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Sony VTC5a authentic or fake

Hi all,

Please advise if those Sony VTC5a batteries are authentic or fake?
 

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IMFire3605

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The Sony VTC5A is an actual Sony battery model, it is a re-vamp of the old VTC5 2600mah 20amp, sacrificing 100mah (down to 2500mah though their label says 2600mah, independent test by @Mooch our resident vaping battery tester rated them at 2500mah) and a boost in CDR, up to 25amps. Are the ones you show pictured authentic or not, hard to say, vendor you bought from, not able to see the manufacturer codes on the insulator wraps (the green wraps on them) or the underlying codes on the metal casings. Thus why we suggest here to buy from reputable and/or authorized vendors. For the US/Can/Mex region those are Liionwholesale.com, illumn.com, imrbatteries.com, orbtronic.com, and RTDVapor.com, if you are in the UK or other region beside this you'll need to search for a good vendor, (UK region you might ask @conanthewarrior or some others from that region).

Don't trust any batteries from Ebay or Amazon, way to many clones/fakes sold on those two sites, and/or are re-wrapped to look like an authentic.

Liionwholesale has a rep that posts here regularly as well, @Jon@LiionWholesale if you decide to use Liion, Jon and the staff are very, very customer friendly and helpful.
 

Puff

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Thank you for the good advice, Vapors need to be aware and deal with trusted. Vendors ...... These Batteries need to be taken seriously.

Sent from my LG-V930 using Tapatalk
 
Yes especially that I only use Mech Mods, that is why I'm extra careful in selecting my batteries. Thank you.
 

Carambrda

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Looks like they could be real VTC6 instead of real VTC5A, but yeah... there's no easy way to be perfectly sure because fakes can still be made to look 100 percent identical to real ones. Buying from reputable vendors, although recommended, doesn't guarantee you will never get any fakes. What makes a vendor reputable is what this vendor will do once they find out they've been selling fakes. Either way, to be able to see what the difference between a VTC6 and a VTC5A looks like, you can click on the pictures of the VTC6 here:
https://www.e-cigarette-forum.com/f...ults-a-great-battery-equaling-hg2-30q.754649/
and the VTC5A here:
https://www.e-cigarette-forum.com/f...-test-results-a-fantastic-25a-battery.746719/
As you can see in those pictures, you could tear off the shrink wrap to be able to see what's printed on the battery under the wrap, and then put a new wrap on it after that. But even then there's still no easy way to be sure if it's fake or not. Because like I said... fakes can still be made to look 100 percent identical to real ones─including the part that's hidden under the wrap.
 
Thank you guys, you were very helpfull. So lastly, is there an easy way to test the amperage of the 18650's on the go, that a person can test it on the spot before buying from the shop?
 

IMFire3605

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Not really a reliable way. An authentic VTC5A at a factory charge (generally 3.4 to 3.7v for shipping and storage purposes) just won't have the oomph to test to begin with. After about nominal gentle 5 recharge and discharge cycles will be at its most powerful ability after a 6th recharge. Then you do a full discharge in one cycle after hooking the battery up to a multi-meter, placed in a safe testing bin, and discharged fully down to about 2.5ish to 2.6ish volts, also need a temp diode connected to make sure the battery isn't going over 80 to 120C in temp.

An authentic should reach about 80C during the test at its full CDR and never creep above that, the test that Mooch does I believe is about 5 to 10 second on, 30 seconds rest at off, but the battery should be handling a 25amp load no problem, starts reaching 90 to 100C at 25amps it will be a standard VTC5, battery goes over 120C you'll have problem with venting and internal damage, it sky rockets toward 200C + you have a thermal runaway.

Just noticed you are from the middle east in Kuwait, I am sorry but I know of no good online vendors from that region for shipping.

Visual inspection, an authentic Sony should be an almost slightly, metalic sheen pine green on its wrap, not dull or to metalic like on a car paint job, the SE US18650VTC5A then the batch number underneath that and the reversed UR logo should be seen under the wrap in a kind of dull print and if you remove the wrap should be solid and a lot of inking, the insulator ring at the top should be white, not black or silver, positive post should have 3 prongs leading to the top cap, not 4 or 5. I'd start inspection at the prongs, then the insulator ring, then the wrap color, and finally the model and batch number printing. A fully charged VTC5A should also hit like the old VTC3 as it has a very comparable pulse discharge compared to its older brother the VTC5 and the old VTC4 with very little voltage sag when under load. If you don't trust your B&M vendor I wouldn't trust buying any batteries at all from them, and suggest getting a raport and dialogue going with them as a regular customer to get a feel for their morales and business mindset if you are that paranoid about them.
 

gopher_byrd

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@IMFire3605 Are you speaking about the insulator between the case and the positive cap that will only be seen with the wrap off or the insulator between the wrap and the positive? The insulator between the case and the positive is indeed white, but the insulator between the wrap and the positive is always black that I have seen. I just wanted to clarify for @Marlbeno and myself. I didn't want him to freak seeing the black wrap insulator.

I only get batteries from Liion Wholesale btw, but not an option for Marlbeno in Kuwait.
 

IMFire3605

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@gopher_byrd

ick, you're right, Sony it is black insulator ring, not white, glanced at a Samsung 25R when I posted that thinking it was a VTC4.
 
Thank you again for clarifying this, I was starting to freak out as I thought nothing is authentic around me. :cry:
And sorry for the misleading info on my profile but I left Kuwait and now live in Jordan. I will fix it now; and this makes it even harder to find stuff as vaping is still banned here.
 

IMFire3605

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NP, I'm a firm supporter of the statement there are no stupid questions beside the one never asked when it comes to batteries and battery safety with vaping. Now with you saying vaping is pretty strict in the area you live in, 18650 batteries should not be included in that ban because they are in various other devices besides vaping, cordless drills, flashlights, laptop battery packs, RC vehicles, the list is long. I don't normally suggest this, and shipping is a bit slow, but you might check Fasttech.com, but word of caution read the description for "Authentic" and read several of the customer reviews for each product you purchase, any negative majority on a listing leave it alone, but Fasttech is in China and is worldwide shipping, you just have to be careful with the batteries, not as badly as you do with Ebay and Amazon though, most times any item listed "Authentic" is real, any that say "Name Type" or anything but "Authentic" is a clone or knock off. Batteries most times have to be transported via boat and ground delivery, no air shipping due to their instability at cold higher altitudes in a plane and lack of pressurized cabins in cargo holds there, Li-ion batteries don't like low pressure, low temperature, and high moisture during transport, or very rapid changes in those variables.
 

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