TEMU/Dirt cheap EBAY vendors - are they for real?

[Zork Arg]

VERY new user - After looking at an Ebay seller of raw cells, and some ads by TEMU, I find it hard to take them seriously. If I trusted them, I would be shoving money at them because of the low prices. Mine is a very low budget operation, so I'm looking for a low price point, but I don't want to be taken as a sucker, either. Has anyone had any dealings with them?

 

[robbob2112]

Remember if it seems to good to be true, it is.

There are several reports of folks with batteries super cheap from those sources....QR codes sanded off and tampered with cells that never arrive or that are far under the supposed capacity. No report paperwork with the cells, or the same report for all the cells... etc

 

[homeshow]

I'd really like some Temu customers to chime in on this.

 

[Q-Dog]

Who do you deal with if you need support or have a failure?

 

[Zork Arg]

Who do you deal with if you need support or have a failure?

Good point... my Mandarin is pretty non-existent

 

[homeshow]

Good point... my Mandarin is pretty non-existent

Dim sum, lo mein,

 

[JWLV]

Dim sum, lo mein,

Yea...That's not Mandarin.

 

[JWLV]

I shop on Temu once in a while. Many things are good and cheap. The only thing solar I would buy from Temu are those garden lights. I would advise to stay away from any DIY solar gear. For example, some of the solar panels or solar kits are wildly exaggerated. It's similar to Wish. They have 500W or 1000W kits that cost $80. You look at the picture and it's a large flexible panel. First of all, they don't make flex panels that big. The largest single flex panel I've ever come across is 50W. There might be 100W but I have never seen one. The higher wattage ones are always smaller panels that are folded. For example, they connect five 50W panels folded together to make 250W. There are other outrageous claims such as a 200A MPPT controller when the picture clearly shows it's a tiny 10A PWM with USB ports. When it comes to DIY solar gear, there's sort of a standard price that you can expect. If someone is selling it for 10% or 25% of that price, you know it's a scam. Think of it this way. You know that an iPhone 15 is pricey at upwards of $1000. Different places might sell it at slightly different prices. But when you see a brand new iPhone 15 for $150, what's your first reaction? Buy buy buy or run run run!!!