Has anyone tried cr123 rechargeables? Do they work, or are they just bad news?

The work, but you have to realize they have about 50-60% of the mah of regular CR123s (~700-850 mah versus 1450-1550 for quality CR123s) and so won't last as long in heavy drain items like night vision and thermal. For example, a buddy of mine gets about 90 minutes use out of his thermal with the rechargeables but over 3 hours with the CR123s.

Note, you can find cheaper CR123s that have 1250-1300 mah, but they also have a shorter run time.

So, they aren't bad news, but they are a grand solution great savings either for serious hunters when you consider how often you may be needing to change batteries.

I use them for EDC single cell pocket flashlights and find they are quite useful in that regard.

I like the regular CR123 in my bark collars for my dogs. They last 1 year, the one I have that’s rechargeable lasts 2 weeks.

I totally agree. I tell people all the time, you can buy Energizer 123 batteries 50 at a time for $1.40/each delivered. (Batteryjunction.com) If your scope gets 3 hours on 2 batteries, that is less than $1/hr to run it. Running a scope for over 100-200 hours is very long time unless you're a serious hunter who's hunting long hours, multiple times a week. The gas it takes to drive to your hunting spot will cost way more than it does to run your scope all night on disposable CR123 batteries.

So are rechargablebles a bad thing? Not if you get good ones, have plenty of sets of them and are willing to keep them charged and rotated through etc. But for $1/hr, I'm buying disposables, throwing them away when they done and keep on rolling.

It's definitely a personal preference.

Jason

Absolutely!

Now, this is me on a soapbox, but the few folks that I know that run rechargeable CR123s in their thermals to save money, are sort of missing the boat on saving money. It is like building the Titanic and saving money by not installing enough lifeboats or buying a Ferarri and running it on the cheapest and lowest octane gas you can find. In the long run, it doesn't pay to cut corners on mission-critical gear.

If I am paying a few thousand dollars to buy a thermal scope, it just seems counter productive to ham-string its capabilities. Moreover, most of these folks aren't poor. They aren't balancing between feeding their family or buying CR123s. The battery expense is likely inconsequential to most folks overall hunting expenses.

Like you said, personal preference.