I spent $100 to save 20 bucks... and it was TOTALLY worth it!

[ColinLTT]

We breathe new life into an old battery bank by building our own DIY Spot welder!

 

 

Buy Anker Portable Chargers
On Amazon (PAID LINK): https://geni.us/XHsadhE
On Newegg (PAID LINK): https://geni.us/HLBeiA
On BHPhoto (PAID LINK): https://geni.us/lqsevV

 

Buy 18650 cells
On Amazon (PAID LINK): https://geni.us/vw5Gi

 

Buy a battery spot welder - but like, a real one. 
On Amazon (PAID LINK): https://geni.us/uldj
On Newegg (PAID LINK): https://geni.us/Fk7SRD

 

Buy Nickel strip
On Amazon (PAID LINK): https://geni.us/gXZ31rB
On Newegg (PAID LINK): https://geni.us/hD5oa0
 

[kelvinhall05]

Ebike battery builders irl

[Filip96]

Where can we get a relay and the electrodes, or at least what specs they should have

[Bombastinator]

Ummm...  you can make a diy spotwelder sufficient for welding battery contacts out of the flash of a disposable camera.  They’re about the size of a hockey puck.  The trick is you use a capacitor.  The disposable cameras have both a battery and a capacitor of about the right size.  All you need is a welded point.  You don’t need a spot half an inch across.  You could weld car plate with that thing.

[ColinLTT]

2 minutes ago, Filip96 said:

Where can we get a relay and the electrodes, or at least what specs they should have

Any automotive store, copper nails from hardware store. But seriously guys, just buy a spot welder, they're cheap enough to make DIY not really worth the dangers. 

[maksakal]

What is the PCB side of a PCB?

[rcmaehl]

To the upcoming comments:

 

No, he didn't shave, it's a video from the beginning of quarantine. 

[Dwarfs Lord]

I feel like you could have added a timing circuit (by using a capacitor and a transistor).
It would improve the repeatability of your welds (and not burn your house down)

[Wh0_Am_1]

Of course they would sponsor it, the cells are the one part in a power bank that you would never want to replace. Now this is probably to deflect the primary defect in Anker's power banks, Anker's control boards while safe are short lived, I have had multiple of their Powercore 20100s only survive to 300 cycles, now as those power banks are large, 300 cycles took well over a year to reach, but even still those cells have plenty of life in them. Which is why I have resolved to not buy any more Anker products, at least until they can add a control board that lasts.

[Wh0_Am_1]

32 minutes ago, ColinLTT said:

Any automotive store, copper nails from hardware store. But seriously guys, just buy a spot welder, they're cheap enough to make DIY not really worth the dangers. 

Unless the zombie apocalypse occurs, or some other apocalypse, then that may no longer be a solution... Or we get transported to an isekai... Never mind let's not think about that.....

[greenflights]

I happen to have some experience with welding 18650 packs. (DIY Ebike stuff)

 

Firstly, 12v DC is not an electricution hazard.

 

Secondly, for those who are interested in battery welding at home, I can thoroughly recomend the kWeld product.

https://www.keenlab.de/index.php/product-category/kspot-welder-kit/

 

It is fairly easy to remove spot-welded nickel strips from batteries by pulling firmly with a pair of plyers.

 

It is fine to weld multiple nickel strips, in a pinch it is a way to get higher current rating.

 

 

One of the things Linus doesn't mention in this video is that it's very hard to get genuine 18650 cells. Most suppliers will not sell them to consumers, as they're a lot more hazardous than consumer alkaline cells. Online sellers often sell very low capacity cells which are relabeled as genuine LG, Samsung (etc) cells.

[DildorTheDecent]

27 minutes ago, rcmaehl said:

No, he didn't shave, it's a video from the beginning of quarantine. 

Thank goodness. I panicked for a second.

[Bombastinator]

9 minutes ago, greenflights said:

I happen to have some experience with welding 18650 packs. (DIY Ebike stuff)

 

Firstly, 12v DC is not an electricution hazard.

 

Secondly, for those who are interested in battery welding at home, I can thoroughly recomend the kWeld product.

https://www.keenlab.de/index.php/product-category/kspot-welder-kit/

 

It is fairly easy to remove spot-welded nickel strips from batteries by pulling firmly with a pair of plyers.

 

It is fine to weld multiple nickel strips, in a pinch it is a way to get higher current rating.

 

 

One of the things Linus doesn't mention in this video is that it's very hard to get genuine 18650 cells. Most suppliers will not sell them to consumers, as they're a lot more hazardous than consumer alkaline cells. Online sellers often sell very low capacity cells which are relabeled as genuine LG, Samsung (etc) cells.

I can name you 4 reliable mail order sources if you’d like.  There are companies that know it’s an issue.  They emphatically do not include  amazon or eBay.  Or even a lot of wholesalers that supply ecig shops. 
 

The one I most recently ordered batteries from is a company called “liion wholesale”

[manikyath]

52 minutes ago, ColinLTT said:

Any automotive store, copper nails from hardware store. But seriously guys, just buy a spot welder, they're cheap enough to make DIY not really worth the dangers. 

but.. where's the fun in that

[greenflights]

2 minutes ago, Bombastinator said:

I can name you 4 reliable mail order sources if you’d like.  There are companies that know it’s an issue.  They emphatically do not include  amazon or eBay.  Or even a lot of wholesalers that supply ecig shops. 
 

The one I most recently ordered batteries from is a company called “liion wholesale”

Are you certain they're genuine?

Fwiw, I'm in Europe and the market here might be a little different. e-cig suppliers are known for being a bit hit-and-miss.

[Bombastinator]

34 minutes ago, rcmaehl said:

To the upcoming comments:

 

No, he didn't shave, it's a video from the beginning of quarantine. 

Now all I have to do is form a question in such a way as to make this answer humerous

 

 

[manikyath]

Just now, greenflights said:

Are you certain they're genuine?

Fwiw, I'm in Europe and the market here might be a little different. e-cig suppliers are known for being a bit hit-and-miss.

i buy mine off of reichelt.de, no idea how genuine or knockoff they are, but they seem to at least work as expected.

[Bombastinator]

4 minutes ago, manikyath said:

i buy mine off of reichelt.de, no idea how genuine or knockoff they are, but they seem to at least work as expected.

There are ways to test batteries for genuineness.  It requires some significant equipment though.  You’ve got to charge and drain the battery while looking at the graphs of various test criteria and compare them to known genuine examples.  There are people who do it.  This dude is one of them https://www.e-cigarette-forum.com/blogs/mooch.256958/

[greenflights]

1 minute ago, Bombastinator said:

https://www.e-cigarette-forum.com/blogs/mooch.256958/

This chap links to 18650.uk which I have heard is reuptable, albeit expensive.

 

There's a wholesaler who sells on the side via endless-sphere.com who has a good reputation in the community, and sells at wholesale prices.

 

I bought 200 Samsung 29E cells for about £1.80 per cell.

 

They seem to checkout on my test setup at home, and get me good range on my bike.

[Maman]

I really need to know what powerbank is this in the video

[Bombastinator]

48 minutes ago, greenflights said:

This chap links to 18650.uk which I have heard is reuptable, albeit expensive.

 

There's a wholesaler who sells on the side via endless-sphere.com who has a good reputation in the community, and sells at wholesale prices.

 

I bought 200 Samsung 29E cells for about £1.80 per cell.

 

They seem to checkout on my test setup at home, and get me good range on my bike.

There is a premium for dependability.  There aren’t a lot of “ real” companies that make the batteries.  The equipment is immense.  Most liion batteries are either factory seconds that are “rewraps” or earlier systems using equipment sold off by those companies.   To get top performing batteries both of these must be avoided and the downside is additional cost.    The older systems usually work, at least for a while.  The problem is they want to sell them for the same price as the newer higher performing models so they fake the info on them and it makes things dangerous.  Rewraps are particularly bad that way.  There has been an inflation of claims to flatly impossible and unattainable figures.   The biggest advantage genuine batteries have isn’t even their capacity so much as that the numbers they use may be relied upon.

[Bombastinator]

56 minutes ago, greenflights said:

This chap links to 18650.uk which I have heard is reuptable, albeit expensive.

 

There's a wholesaler who sells on the side via endless-sphere.com who has a good reputation in the community, and sells at wholesale prices.

 

I bought 200 Samsung 29E cells for about £1.80 per cell.

 

They seem to checkout on my test setup at home, and get me good range on my bike.

Ecigarettes cannot use tesla batteries because their individual voltage is too low and the largest e-cigarettes can fit only 3 batteries.  I’ve always wondered if the battery pack of an ebike is large enough to make tesla batteries viable.  It’s really a great chemistry.  The total mah and cycle numbers are amazing.  

[ColinLTT]

11 hours ago, Dwarfs Lord said:

I feel like you could have added a timing circuit (by using a capacitor and a transistor).
It would improve the repeatability of your welds (and not burn your house down)

I'm a few days ahead of you on that idea

[U4P]

@LinusTech

Watching this video I noticed heavy stutter in your B roll, wich reminded me of something, I have encountered and solved a few months ago.

When I rendered my last vacation video with Magix Vegas 15, there were some parts that stuttered in a very similar way to you B roll. All those parts were shot on Android smartphones (Xiaomi Mi8 and Mi9). With MediaInfo I found the problem to be that the smartphone videos had variable framerate. MediaInfo detected a range from 5 to 30.5 fps, with an average of around 29.93 fps. I was able to convert the video to constant frame rate with mp4fpsmod, wich only adjusts the timecodes of the frames, without re-encoding. After that I could render in Vegas without any issues. Maybe this would fix your smartphone / webcam B roll as well.

 

Stay well and thanks for your awesome videos,

U4P

[Matrix Prime]

is there a video about how colin built the spot welder