Lithion-Ion battery packs from China

[Brian Roth]

One of my good friends here (15 years younger) is quite the outdoors man and kind of a survivalist when he goes fishing, etc. He has small solar panels to recharge his stash of batteries etc. He will venture out into the "wilds" for days at a time.

Recently, he brought me one of his Chinese Li battery packs housed in a molded plastic shell to ask me if he could use some of my 3M electrician tape to "close" the plastic pack which had expanded and was splitting the plastic case open.

I told Kevin to GET RID OF THAT IMMEDIATELY because the innards were breaking the outer plastic shell. Maybe I'm paranoid, but have heard of many of those Chinese Li packs catching on fire/exploding.

Not sure what he did with it, but no longer in the house!

Bri

 

[JohnRoberts]

Danger will robinson...

JR

 

[crazydoc]

I don't qualify for an activated smartphone (not smart enough), but my daughter gave me her old iPhone 4s years ago (that I used as a pocketable camera - f/8 and be there). Last year I noticed it was buldging out of its housing because the battery was expanding - oops! I was going to buy a new battery, but she gave me her old iPhone 5s which I've used since.

A friend of mine, an EE, says he never charges any devices at night while he's asleep.

 

[JohnRoberts]

Good advice.

My brother (the smart one) who flips his wife's Tesla every few years so she can use the HOV lane for commuting in SOCAL, charges his EV outdoors. The tesla charger is mounted on the inside of an exterior wall. Decades ago he worked on new battery technology while at GE in England, so he knows a little about it.

JR