Don't park near an EV!

QUOTE: A lithium-ion battery fire has destroyed five cars, including a luxury vehicle, at Sydney airport overnight.

Firefighters were called to a parking lot on Airport Drive in Mascot after flames “engulfed” a luxury electric car and spread to four other vehicles at 8.30pm on Monday.

The radiant heat from the fierce blaze gutted all five vehicles and left sections of the cars melted in the carpark.

https://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/breaking-news/carpark-fire-caused-by-lithiumion-battery-destroys-five-cars-at-sydney-airport...

I work in a highrise building and whilst electric cars are permitted to be parked there, recharging is banned and a few years ago I went around and put keyswitches on all the GPOs in the car park to make sure tenants were not helping themselves to power against the no charging policy.

There was the usual grizzling and moaning from the entitled owners but it all fell on deaf ears and for good reason. Lithium-cobalt batteries do not need a reason to blow up. Sometimes they just do it. The fires cannot be put out with water and the firefighters will simply turn their attention to protecting neighbouring property.

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A valve a day keeps the transistor away...

Been a few fires with Ebikes and scooters as well. Always when charging my E mountain bike put the battery outside on a metal surface just in case.

It has always been caveat actor when charging batteries. The location has always been of significance. I have even seen lead acid SLA batteries in vehicles catch fire due to a malfunction in the charging system.

I have a UPS from a prominent purveyor of parts. Its predecessor destroyed two sets of batteries. In both cases a cell failed and one of the two batteries went to ten volts after dropping a cell. That caused the seemingly current un-regulated to go full bore and cook the batteries in both cases. There is no backup circuit (thermal fuse) to kill it in such circumstances.

The potential for fire & acid damage and self destruction is obvious and it and anything like it should be banned. You cannot trust it to be left on permanently.

I did see a report that an American Uni had worked out why some are self destructing: Its actually fast charging. We already know that fast charging has ramifications but instant gratification applies above all else. One of my home built "No breaks" has a Barretter in its charging circuit as a current limiter: Charger circuit cannot overload. There is a fuse.

From what I have gleaned; Fast charging of the automotive motive storage batteries (SLA is not motive storage) (CCA is not applicable to a motive storage battery). What apparently happens is that these batteries have some sort of Ceramic dielectric. By fast charging the heat & stress cracks it.

Those cracks allow metal dendrites to form: These in turn, being conductive, short & then all hell breaks loose. There are hundreds of Kilo Watts of energy involved.

According to one US Fire Dept. It takes 43 minutes and water 600 us gallons per minute, to tame it: So much for pollution benefits. I looks like these motive storage batteries should be charges on a bunded pad with a deluge system & six car widths away from anything that can be set fire to.

It is becoming clear that anything purporting to save the planet, is more dangerous to it than anything it replaced.

It poses an interesting question - what do the tunnel operators in the three eastern capitals do when an electric car catches fire? Road tunnels rely on only two things to stop fire spreading - water and huge exhaust fans. Both are proven to be effective for oil based fires but what about a 15,000 volt lithium cobalt battery? It's something I have never head discussed and there are tunnels being built all the time.Not including the WestConnex juggernaut, Sydney has seven that I can think of, ranging from 2km up to 9km. WestConnex is 22km and will one day form a part of a tunnel network indepentent of the other seven tunnels. With something like 40km pf tunnels now in use with more on the way, it is a subject that needs discussing.

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A valve a day keeps the transistor away...

"Don't mention the fires!"

I have NEVER heard a news report on the ABC about lithium battery fires.

The ABC only publishes what fits its agenda these days.

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A valve a day keeps the transistor away...

There is a lot you will not hear on ABC truth is one, balanced reporting second, and a woke agenda third. What they are supposed to be reporting no longer exists. They were also largely responsible for backing Chinese influence in the Pacific & Oceania by willfully killing Radio Australia. Not everyone in the world has internet, etc and rely on radio.

I note the retirement of Ita; who I see as only drawing a salary and was another Nero, watching it all go up in smoke.

QUOTE: I did see a report that an American Uni had worked out why some are self destructing: Its actually fast charging.

I've modified 5V wall warts with USB outlets on them to tell my iPhone 12 to charge at half the usual rate. Thus drawing a half amp instead of 1A. I figure it's easier on the battery. What you do in this mod is to make a resistive voltage divider to produce 2V. 22K to ground and 33K to +5V. You connect this 2V to the signal pins of the USB connector (the ones in the middle, the ones that feed the green and the white wires).

See https://www.instructables.com/Modify-a-cheap-USB-charger-to-feed-an-iPod-iPhone/

I don't know of a battery chemistry where fast charging is ideal and as far as I know it is always a bad thing to do. It's no different to treating a heatstroke victim by telling them to drink several litres of chilled water in a few seconds. It would likely kill them, just as fast charging will kill a battery.

Electric car proponents constantly scream "you can charge to 80% in 30 minutes!" but they never conveniently mention that a petrol car can be filled from 0 to 100% in three minutes and the fuel tank will last the full service life of the car and ultimately, that is what a battery is - a fuel tank, not a fuel.

Meanwhile, replacing a high tension battery in an electric car will still cost $20,000 in round figures, effectively making the resale value of any electric car zero. Then there are the fires.

On that note, two electric cars and more than two dozen electric bikes and scooters have spontaneously combusted in the last three weeks in NSW alone.

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A valve a day keeps the transistor away...

Clearly battery technology has not advanced at the same rate as 'renewable energy'.

I would have thought the multinational corporate giants would address this before pushing their 'clean energy' products, and I am astounded at our totally useless politicians for allowing this.

Another one:

QUOTE:
January 5, 2024 - 1:55PM

An e-bike factory has been destroyed after a huge fire broke out in an Inner-Western Sydney warehouse on Friday morning, just metres away from homes.

More than 60 firefighters and 15 fire trucks rushed to a two-storey warehouse on Elizabeth Street in Croydon just before 5am to contain the blaze.

Fire and Rescue NSW Superintendent Joshua Turner said the warehouse was used to repair electric bikes, which contain highly volatile lithium batteries.

“Crews found it was an e-bike repair centre so the risk of lithium batteries and storage units of electricity was their primary concern,” he told the ABC.

“Lithium batteries maintain a high level of heat when they’re on fire, and they don’t go out as easily as other fuel sources.”

Firefighter crews spent more than two hours battling the fire from the exterior of the warehouse amid concerns parts of the structure would collapse.

-- News.com


And another one:

QUOTE: January 19, 2024 — 1.21pm


An e-bike battery left on charge overnight has sparked a destructive blaze in a North Bondi unit, forcing the residents to jump out of the windows to escape with their lives.

The fire was extinguished and no one was hurt, but the travellers lost everything, including their passports, banking information and phones, Fire and Rescue NSW spokesman Adam Dewberry said.

. . .

Investigators were quick to comb the unit after the blaze was extinguished and quickly determined a faulty lithium-ion battery was to blame.

Dewberry said the residents had hired the e-bike to get around and had left the battery on charge while they slept.

“Don’t charge them when you’re asleep. You don’t smell smoke when you’re asleep, and we’ve had a couple of events now with lucky escapes and the battery has failed and caught fire while the residents were asleep,” Dewberry said.

“Our advice is just don’t do it, and make sure you have working smoke alarms.”

--- SMH

If the report was right, it is the fast chargers that are doing the damage and we all know, or should know that the heat generated, fast charging, does not do most batteries any favours. In the Lithium battery it cracks the ceramic type dielectric, dendrites for in the cracks and that's the spectacular end of that battery.

Unfortunately in matchboxes if there is no outside, unless there is some form of balcony to charge these things on, in a place where on malfunction it can't set something alight.

It is getting to the point where a specified number of batteries have to be stored and / or charged in bunded areas. It will get to the point where on the purchase of an EV like the fire, insurance will go through the roof.

Now on pollies. If we introduce AI into the current parliaments & bureaucracies, that would be the only detectable intelligence present.

It's all due to the use of battery packs with no, or badly designed, integrated BMS (Battery Management System).

A proper BMS adds maybe 10% to the cost of the battery. Leaving it out is inexcusable.