for AAA's.
*These results are based on just one battery for each type, so there is plenty of room for deviation. They should however provide rough indication of performance.
More to follow in coming weeks, if people are still interested?
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The price of these batteries has jumped between £10.50 and £12 over the past 6 months or so. They tend to be £10.50 for a week or two before going back up.
They can be charged within any standard NiMH charger and can be recharged 500 to 1000 times before losing capicity.
The batteries can also be used with C or D shell adapters (cheap plastic shells) to replace regular C and D type batteries. I use these adapters for my potable stereo, Big Track, torches, and a few other things:. I can take piccies of the adapters if a anyone is interested. Few people know that many C and D shape batteries actually contain AA cells of lesser capacity than these anyway. Using these works out much much cheaper, and rhey are easy to charge within a standard charger.
edit: Piccy of C-Shells added. These turn your AA's into C batreries. They are completely safe to use because AA, C and D batteries all output the same voltage. The only difference is the external size and mAh ratings (these AA's are higher capacity than many standard C's). You can also get D-Shells.
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Here is a link to C-Shells at Amazon. You can google for a better deal, this is just an example.
Uniross C convertors with LSD AA batteries included
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I am an electrical engineer so I guess that does make me a battery geek.
For any aspiring battery geeks (or those that just want a little more battery and charger knowledge), check out the forum below. It contains some very useful info.
candlepoweredforums
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*Out of pack capacity results are mixed. Some cells are very good, some okay, and some very poor. Two batteries contained virtually no charge, so cannot really be called Intstant.
*After the first charge, battery capacites are trully superb. The only batteries I have owned that come anywhere close to these are Sanyo Advanced 1000mAh, which were standard NiMH (non LSD).
Summary of Results
I do not think the Vapex AAA's are quite as good and the AA's listed within the title post. They offer massive capacity once charged, but I do not think they are full LSD batteries. Now it could be that they were not charged correctly at the factory, or they could just be very good non LSD batteries that happen to retain their charge for a reasonably long time. My opinion is that they will not retain their charge for as long as Sanyo Eneloops or GP Recyko's, but they should be good for several months. The packaging has no date information so I have no way to tell whether they were produced 1 month, 3 months or a year ago.
If you need batteries that will hold their charge for years best look towards GP Recyko (my first coice) or Sanyo Eneloops. If however you need maximun power within devices that drain batteries within a few months these will probably be better due to much higher starting capacity.
I will keep 4 batteries to one side and test the in one, two, three and four weeks time. Hopefully this will give me an idea of how well they really retain charge.
For under £4 they are very very good. I am just a little disappointed with the out of pack capacity. 900mAh true charge is massive capacity for AAA batteries. Asking for them to provide this and 70% power retention for 1 year is probably pushing things a little too far. For AAA's I still prefer GP Recykos. However, Vapextech remain the best AA's I have used and tested.
Conclusion
Very good for general use, but probably not full LSD type batteries. The AA's are better.
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3 week test results have just completed.
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Vapex AA, Eneloop AA and Eneloop AAA continue to de really well. For these three batteries there has been very litttle (if any) discharge between weeks 2 and 3. At this rate I am very confident that the Vapez AA's will retain a significantly higher charge than Eneloops for many years.
Vapex AAA's continue to give mixed results. They appear to be a lottery of good NimH and okay LSD's. Decent value for the money, but nowhere near as good as the Vapex AA's.
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If however you do not find it convenient to charge all of your batteries immediately before using them, LSD's such as Vapex Instants, Sanyo Eneloops, GP Recyko's etc are much better. I use LSD's within my 580EX flashgun, plus keep a spare set in my camera bag.
Below are the results for 4x random Vapextech AA's. I mix and match same cells, so some may have had more or less charges than others, but all are 18-24 months old.
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Cell #1 = 2188mAh
Cell #2 = 2224mAh
Cell #3 = 2266mAh
Cell #4 = 2230mah
The first slot always reads low within my C9000. This seems to be a common trait of the charger, but even so the average discharged capacity for these old batteries equals 2227mAh. This means that on average they have lost just 78mAh capacity after ~2 years of constant use, and still provide 300-400mAh more capacity than my original Sanyo Eneloops.
I have not seen a single cell failure out of 30-40 Vapextech AA's I own. These are great batteries.
The AAA Vapextech's performed much worse and were all binned last year. I found those too unreliable/inconsistent to bother with.
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Nice charger too, I want one.
+1 I don't think I could possibly argue with the op when it comes to batteries! Feel i need these babies now :P
Gadget show!LOL.
Those clowns couldn't test a **** up in a brewery.
Listen to Orville. You know it makes sense.
Cheers op for a hot and informative deal. 10/10
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I have not tried them, but they appear to be very similar to the Vapextech's in true capacity and I am sure they are great. Unfortunatley they are quite a bit more expensive than the Vapex.
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Yeah I mentioned this also (post#93). I've found it to be good value having all the groovy features you need but without the display of the dearer models.
There was some discussion as to whether the electronics are from an Ansmann charger:
hotukdeals.com/dea…336 (see post #17)
Looks like a neat piece of kit!
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All branches do. In fact *all* retailers that sell batteries are obliged to offer disposal facilities by law since 1st Jan 2010 (EU directive: ec.europa.eu/env…htm )
Thanks, I came for the batteries, left with a £50 charger. Cheers to the new year.
I'm in tears of admiration for Orville.
Not only a good battery deal but information on how to get cheap C and D size as well. Been a right battery school day today.
Packet of Trill on it's way to you op.
Yes you can use any NI-MH charger, not sure I could be bothered to wait 18 hrs for a charge though. I use a Lidl tronic charger which I picked up for a tenner some time ago and is the best cheap charger. The new ones also have an lcd display.
Thanks for that mentm, lol it is a bit of a wait but ive got a couple of them.
hahaha well said