Not Just Samsung? The Increasing Frequency Of Battery Fires (sltrib.com) 89
Dozens of aircraft fires have been caused by lithium batteries, and after 2013 Tesla even strengthened their battery shields after several of their cars caught on fire. An anonymous Slashdot reader quotes the AP:
Samsung's Note 7 isn't the only gadget to catch fire thanks to lithium-battery problems, which have afflicted everything from iPhones to Tesla cars to Boeing jetliners. Blame chemistry and the fact that the batteries we rely on for everyday life are prone to leaking and even bursting into flame if damaged, defective or exposed to excessive heat...
Still, lithium batteries are so ubiquitous that ordinary users of phones and computers shouldn't worry. Research suggests that you're more likely to get hurt by a kitchen grease fire or a drunk driver than the battery powering your iPhone, Kindle or laptop. "It's not like we live in a world where people's smartphones spontaneously combust," said Ramon Llamas, research manager of research firm IDC's mobile phones team. He said owners of Galaxy Note 7s should err on the side of caution and contact Samsung for a replacement that doesn't run the same risk.
The article also reports that hoverboards were linked to at least 99 electrical fires in America that were presumably caused by battery problems. "Amazon, Best Buy and other retailers dumped the products after videos of burning hoverboards went viral."
Still, lithium batteries are so ubiquitous that ordinary users of phones and computers shouldn't worry. Research suggests that you're more likely to get hurt by a kitchen grease fire or a drunk driver than the battery powering your iPhone, Kindle or laptop. "It's not like we live in a world where people's smartphones spontaneously combust," said Ramon Llamas, research manager of research firm IDC's mobile phones team. He said owners of Galaxy Note 7s should err on the side of caution and contact Samsung for a replacement that doesn't run the same risk.
The article also reports that hoverboards were linked to at least 99 electrical fires in America that were presumably caused by battery problems. "Amazon, Best Buy and other retailers dumped the products after videos of burning hoverboards went viral."
Asus had this problem (Score:3, Informative)
That's it, I'm switching to something safer (Score:2, Funny)
Like gasoline, or propane, or radioactive plutonium.
Re: That's it, I'm switching to something safer (Score:1)
You mean there's unradioactive plutonium too ?
excessive heat (Score:5, Insightful)
there is one critical thing about the excessive heat that is being left out, the batteries are generating the excessive heat. the basic issue is that if you exceed a certain rate of charge or discharge then your battery is going to go up in flames. this is why battery cells are rated for maximum charge and discharge rate. when companies ignore the charge/discharge ratings you end up with devices that are prone to combusting.
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Well Shakira get's around without bursting into flames, so the problem can be solved...
Yeah, it's the guys around her that catch on fire...
Re:excessive heat (Score:4, Insightful)
when companies ignore the charge/discharge ratings you end up with devices that are prone to combusting.
Except that few if any of these fires are caused by improper charging speeds. Nearly all product recall related fires have been due to quality control issues on the cells themselves, or faults in the circuit that overcharge individual cells in a pack, not due to engineering fault on the charging rate.
Especially since overdoing the rates of charges and discharges cause premature battery failure long before it causes batteries to catch fire.
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Given the number of lithium batteries in the world, the number of fires, and the quick recall, your statement is unfounded. Not only because of the rarity of events, but given the volumes of production when compared with the rarity of events, it probably truly is cheaper to simply replace all devices than to do many years of QC to catch such a rare event.
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This is 2016! Quality control was abandoned years ago in favor of lower cost and faster delivery times. Eating the cost for having to replace or rework stuff is considered cheaper than preventing bad things from happening, although it rarely is.
Sorry, but that might be an issue if all the batteries burst into flame, or even a majority of them.
Its actually a difficult task to pack that much energy into a tiny little battery, and while its possible to have QC issues, there is a whole lot of QC happening, or else the things wouldn't function at all.
We're so used to these little gadgets, that when we get a phone that's half as thin as the last one, but the battery lasts twice as long, we just say 'Kewl", and don't give a second thought to it, unt
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Excepting a Tesla, most battery powered devices are charged from current-limited sou
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there is one critical thing about the excessive heat that is being left out, the batteries are generating the excessive heat.
It all comes down to energy density. As customers demand long battery life, and marketing forces push thinner and lighter, we have largely accommodated them. But the margins between safe operation and a big problem become razr thin.
And the high energy density packed into a small space is just asking for trouble. It's a tribute to manufacturing that we've had a little trouble with battery fires as we have so far.
Unpossible (Score:2)
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This might explain why the smartphones are all crap. Their corners have been cut so many times that they almost look rounded to us.
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What will the resolution be? (Score:3)
I'm submitting from one of these. The question I have is am I trading a 1 in 50,000 chance of fire for a 1 in 1 chamce of crappy charging and low battery life. If the problem was an aggressive charge cycle the resolution might well ne to wimpify it.
Re: What will the resolution be? (Score:3)
Also, it needs a less fumblefingery keyboard.
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They said that only batteries from one of their two battery suppliers had problem, so I'm guessing the fix is to identify whether your battery is from that battery manufacturer or not. If not, it would come back as "no problem found", else they would replace it
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Lowest tender wins, everybody else loses. Just a fact of psychopathic capitalism and being able to claim bonuses and make money disappear prior to declaring bankruptcy as a result of all the damages and as a bonus claiming a golden parachute. The reward buying politicians for decades, those doing the buying basically get away with fraud and greed driven murder.
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They said that only batteries from one of their two battery suppliers had problem, so I'm guessing the fix is to identify whether your battery is from that battery manufacturer or not. If not, it would come back as "no problem found", else they would replace it with a battery from the other supplier while trying to find a third supplier to ensure that there aren't supply problems later.
So just unclip the battery and take a look. Oh wait...
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I'm gonna go out on a limb and predict that the solution will be to partition the two reactants in the battery chemistry with something more than a 24 micrometer separator [batteryuniversity.com]. Possibly even switch to a chemistry which doesn't require carrying around one of the reactants at all, and getting it from the air. You know, like
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The question I have is am I trading a 1 in 50,000 chance of fire
Are you? On day one the chance was 1 in infinity because there were no fires. Only 16 days later were down to the 1 in 50000. What happens in another 16 days? If this was guaranteed to randomly burst into flames sometime in the next year, would you consider returning it then? I wonder what your insurance company would think if your house burnt down as a result of a device you knew had a product recall notice out?
As for crappy charging and low battery life, you don't know that. You don't know the exact probl
Because it's not Apple (Score:3)
It's not Apple, so "ho hum, this has been happening to everyone more and more often".
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When it comes to batteries catching on fire, Apple's both a pioneer and a market leader
Maybe due to Increasing frequency Li-ion sales (Score:2)
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I think we need industry authorities to come to conclusion that the Lithium-Ion chemistry is too unstable and mandate the use of a safer option such as LiFePO4.
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Exactly. Increasing frequency does not mean increasing rate.
There are a lot more automobile-related deaths than there were 70 years ago, does that mean cars are less safe?
Energy density (Score:5, Insightful)
It's all about our expectations of energy density. Think about it: would you be surprised to hear that a small container of gasoline caught fire? Of course not, and the risks involved in a gas-powered phone are obvious. Modern batteries don't store as much energy per mass as gasoline -- not even close -- but as we push in that direction we shouldn't be surprised that they start behaving less like electronics and more like explosives.
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I was hoping someone else figured this one out. I explain to non-technical people all the time that it's not hard to store large amounts of energy in a small space, it's hard to keep that energy from being released all at once in a KB malfunction.
The smart ones ask what KB stands for. The really smart ones figure out it means "KaBoom" on their own.
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That's moronic. NiMH has about 2/3rds the energy density by volume (not weight) of Li-Ion batteries, and NiMH is about the most stable battery you can get, which won't explode or burn no matter how badly you abuse them. Similarly, LiFePo4 batteries are slightly less powerful than the more common Li-
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Nothing inherent about this (Score:2)
Lithium iron phosphate batteries have about the same energy density and yet they won't randomly explode or catch fire. You can shoot them, use them as bowling balls and Intentionally destroy them by massively over charging or pulling current down yet they are not going to explode or catch fire.
There is obvious still risk with stored energy. You could short a conductor and start a fire by resistive heating yet the assertion this is unavoidable "cuz energy density" is BS. Food in your fridge has a much hig
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It's not the same energy density, it's about half. This is workable for a car - although it wouldn't have Tesla like range or handling, but you'd get 600k miles before the batteries were under 80% capacity - but impractical for a competitive phone.
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It's not the same energy density, it's about half. This is workable for a car - although it wouldn't have Tesla like range or handling, but you'd get 600k miles before the batteries were under 80% capacity - but impractical for a competitive phone.
I think people are confusing weight with density. Yes the battery itself would weigh twice as much but wouldn't necessarily be any bigger.
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Per wikipedia, "Energy density is the amount of energy stored in a given system or region of space per unit volume or mass". So other people aren't confused, they are just choosing the more relevant of the 2 measures. The reason it's generally more relevant is because weight more directly determines the energy required to carry the energy storage medium. For phones, obviously both a heavier weight and a bigger size are disadvantages, and the ~1000 cycles you get from lithium-cobalt is close to the ~3 yea
Electronic Recycling Company battery fire epidemic (Score:4, Interesting)
I manage an electronics recycling company. We are all hand disassembly, but even we have seen lithium battery fires. The companies which switched to shredding (to reduce labor costs) have had a serious and growing problem with fires from charged lithium batteries exposed to oxygen.
We use this youtube video for staff training
https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]
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Tesla? Really? (Score:4, Insightful)
Isn't it a bit disingenious to lump a whole lot of unprovoked fires started during standard normal operation of a device in with Tesla having major accidents? I mean every time we hear of a Tesla fire it's after the car got airborne, flew through a brick wall, and impaled itself on road debris. It's like lumping deaths due to mobster killings in with death due to medical conditions.
Halt and catch fire (Score:2)
For real!
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I couldn't find any statistics or news articles providing a figure for battery related deaths or injuries, but I suspect it's not as many, though I have heard multiple stories about batteries in electronic cigarettes causing injuries, though it's believed
Because it's Summer? (Score:2)
...apparently not [google.com], but it looks like Christmas might have something to do with it.
RECALL JESUS.
They are NOT hoverboards (Score:3)
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Sure. Just as soon as you stop calling cars by animal names... It's not a mustang, not a jaguar, not a ram, not a cougar. None of those animals have cup-holders. It's false-advertising!
The real issue keeps being ignored (Score:2)
I woke up to a Lithium Ion battery fire (Score:2)
About six weeks ago I woke up to a fire started by a lithium-ion battery. It was pure luck I woke up because I had disconnected the smoke detector while seasoning cast iron cookware the evening before and hadn't yet reconnected it.
It was a cheap chinese LED camping lantern with an integrated USB charger. I had it charging and went to bed. I woke up and put the fire out, and put the hot melty charred items in the freshly-seasoned cast iron skillet and let it cool off. Once it was cool enough I started disass
Re: I woke up to a Lithium Ion battery fire (Score:1)
Li-ion cells are inherently hazardous because they're not safe to be used without a working cut-out and even then can catch fire when damaged. How many of these fires are down to dodgy remanufacturing practices like those you describe and how many to imperfect quality control when the cells were first made? How often do properly made Li-ion cells catch fire?
Lipos are dangerous. But they are also tough. (Score:2)
I strap propellers to 1300mah lipos and drain them at rates exceeding 100amps. I will drain said Lipo in approximately 180 seconds. Sometimes less. And when they land they are often exceeding 60c.
Not only that but I will often slam them into hard surfaces, trees, rocks, or pieces of plastic that are rotating at 30,000 rpm +. Despite this I have yet to have a single one spontaneously go up in flames. I have seen the after effects of over charging lipos when people decided to charge them to too high a vo
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You may be using LFP batteries, which are much safer and support much greater loads than the LCO batteries found in phones.
The downside is that they have about half the energy density.
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I'm honestly not sure. They are always referred to as Lithium Poly. Claimed power density is 0.15-0.17kw/kg. They are 4 cells in parallel and operate at 16v
http://www.hobbyking.com/hobby... [hobbyking.com]
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Your batteries seem to weight about twice as much as my cell phone batteries per Wh. They are however much, much more powerful.
It seems to match a phosphate or manganese chemistry rather than the more common and more energy dense cobalt. I am no expert though.
See : http://batteryuniversity.com/l... [batteryuniversity.com]
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They are also a lot larger. I don't know what the internal chemistry of them is.
I do know though if you puncture them they will burn, especially when they are fully charged.
The real risk comes though when people charge them the wrong way.