Battery Life For New Vapers
I’m asked quite a lot about battery life…”How long will that eGo 650mAh last me between charges?” It’s a great question, obviously…and one that depends on a few variables. However, certain aspects are immutable. So let’s take a look at this question and see what we come up with, shall we? This may get a little technical, but don’t worry…it’s not so hard and afterwards you’ll be able to easily figure out all kinds of useful info about your devices!
For the sake of this example, I’m going to use a standard eGo type 650mAh battery as our reference. I have a bunch of these battery types lying around, and I’ve metered most of them at about 3.4 volts, even though they are rated at 3.3v; so I’m going to go with the manufacturers claim of 3.3 volts. In addition, I’m going to use a Kanger T3 as a load for the battery. A standard resistance T3 is approximately 2.5 ohms, so we’ll use that figure.
Next we need to know what 650mAh (milliAmphour) actually means. Essentially it means that, if you have a load applied to a battery and hit the switch, it will deliver up to 650 milliAmps of current for one hour. So…what is the amount of current our example setup will really deliver and for how long?
Using Ohm’s Law (where in a direct current circuit the current draw is equal to voltage divided by resistance), we can calculate that a 3.3 volt battery with a 2.5 ohm load will draw about 1.32 amps (or 1320 millAmps) of current. So, since our battery is rated to deliver 650milliAmps amps of current for one hour, we can simply divide 650 mA by 1320 mA to determine the amount of time our eGo can deliver that amount of juice. In this case it’s about 0.49 of an hour, or about 29 minutes.
Now for the variables part. To turn that 29 minutes into a useful indicator of vaping time, we need to know a couple of things; one is how long are your “toots” (nod to Nick “Grimm”Green) and how many of ‘em do you suck down? So let’s just use my typical vape pace as an example; you can plug your own figures in here for your own situation.
When I vape, I tend to have the button pressed for about 5 seconds for each blast. I also tend, on average, to take about 40 draws an hour. So every hour I’m “using” 3 minutes and 20 seconds of my original 29 minutes (5*40=200, 200/60=3.3). With this handy-dandy bit o’ knowledge, I can determine that, on a fully charged battery, I’m golden for about 8 hours (29/3.3). Now, if you do the math, you’ll see that the figure is actually 8 hours and 46 minutes; however the eGo will shut down before the current supply is fully depleted to protect the battery from being fully drained.
So there you go…if you vape at my pace with my type of setup, you can get about 8 hours from a charge on an eGo 650mAh. Note, however, that after some period of time that will change as the battery ages. After a few months, that 650mAh may become 475mAh and less as it gets “older”).
You can figure out your battery “life” regardless of the battery if you know the voltage of the battery and the resistance of the device you’re using by plugging your figures into the above equations. Have fun!
Hmm. That is interesting
good article! Thanks!
good articl and it made me think a lot on my battery and how best to care for it as well
thanks for this info, i had never had this explained this way before and didn’t really understand how mah affect battery life… i was thinking that what i was told was wrong, and it’s not, it just wasn’t clear from what i was told…
Another great article that would’ve helped if i REALLY needed to pinch my pennies when I started vaping… But a 1100mah did me as a heavy smoker, now heavy vaper pretty good. Wasn’t good enough, so I got another one.. now I am definitely set.
And thanks so much. Full if info
I don’t remember putting that last comment.
650mah only lasted maybe four hours when I first started vaping. I also vaped a lot more when i first quit smoking analogs as well. Now I dont vape as much but I also upgraded to bigger bats like 18650 devices and 1100 mah Ego batts. Those will last me a day or even two.
6 hrs fo sho
Very well explained Abby, great job as always!
sorry slap! Had it in my mind it was from Abby by the time I hit submit.
Heck, if I’m gonna be confused with anybody, Abby’s a good one.
This is really helpful. I’ll pass this along to the curious.
Thanks for the article! I like knowing how this stuff works and not having to just guess at it!
the way i was told was that 650mah meant if it didn’t have a shut off or burn out, it would theoretically run for about 6.5hours nonstop… and i wasn’t getting anything close to that out of what i was using, this explanation is a lot more realistic…
Ego battery only lasted me a couple hours of vaping. I quickly moved into mods for that reason.
Yeah…some eGo batteries rather quickly loose their ability to maintain their mAh capability. I’ve had one that’s a year old that started as 1000mAh and will still suck up 800mAh; another one — same brand, bought the same day from the same vendor…was dead in 6 months. Go figure.
I really like this post. I actually referred to it today at work. Comes in quite handy!
Excellent explanation Slap, thanks.
Thanks for the info. I think that I have the hardest time understanding the mah, ohms, resistance, volts, etc. All I know is when I use my tank on my twist, my battery is dead in less than an hour! I think the cartridge in it is not the right ohms. Or something. And one of the K2 I bought is rated at 2.5 ohms, and it won’t even work on my eGo C. So maybe it’s bad as well? I’m not having the best vaping experience, that’s for sure. I bought a new clearomizer, and it snapped the tip off when I dropped it… so I think it’s murphys law that works for me…
My wife has a Bam coming. I wonder what the battery like on a 26650 battery is. Great information here. thanks.
You made alot of great points about battery life that us new vapers should know.
on another point, i took just 1 650mah ego battery on a road trip, forgot a charger, and it lasted me 2 days, and i vape a lot while driving. So, this can show that we are all VERY different
3 Months vaping and I never knew what my battery can last…. Very informative.
Awesome, Awesome information slap. Good stuff!
The bigger the better
Thanks for the tip slap.
ALthough I knew the math, I’ve never really tried to figure out how much I vape. I guess it was a part of my smoking addiction where I never really wanted to face how much I smoked.
I guess I could spend a few days with a stopwatch and click it on and off every time I vape to get me an idea.
its always good to hear of ways to save battery life and get the most out of your battery.
awesome stuff, thanks for the lesson now i gotta do the math and see how long i’l last on my 900 mah battery at 3.7 volts
Great things I didn’t know. Thank you. Now I have to get a vv device. As soon as I can, I will.
Great information!
Wish I had found this site before i learned so much the hard and expensive way that is some great info my friend.
Glad to be of assistance. Batteries are the most important part of our vape gear!
Great article here! You mixed two things I love which are vaping and math! Lots of fun here!!!
Some great info!