What is your RC LiPo of choice in 2021

[WoodiE]

RC LiPo companies come and go (rip SPC) and RC LiPo batteries are constantly changing and improving.

So to stay current, we are doing an annual thread and what to know what you thank are the best RC LiPo batteries. Tell us which LiPo batteries have offered you the best performance, lifespan and price.

If you see a LiPo battery already mentioned, be sure to up vote that reply!

If you're looking for suggestions on a lipo charger, be sure to read Recommend me a battery charger. If you're unsure about how to store a LiPo battery, then check out How to store a LiPo battery.

Get previous years recommendations in the original What's your "budget" LiPo of choice? thread.

That said, what are the best RC LiPo batteries for 2021?

 

[kenm04]

@Diggery, that's about it it protects the cells but hides the puffing until it's enough to either force the case to expand or split the seem.

@jkflow, seems like you are correct, even though I have not looked for a manual that describes the light codes on the ESC. I did use my charger to do a 1c discharge then recharge the pack. And I was able to discharge 5125ma from the pack after 1 hour, and then was able to recharge the battery back to the same amount.

 

[jkflow]

Do not ever discharge that low. It will kill your cells quickly. Stop when the lipos are at 3.7V on recovery.

Hardcase won't hide swelling, the case will crack. I never liked hardcase but mainly due to the case cutting the wires and unable to spilt packs and repair.

 

[kenm04]

I don't remember if the discharge stopped at 3.6v or 3.8v, I know the pack voltage was measuring around 6.5v or higher. And I was only doing the test once to see if I could get the full rated 5200 or if I was still going to get somewhere in the 2500 - 3500 ma range.

 

[Diggery]

I went for the Zeee hardcase in the end - a 2 pack is cheaper than one gens-ace-r-spam and can be delivered today so thought it was worth a shot.
The hobby shop have asked for my gensacearespammers back to investigate warranty, which is good. I'm interested in what's gone wrong with it.

 

[Armarookie43]

I've ran these on my Outcast 8s and EXB K8S beasts with no issues like 5 times. With QS8 connectors, they seem to be working very well. Powerhobby 4s graphene 8000mah 120C batteries. What's weird is that when I order the normal 14.8V 7000MAH 120C Graphene batteries from powerhobby off Ebay, they have sent me the 8000mah 15.2v ones instead. I charge them as normal lipos and not high voltage. I just bought another pair and will be using them very soon.
Link:
https://www.ebay.com/itm/Powerhobby...2349624.m46890.l49286&mkrid=711-127632-2357-0

I've recently purchased HOOVO lipos from Amazon and they've been pretty solid! Good run time, stay balanced, and don't hurt the pocket!

HOOVO 3S 11.1V 80C 5200mAh RC Lipo Battery Hard Case with EC5 Connector

HOOVO 6S 5200mAh 22.2V 60C LiPo Battery with EC5 Plug

One of my Hoovo 3s batteries on my Granite BLX 4x4 V3 puffed after like 3 runs and it hits LVC (acts like it) after like 5 minutes, so it's done. My other Yowoo 4s 6000mAh 100C graphene battery(I bought a pair) puffed on my Outcast 8s and it's done after like 6 runs. I'm going with powerhobby graphenes for my bugger trucks with QS8 connectors. I think that I'm done with Yowoo

 

[Rainger40]

I've ran these on my Outcast 8s and EXB K8S beasts with no issues like 5 times. With QS8 connectors, they seem to be working very well. Powerhobby 4s graphene 8000mah 120C batteries. What's weird is that when I order the normal 14.8V 7000MAH 120C Graphene batteries from powerhobby off Ebay, they have sent me the 8000mah 15.2v ones instead. I charge them as normal lipos and not high voltage. I just bought another pair and will be using them very soon.
Link:
https://www.ebay.com/itm/Powerhobby...2349624.m46890.l49286&mkrid=711-127632-2357-0
View attachment 165395

One of my Hoovo 3s batteries on my Granite BLX 4x4 V3 puffed after like 3 runs and it hits LVC (acts like it) after like 5 minutes, so it's done. My other Yowoo 4s 6000mAh 100C graphene battery(I bought a pair) puffed on my Outcast 8s and it's done after like 6 runs. I'm going with powerhobby graphenes for my bugger trucks with QS8 connectors. I think that I'm done with Yowoo

I had exact opposite experience, hovoo have been awesome and powerhobby puffed in less that 6 charges.

 

[Armarookie43]

I had exact opposite experience, hovoo have been awesome and powerhobby puffed in less that 6 charges.

I did have a 6s powerhobby puff on me, but I abused the crap out of that one.

 

[Diggery]

I went for the Zeee hardcase in the end

Zeee's arrived and look very good.
Hard case may as well be built to be a custom fit in my Big Rock - very snug and the straps tighten it down perfectly.
The balance lead does not clash with the mounting like it did on my soft pack, it exits the top of the case nicely.
The arrived nicely at storage and well balanced.
Quick IR check, one was spot on, the one was 4.7 / 5.1 / 4.7, the other 3.8 / 5.5 / 4.9 so not as close but still well within spec I believe.
They will be getting hammered this weekend to see if they deliver.

2 for £55 versus £45 for a GA or nearly £60 delivered for an Overlander seemed like a good deal.

 

[Gosraider]

Bonjour,

J'utilise essentiellement deux marques de lipo 4S, Gens & Turnigy

 

[Tigershark1956]

Anyone using the SMC True Spec Extreme Graphene V2 14.8V 5200mAh LCG 120C:
https://www.smc-racing.com/index.php?route=product/product&path=67_96&product_id=175

The weight almost 100gr less than the DV Extreme packs.

So far all my SMCs have been great and performing well. Everything I've read about SMC has been positive. Kind of like the old adage that you get what you pay for. The cheaper batteries will be hit or miss and a lot of time miss. I believe SMC will stand behind their batteries but time will tell.

 

[Armarookie43]

So far all my SMCs have been great and performing well. Everything I've read about SMC has been positive. Kind of like the old adage that you get what you pay for. The cheaper batteries will be hit or miss and a lot of time miss. I believe SMC will stand behind their batteries but time will tell.

They do stand by their products. Unfortunately, the wires would come unsoldered for me where they connect internally to the lipo. It happened to like 3 times and I'm not the only one who has experienced that issue. They replaced 3 packs like that, but now I don't trust those batteries anymore.

 

[slick2500]

Bonjour,

J'utilise essentiellement deux marques de lipo 4S, Gens & Turnigy

View attachment 166889View attachment 166890

Cher monsieur, en règle générale, nous vous demandons d'utiliser l'anglais sur ce forum. Je te l'ai déjà dit deux fois.

Au cas où vous auriez encore besoin d'un rappel, voici un lien vers les règles du forum où il est spécifiquement indiqué que vous devez communiquer en anglais uniquement. https://www.arrmaforum.com/help/terms/

 

[Tigershark1956]

They do stand by their products. Unfortunately, the wires would come unsoldered for me where they connect internally to the lipo. It happened to like 3 times and I'm not the only one who has experienced that issue. They replaced 3 packs like that, but now I don't trust those batteries anymore.

Well, that sucks.. Just my own curiosity but were you running them hard for long periods?

 

[Gosraider]

Cher monsieur, en règle générale, nous vous demandons d'utiliser l'anglais sur ce forum. Je te l'ai déjà dit deux fois.

Au cas où vous auriez encore besoin d'un rappel, voici un lien vers les règles du forum où il est spécifiquement indiqué que vous devez communiquer en anglais uniquement. https://www.arrmaforum.com/help/terms/

J don't undurstand ?? J speak english on the forum !!!!

 

[arknotnoahs]

New to elec RC but have built up a bunch of different cars for me and son to play with (live in a lucky spot where able to build own cool race track). Playing with different battery brands so i have no pre-disposition / bias to any brand. I see maxamps comes up a lot on forums and in a very very negative manner - typcial comments are basically overpriced junk.

However since i work in a field that deals with independent testing for objective results, i kept searching to try to find such testing in RC world. I found this guy -

whose testing seems very robust, and shows maxamps pack tested extremely favourably.

I know from my field so much anecdotal evidence on forums is at odds with robust testing, and the robust testing is the true reflection of the products performance.

Wondering why there is so much hate for maxamps on every forum i find, yet very little (as in none) have ever referenced objective testing of RC battery performance.

Thinking of trying some maxamps for fun after seeing this guys testing, wondering if anyone knows of any other sites that do robust testing for battery performance and also Esc and motor performance? Again the comments on RC forums re batteries appear all over the place - one person treasure is another person puffed piece of crap. I prefer robustly obtained facts over anecdotes. To save a stack of googling do more experience RC peeps here have any sites to point me too? (and any more informed insight into the maxamps hate levels? )

 

[Mr.Duke]

I’ve switched almost all of my 4&6s lipos to CNHL G+Plus 70C 5000 & 6000mah packs this year.
The punch and super low IR per cell in every pack have been the best that I’ve seen in the hobby so far.
I still do have 1 pretty new PowerHobby 5200mah 75c 6s pack that I run in the rotation off road.

 

[slick2500]

New to elec RC but have built up a bunch of different cars for me and son to play with (live in a lucky spot where able to build own cool race track). Playing with different battery brands so i have no pre-disposition / bias to any brand. I see maxamps comes up a lot on forums and in a very very negative manner - typcial comments are basically overpriced junk.

However since i work in a field that deals with independent testing for objective results, i kept searching to try to find such testing in RC world. I found this guy -

whose testing seems very robust, and shows maxamps pack tested extremely favourably.

I know from my field so much anecdotal evidence on forums is at odds with robust testing, and the robust testing is the true reflection of the products performance.

Wondering why there is so much hate for maxamps on every forum i find, yet very little (as in none) have ever referenced objective testing of RC battery performance.

Thinking of trying some maxamps for fun after seeing this guys testing, wondering if anyone knows of any other sites that do robust testing for battery performance and also Esc and motor performance? Again the comments on RC forums re batteries appear all over the place - one person treasure is another person puffed piece of crap. I prefer robustly obtained facts over anecdotes. To save a stack of googling do more experience RC peeps here have any sites to point me too? (and any more informed insight into the maxamps hate levels? )

Maxamps get so much hate because their batteries are not worth what they charge for them.

This guy has been testing lipo batteries for nearly a decade and he had 2 Maxamps batteries that did not perform anywhere near their rated specs. There is a lot to read in that thread 800+ pages going back to 2012.
https://www.rcgroups.com/forums/showthread.php?1767093-Battery-Load-Test-Comparisons

I'm sorry but when a $50 lipo outperforms a $250 lipo that is going to be a hard pass for me.

C rates are the biggest lie in the rc industry. They are made up numbers that are used for marketing and guess what brand started this trend, Maxamps.

It's a lot to read but here is some information about c rates https://www.arrmaforum.com/threads/c-rates-what-is-the-deal.17174/

 

[arknotnoahs]

Maxamps get so much hate because their batteries are not worth what they charge for them.

This guy has been testing lipo batteries for nearly a decade and he had 2 Maxamps batteries that did not perform anywhere near their rated specs. There is a lot to read in that thread 800+ pages going back to 2012.
https://www.rcgroups.com/forums/showthread.php?1767093-Battery-Load-Test-Comparisons

I'm sorry but when a $50 lipo outperforms a $250 lipo that is going to be a hard pass for me.

C rates are the biggest lie in the rc industry. They are made up numbers that are used for marketing and guess what brand started this trend, Maxamps.

It's a lot to read but here is some information about c rates https://www.arrmaforum.com/threads/c-rates-what-is-the-deal.17174/

Thankyou slick 2500 for taking the time to help provide some good info and links to back it - will enjoy digging a bit more without randomly trawling through 100 forums. In my industry there is also one particular company that has taken marketing WAAAY too far and charge a lot for some terrible performing products - it may be that maxamps are the equivalent in the RC world. Wonder how they still survive with such universal hate on all forums!

But thanks again for taking the time to reply, when stepping into a brand new world of tinkering it helps a lot when much more experience peeps help direct to find out what is factual in X area vs just anecdotes which whilst have been very consistent re hate for maxamps have been, as is typical, all over the place in general with Turnigy the best bang for buck by one is turnigy are terrible all of mine puffed straight away to gensacearespammers are amazing to gensacearespammers had significantly less run time and puffed within a few cycles and just endless contradicting anecdotal experiences. Early days but so far i haven't found a generally accepted consensus on what is a top quality lipo at non robbery pricing. I only get snippits of time to google research as workload is mental so trying to find the most trusted & robust battering testing resource.

 

[arknotnoahs]

Thankyou slick 2500 for taking the time to help provide some good info and links to back it - will enjoy digging a bit more without randomly trawling through 100 forums. In my industry there is also one particular company that has taken marketing WAAAY too far and charge a lot for some terrible performing products - it may be that maxamps are the equivalent in the RC world. Wonder how they still survive with such universal hate on all forums!

But thanks again for taking the time to reply, when stepping into a brand new world of tinkering it helps a lot when much more experience peeps help direct to find out what is factual in X area vs just anecdotes which whilst have been very consistent re hate for maxamps have been, as is typical, all over the place in general with Turnigy the best bang for buck by one is turnigy are terrible all of mine puffed straight away to gensacearespammers are amazing to gensacearespammers had significantly less run time and puffed within a few cycles and just endless contradicting anecdotal experiences. Early days but so far i haven't found a generally accepted consensus on what is a top quality lipo at non robbery pricing. I only get snippits of time to google research as workload is mental so trying to find the most trusted & robust battering testing resource.

Ha - interesting, when i type "gensacearespammers" - it appears as such. When i hit save, it changes to gensacearespammers!! then when i hit edit, what i typed appears as normal with " gensacearespammers" appearing exactly as such, then hit save and it changes to gensacearespammers - wtf?!!

 

[arknotnoahs]

Ha - interesting, when i type "gensacearespammers" - it appears as such. When i hit save, it changes to gensacearespammers!! then when i hit edit, what i typed appears as normal with " gensacearespammers" appearing exactly as such, then hit save and it changes to gensacearespammers - wtf?!!

wow it does it again. I cant type (will try trick system). g.e.n.s / a.c.e with out being changed to gensacearespammers when i save!