A Man Who does not mince his words.

[fredrussell]

I was once, very foolishly, angle-grinding some steel near a lead acid battery that was on charge in my shed. There was a big bang and case on battery shattered. No injuries but certainly taught me a lesson.

 

[shanemax]

The spirit of your opening sentence is equally applicable to a properly built and maintained LiFePO4 battery. To be able to repeatedly extract ~90% of a battery's energy without damaging the battery seems to be significant progress over conventional lead acid batteries. Is the technolgy perfect? No. Will it improve? Yes.

Have you seen the inside of a life po4 battery. The large size of the circuit board, the dozens and dozens of capacitors, resistors, semi conductors and chips, plus senses all waiting to go wrong and why does a simple 12 volt battery need all this, Its to stop it catching fire, over heating, gassing off or freezing. If this is what all you lovers of Lithium call progress you know where you can put it. Give me a tried and tested STAND ALONE lead acid every time. The sooner these Lithium ticking time bombs are replaced with new tech the better.

 

[Wansworth]

Indeed, I once set the back of my trousers alight with my pipe. In llfracombe as I recall.

This danger deserves wider publicity.

.

Won’t visit Ilfracombe

 

[shanemax]

I was once, very foolishly, angle-grinding some steel near a lead acid battery that was on charge in my shed. There was a big bang and case on battery shattered. No injuries but certainly taught me a lesson.

Angle grinding, Sparks, Battery on charge, The only thing missing was 5 litres of petrol, with the lid off, where you had just topped up your lawn mower.

 

[Porthandbuoy]

I remember back in the mid seventies when I worked in a nuclear power station. There were huge battery rooms containing enormous LA batteries of the type that went into submarines. One of my jobs was to maintain the hydrogen detectors. The first part of the job was to remove the rubber gloves surreptitious smokers had placed over the sensors, and in the winter turn the extraction fans back on which they'd turned off. One still winter's night, not a breath of wind, the door was blown off and the roof dislodged due to a build up of hydrogen being ignited by a labourer having a sly smoke. Amazingly, the batteries were okay despite the cases being made of glass. I don't know if the labourer was injured or not, but if he got away with nothing more than ruptured eardrums he was lucky.

 

[ducked]

For sailors who want to install LiFePO4 here is a report on the fire risk of LiFePO4 chemistry as used in battery. Anern is a global company that sells solar lighting and battery solutions. There is no doubt that they are selling their product but they give the reasons why the chemistry is safer than other Lothian ion batteries.

Do LiFePO4 Batteries Catch Fire? - Guangzhou Anern Energy Technology Co., Ltd.

"other Lothian ion batteries"?

Something to do with Irn Bru? Made Frae Gurdurs?

Think I might stick with lead poisoning for now.

 

[fredrussell]

Angle grinding, Sparks, Battery on charge, The only thing missing was 5 litres of petrol, with the lid off, where you had just topped up your lawn mower.

Indeed- I was a very silly man and was lucky not to be hurt. But there’s a few first hand examples of lead acid batteries going bang on this thread. Now it’s your turn. Care to provide a few examples of LiFePo batteries that have done the same?

 

[Biggles Wader]

And another battery bang story-----Many years ago (45?) I had an old Mini and after a longish drive it failed to start after a short break. I opened the boot to check for loose battery terminals and caused a spark. Bang went the battery. It had been overcharging due to a regulator fault. I got away with very minor acid splashes.

 

[Marsali_1]

Have you seen the inside of a life po4 battery. The large size of the circuit board, the dozens and dozens of capacitors, resistors, semi conductors and chips, plus senses all waiting to go wrong and why does a simple 12 volt battery need all this, Its to stop it catching fire, over heating, gassing off or freezing. If this is what all you lovers of Lithium call progress you know where you can put it. Give me a tried and tested STAND ALONE lead acid every time. The sooner these Lithium ticking time bombs are replaced with new tech the better.

I have. I respect that you have an opinion to which you are entitled as do I. I think we are diametrically opposite in view and likely will never meet in the middle

 

[[194497]]

Lithium batteries have soared in popularity for performance reasons, not "because of the green lobby" - specifically their energy density (amp hours capacity per kilo) and the nature of their charge and discharge capabilities.
Safety-wise one might compare them to petrol engines - a tank of petrol represents the business part of a very effective bomb, but we seem to have worked out how to manage the stuff.

 

[RunAgroundHard]

I quote Einstein, please Google if in doubt.
Any intelligent fool can make things more complex. Simplifying something complex requires a greater degree of intellectual effort and insight than making it more complicated.
I would say Lithium compared to LA
Is more complicated and complex so as other person said not progress

Perhaps you should have googled it and read what it says. That is not attributed to Einstein, nor is it applicable to the example you give.

“Any intelligent fool can make things bigger and more complex... It takes a touch of genius and a lot of courage to move in the opposite direction.”
― E.F. Schumacher from his book Small is Beautiful. The concept is partially technology and partial social construct, based around appropriation for the need, or society.

… advancing small, appropriate technologies, policies, and polities as a superior alternative to the mainstream ethos of "bigger is better". …

LiFePO4 is very much fits into this philosophy where small is beautiful. Instead of massive rows of lead acid batteries providing the required power, smaller, lighter, more durable batteries can provide the required power.

A good example of change where small is beautiful is the evolution of rotary power source, from human, to donkey, to water or wind, to steam, to internal combustion engine, to battery.

 

[billskip]

I have known two people who have had a lead acid battery explode in their faces

If you know me you know three...
I had one explode in my face, it dissappeard, the noise was deafening,in an instant the stuff on the workbench was bubbling, I stuck myself into the shower and after a short while my clothes were airtex
You don't want to go there......
Ps ...it was my own stupid fault.

 

[shanemax]

I have. I respect that you have an opinion to which you are entitled as do I. I think we are diametrically opposite in view and likely will never meet in the middle

Is it progress . If I open up a Lead battery its simplicity (zero battery management) and then I open up a Lithium, Total scary complexity, It tells you something is very wrong with the Lithium design to have so many safety features not needed in Lead. Open your eyes .

 

[lustyd]

I have never in my life heard of a hydrogen explosion from a LA battery

Yes you have, Paul Rainbow posts the photo all the time and you’ve certainly been on those threads.

I’m not sure why there’s such a concerted effort to keep posting misinformation about Lithium on this forum at the moment. Its lowering the usefulness of this great resource, and making the whole system untrustworthy for new users who may believe this bullshit.
For a while I thought this forum was immune to the sort of idiocracy that’s brewing in society, but apparently stupid is seeping into every crevice.

 

[lustyd]

Is it progress . If I open up a Lead battery its simplicity (zero battery management) and then I open up a Lithium, Total scary complexity, It tells you something is very wrong with the Lithium design to have so many safety features not needed in Lead. Open your eyes .

You don’t need to understand everything you use, what a pointless argument.
Lead is simple because it’s crappy old tech. Like a horse and cart, easy to understand but slow and inefficient. Modern cars are extremely complex and almost nobody could understand all of the systems. Same with lithium, more power, more reliable, longer life, better for the environment, lighter, better in every conceivable way.
But you don’t understand it so sure, let’s halt progress until you die.

 

[Momac]

I have never in my life heard of a hydrogen explosion from a LA battery.

I met someone who had a BMW. The lead acid battery which was under the rear seat had exploded. Amazingly no one was hurt . This was probably more than 25 years ago.
I have since known lead acid batteries become faulty and become very hot. This was on my own boat when I bought it and found the batteries were all duds and more recently on neighbouring boats on the pontoon where I keep my boat . To be fair they have not exploded but it seems to me quite common for a dud lead acid battery to become quite hazardous. I would say more of a hazard in a boat than a car unless the battery is under the back seat like the BMW I mentioned.

 

[seeSimon]

I was once, very foolishly, angle-grinding some steel near a lead acid battery that was on charge in my shed. There was a big bang and case on battery shattered. No injuries but certainly taught me a lesson.

I was present at a very similar accident on a small commercial vessel.
Crew grinding off rust on deck part of engine room vent, sparks dropped down the vent. Below was a small bank of LA batteries, some lazy twerp had left the cover off the battery box after checking fluids. BANG! Casings shattered, acid everywhere. Luckily no injuries.

 

[seeSimon]

Indeed, I once set the back of my trousers alight with my pipe. In llfracombe as I recall.

This danger deserves wider publicity.

.

Combining both battery and trouser fire related experiences.....how about this for a dit?

I once set light to the pocket of a pair of quite smart chinos, by pocketing both my (then new tech) BMWs fancy keys (they had some sort of contacts on their exterior, the dealer dropped them into a reader device to scan the cars data logger) , and a few small coins...short circuit.
BMW denied any possibility of a fault, and tried to blame fags/lighters/pipes etc but I was a non smoker, and had the burnt trousers as evidence! I recall a free service?

Ps. Not just any chinos either...MnS chinos

 

[ducked]

And another battery bang story-----Many years ago (45?) I had an old Mini and after a longish drive it failed to start after a short break. I opened the boot to check for loose battery terminals and caused a spark. Bang went the battery. It had been overcharging due to a regulator fault. I got away with very minor acid splashes.

I'd think mechanics leaving big massively conducting tools on top of or near battery's must be a relatively common source of dead-short accidents.

I've seen such careless tool placement in illustrations for maintenance articles, both amateur and pro, and have done it myself, though luckily without serious consequences.

Doesnt seem to be an inherent vulnerability of any particular battery technology, just a funtion of dense energy storage and operator carelessness, but perhaps lithium battery electrodes are better protected?

 

[ducked]

I once set light to the pocket of a pair of quite smart chinos,...
...BMW denied any possibility of a fault, and tried to blame fags/lighters/pipes etc but I was a non smoker, and had the burnt trousers as evidence! I recall a free service?

Ps. Not just any chinos either...MnS chinos

Manganese-Sulfur powered chinos are notorious in the trouser trade for inherent safety issues leading to autonomous runaway incidents and hydrogen sulfide release. A dead-end trouser technology dropped long ago by all the big boys.

They may no longer be legally sold in the United States (where they are officially pants) and are suspected of causing birth defects by The State of California.

You got The Wrong Trousers

This does not of course undermine the importance of Mn in existing established battery technologies, Lithium-ion-manganese-oxide (LMO) and Nickel-manganese-cobalt (NMC), or necessarily deny its potential to eventually provide higher energy-density alternatives to Lithium ion based batteries.

Manganese a substitute for lithium-ion batteries? – Manganese X Energy Corp.