Lithium-ion battery dangers

flecc

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Don't want to be pedantic Flecc but I don't think weight saving was the issue with the Comet. It was a lack of understanding in the aircraft industry worldwide about metal fatigue in alloy.
That's the excuse one will find online and elsewhere John, but that is only a symptom, not the problem, which was corporate pride. How the chief designer and directors escaped prosecution for corpporate manslaughter I will never know.

The problem arose because for pride reasons they wanted to use the DH Ghost jet engine, the one they made which was used in the Vampire and Venom jet fighters originally. That meant using four, utterly ridiculous on so small an airliner as it was at that time, but unfortunately calculations showed that even that wasn't quite enough power. The answer decided on by the chief engineer (I can only recollect his first name of Sidney) was to use a lighter gauge of metal for the structure than ever used before and mount the engines in close coupled pairs inboard. The window design was unwise, but would probably not have been such a problem if a normal metal gauge had been used in the fusilage.

Of course after many crashes including totally fatal ones, they were completely grounded for redesign. Those later versions used normal metal gauges and the far more powerful replacement engines which should have been bought in the first place, but it was still a compromised design ending up with RAF Coastal Command and later as an AWACS. Now of course completely scrapped.

Like so many bad events from yesteryear, modern PR has whitewashed history, another classic example being the world's first major nuclear accident at Windrush where it's no longer possible to find a published correct account of just how bad it really was and how it was discovered. Today's history of that event is nothing but lies.
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Croxden

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History is written by the victors.
 

JohnCade

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That's the excuse one will find online and elsewhere John, but that is only a symptom, not the problem, which was corporate pride. How the chief designer and directors escaped prosecution for corpporate manslaughter I will never know.

The problem arose because for pride reasons they wanted to use the DH Ghost jet engine, the one they made which was used in the Vampire and Venom jet fighters originally. That meant using four, utterly ridiculous on so small an airliner, but unfortunately calculations showed that even that wasn't quite enough power. The answer decided on by the chief engineer (I can only recollect his first name of Sidney) was to use a lighter gauge of metal for the structure than ever used before and mount the engines in close coupled pairs inboard. The window design was unwise, but would probably not have been such a problem if a normal metal gauge had been used in the fusilage.

Of course after many crashes including totally fatal ones, they were completely grounded for redesign. Those later versions used normal metal gauges and the far more powerful replacement engines which should have been bought in the first place.

Like so many bad events from yesteryear, modern PR has whitewashed history, another classic example being the world's first major nuclear accident at Windrush where it's no longer possible to find a published correct account of just how bad it really was. Today's history of that is nothing but lies.
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Well they tested the structure to destruction before they discovered that it was metal fatigue, and the worldwide aero industry learned from it. The main lesson being to round off all edges to avoid small fatigue cracks from forming. Maintenance checks still involve checking carefully for cracks.

Not sure higher gauge alloy would have made any difference really. It was the window design that was the real issue. Sometimes the story which is generally accepted is the real one....

Windscale was always played down and covered up and only in more recent years was the extent of the accident revealed.
 

flecc

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Windscale was always played down and covered up and only in more recent years was the extent of the accident revealed.
But still only the extent. The fact that the plant continuously poured out radioactivity for at least five days and probably much longer is still not published. Nor is the truth about who found out, nor the truth about the government actions to deal with all the polluted livestock.

Similar dishonesty surrounds the Comet history, so I prefer to stick with what actually happened in the design stage as the fundamental cause, the outcomes being symptoms of poor design. The fact is that if they hadn't put pride first, the design would have been radically different for such a small plane. No doubt twin engined like it's rival the Caravelle, with those bought in suitable engines more sensibly mounted and the airframe using the normally accepted gauges instead of risk taking.
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mike killay

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I seem to remember the Belgian Post Office withdrawing ebikes after 3 or 4 fires, anybody know anything about this?
 

flecc

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Yes, here's a link which explains that a bikes left recharging overnight was said to be responsible for a fire. I think they used Heinzmann motors like the German post e-bikes, but not sure which batteries they had:

Belgian Post e-Bike Fires
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jonathan75

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Interesting - if as everyone is saying, charging is the nearest thing there is to a danger period, which amounts to a sort of heating-up of the battery, then at least two issues arise for me.

Firstly, how long ought one to leave after switching off the charger before leaving the battery unattended (i.e. leaving the house) in order to make sure that it's cooled without incident. Secondly, given some chargers will take 7 hours or more to charge the battery fully, does it damage the battery to unplug and leave it half-charged, and likewise does just plugging it in later and top it up? Do they prefer full-charging sessions to half-charging and topping-up?
 

flecc

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Lithium batteries are cyclic, so prefer recharging frequently with every use rather than emptying. Fully charging is not at all a problem now, since in the interests of long life the BMS design cuts the charge before the battery is actually full. For the same reason, the battery cutout at low state of charge when in use is similarly well short of empty. There is therefore a built in safety factor at both ends of charge state.

That's easy to do on today's efficient batteries while still leaving good range capability, but it may well be that a few years ago with less efficient cells the safety factors were not as generous at the full charge end.

To give some idea of the scale of change, below are two battery internals. The first is an old type battery with ten very large capacity cells, each of 10,000 mAh. The second is a modern battery typically of around fifty small cells of between 2,000 and 3,000 mAh each, those cells intrinsically safer. The modern BMS is also more efficient and reliable as a result of experience:

mainint.jpg

Kalkhoff BMZ Battery.jpg

For information, the first above is an early Phylion battery design from 8 years ago, the second is one of today's Kalkhoff-BMZ batteries for the Impulse unit.
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JohnCade

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But still only the extent. The fact that the plant continuously poured out radioactivity for at least five days and probably much longer is still not published. Nor is the truth about who found out, nor the truth about the government actions to deal with all the polluted livestock.

Similar dishonesty surrounds the Comet history, so I prefer to stick with what actually happened in the design stage as the fundamental cause, the outcomes being symptoms of poor design. The fact is that if they hadn't put pride first, the design would have been radically different for such a small plane. No doubt twin engined like it's rival the Caravelle, with those bought in suitable engines more sensibly mounted and the airframe using the normally accepted gauges instead of risk taking.
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I really don't know where you get this idea of pride dictating the design. As I recall the engines used were an interim measure since the Avon engines that were meant to go in it were not ready. They were fitted to the Mk 2 Comet a couple of years later. The alloys were thinner than usual and were glued as well as riveted. But this was an innovative design and no one had built a jet airliner before. So it was new untrodden ground and it's easy to be make critical judgments from sixty years on. Let's not forget it was as far ahead as Concorde in its day.

The revised aeroplanes after the lessons of the fatigue failures in the structure had been learned helped other designers to make safer high flying highly pressurised jet airliners. If it had never been built the Boeing 707 which took on board all the lessons learnt would have had the same problems. A point reiterated by one of the Boeing engineers in a TV programme many years ago.

Anyway it's a diversion from battery safety and I doubt we will agree about it.
 

flecc

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I really don't know where you get this idea of pride dictating the design.
It was a stated fact at the time that they wanted to use the Ghost engine for corporate reasons and that was the driving reason for the light metal and glued design. They could easily have swallowed their pride and used twin engines that were available from Pratt & Whitney and Rolls Royce in a more reasonable airframe design. Instead they compromised with four undersize engines in less efficient positions.

Clearly they would not have gone ahead with that four engine layout if they were contemplating buying externally at that design stage, so your contention that they were is clearly not the case. The small Avon engines were indeed designed to fit in those locations once the need was established.

It's not just here that our aviation industry produces nonsensical stories after the events, just one more example being Concorde and the story around it's design creation. Its French design as the Super Caravelle is concealed in this country to the extent that it was voted as Britain's greatest engineering achievement in a TV poll of viewers. We certainly played a big part in the production of the final enlarged design, but it could hardly be called just British.

The "e" on the end of Concorde reveals the truth of course, but perhaps you once again agree with the official (UK) version rather than the truth.
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D

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designs for gadgets likely had millions if not billions spent on researching and testing design safety and manufacturing-process design, whereas retail ebike batteries I suspect are often assembled in a small workshop and in small numbers where people buy in batteries (with provenance and quality sometimes difficult to guarantee), and BMSs which haven't had the kinds of investment in their original design and manufacture as goods designed for Western markets with genuine CE/other similar certification; and then those workshops, often one or two people, may fit them together themselves under who knows what conditions.
It isn't like that at all. I've dismantled and repaired many batteries from many suppliers. They all have BMSs with surface mount technology built by robots in mass production.

As I said before, no reports of normal batteries catching fire, so I would say your worrying about nothing. I leave my batteries on charge overnight, so the charger stays on for a long time after charging. The charger has a maximum voltage it can charge to that can't damage a battery with a working BMS. The BMS also cuts off the charging if any cell goes too high, so you have belt and braces.
 
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JohnCade

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It was a stated fact at the time that they wanted to use the Ghost engine for corporate reasons and that was the driving reason for the light metal and glued design. They could easily have swallowed their pride and used twin engines that were available from Pratt & Whitney and Rolls Royce in a more reasonable airframe design. Instead they compromised with four undersize engines in less efficient positions.

Clearly they would not have gone ahead with that four engine layout if they were contemplating buying externally at that design stage, so your contention that they were is clearly not the case. The small Avon engines were indeed designed to fit in those locations once the need was established.

It's not just here that our aviation industry produces nonsensical stories after the events, just one more example being Concorde and the story around it's design creation. Its French design as the Super Caravelle is concealed in this country to the extent that it was voted as Britain's greatest engineering achievement in a TV poll of viewers. We certainly played a big part in the production of the final enlarged design, but it could hardly be called just British.

The "e" on the end of Concorde reveals the truth of course, but perhaps you once again agree with the official (UK) version rather than the truth.
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Stated fact about the Comet engines by whom? Some disaffected pilot with an axe to grind who wrote a book perhaps?

Whose truth about Concorde? I've seen pictures of fifties prototypes of a supersonic airliner which looked just like what became Concorde with an e. Long before the French collaboration was formed in the sixties the research work was being done at Filton. The French insisted on being the first to fly it and sticking an e on the end because they're French...They gave us the word chauvinism.

Sorry to say but you are writing nonsense here.
 

flecc

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Sorry to say but you are writing nonsense here.
No John, it is you who are posting nonsense by repeating current inaccurate history. I'm posting what actually happened. Here is a report from an impeccable source including the early truth of what actually finally happened to the British supersonic project that was dropped in favour of the French design:

FLIGHT, 23 November 1961

AIR
COMMERCE
SUPERSONIC ENTENTE ?

ALTHOUGH no official comment is forthcoming, it is believed
that a Guardian report last week, to the effect that Sud-
Aviation will assume design leadership of a joint Anglo-French
supersonic airliner project, is substantially correct. The air correspondent of the newspaper says that the British design for a six engined long-haul M2.2 airliner "is now almost certain to be
dropped" and that two versions of the four-engined Sud design
will be developed instead. According to the report, design leadership will go to Sud under M Pierre Sartre.

It appears certain that no actual decision has yet been taken by
Mr Peter Thorneycroft, Minister of Aviation. Any such decision
would obviously be a political one, paving the way for a cementing
of a close technical working association that has existed between
BAC and Sud for some considerable time past. While both the
British and the French obviously recognize the advantages of a
joint supersonic airliner programme, the most delicate of all the
issues involved—and one which may well require a solution on a
political level—is the matter of design leadership. If The Guardian
report proves to be correct, French design leadership of an Anglo-
French supersonic airliner will represent a major change in British
policy. As the newspaper puts it: "the British Government has
been anxious to improve its European image; and Mr Thorneycroft
has found an apparently happy political and economic solution
in proposing that his two expensive children, space and supersonic airliners, should be the first offspring of the intended marriage."

Discussions between the French and British Governments and
manufacturers are at an early stage, and any joint project would
still be very much concerned with "feasibility." Both BAC and Sud
have been working on feasibility studies for their respective governments for the past year or so. Both studies have in common the M2.2 design parameter; but whereas the French design (typified by the Super Caravelle project, of which a model was shown at the Paris Salon last May) is a four-engined machine for medium ranges, the British design (which began as the Bristol 198 under Dr Russell, and which has become the BAC-198) is a six-engined project for North Atlantic operations. It seems logical to attempt to apply one basic airframe and propulsion system to both requirements.

It is likely that a joint project will be British-powered, either
by Bristol Siddeley—with an advanced Olympus—or by Rolls-
Royce. If the Bristol Siddeley engines are chosen, the propulsion
system would move forward as a joint SNECMA/Bristol Siddeley
effort, for the two firms have been partners since sleeve-valve days.

A vast amount of basic research and airframe development work
has been done in both countries, and it is believed that a great
deal of information has already been exchanged on a technical
level. There appears to be no doubt in either the French or British
industry that, notwithstanding the declared American intention
to proceed with a Mach 3 airliner, Mach 2.2 is the logical and
technically correct first step towards supersonic air transport.
Obviously, the immense cost of a supersonic airliner programme
—anything between £100m-£200m for the production of a prototype— would be shared by the two countries.

End of quote.

It was for this French design origin that France not only got their way on the name but also had the honour of making the first test flight, the first paying passenger flight, the first transatlantic flight and the final transatlantic flight. Not chauvinism, just recognition.
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jonathan75

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Sorry to say but you are writing nonsense here.
I think it's perhaps impossible to make an interesting historical claim or argument, like Flecc's, or yours, without it being one with which it's also entirely possible to legitimately disagree. The most interesting ones are sometimes the most controversial, and their being wrong in some aspect needn't mean that the analysis or arguments used to support them, or their conclusions etc aren't excellent.

But I wish people wouldn't use language like "you're writing nonsense here".
 
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JohnCade

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Flecc you started with an unsubstantiated completely wrong assertion about the Comet - went on to Windscale, which you wrote as Windrush and then on to Concorde. Where next? The errors in the design of the Titanic? I expect a little online research would turn up some easily regurgitated stuff if anyone could be bothered.

But I really can't. You seem knowledgeable about some things but this is not one of them. I don't want to be rude but when someone writes clear nonsense then I will tell them so. Just a small point to illustrate what I meant.

They could easily have swallowed their pride and used twin engines that were available from Pratt & Whitney
The idea of DH using Pratt and Whitney engines in the Comet.... P&R only started making jet engines in 1947 when they built RR engines under license. The Comet was started a year earlier....

Sorry but Life is too short to get into an expanding wrangle about life the universe and everything.
 

JohnCade

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I'm af
I think it's perhaps impossible to make an interesting historical claim or argument, like Flecc's, or yours, without it being one with which it's also entirely possible to legitimately disagree. The most interesting ones are sometimes the most controversial, and their being wrong in some aspect needn't mean that the analysis or arguments used to support them, or their conclusions etc aren't excellent.

But I wish people wouldn't use language like "you're writing nonsense here".
But he is so I'm afraid I have to write the truth.
 

jonathan75

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If you think telling someone that they are writing nonsense is rude you must have led a very sheltered life.
No actually rather the opposite of living a sheltered life. In the university in which I study, if one academic were to say to another in the same department, in front of other people, that they are writing nonsense, then it would be a serious insult to their honour and credentials, and be very undermining. If it was in private between the two of them that's a totally different matter, it could even be supportive. But not in public.